“As above, so below.” If you’ve encountered any New Age philosophy, you may have seen this statement. I’m pretty sure I’ve even seen it on a bumper sticker. Sometimes you might see an expanded version, too: “As above, so below; as within, so without.” The basic idea is that everything in the world is connected and that therefore, actions in one realm (say, “below,” e.g. earth) are reflected elsewhere (“above,” e.g. the heavens).

Guess what? This comes from historical alchemy! Or, more accurately, the quote is translated from an ancient text credited with kicking off the study of alchemy. A long time ago on this blog I talked about Hermes Trismegistus, the historical/mythological Egyptian who, to the Greeks, was the father of alchemy. Among other things, Hermes is supposed to have written the Emerald Tablet, which discusses the mysteries of how the world works.

I was surprised to discover how short this fount of knowledge is! Here it is, in its entirety:

In truth, without deceit, certain, and most veritable.

That which is Below corresponds to that which is Above, and that which is Above corresponds to that which is Below, to accomplish the miracles of the One Thing.

And just as all things have come from this One thing, through the meditation of One Mind, so do all created things originate from this One Thing, through Transformation.

Its father is the Sun; its mother the moon.

The Wind carries it in its belly; its nurse is the Earth.

It is the origin of All, the consecration of the Universe.

Its inherent Strength is perfected, if it is turned into Earth.

Separate the Earth from Fire, the Subtle from the Gross, gently and with great Ingenuity.

It rises from Earth to heaven and descend again to Earth, thereby combining within Itself the powers of both the Above and the Below.

Thus will you obtain the Glory of the Whole Universe. All Obscurity will be clear to you. This is the greatest Force of all powers, because it overcomes every Subtle thing and penetrates every Solid thing.

In this way was the Universe created. From this come many wondrous Applications, because this is the Pattern.

Therefore am I called Thrice Greatest Hermes, having all three parts of the wisdom of the Whole Universe. Herein have I completely explained the Operation of the Sun.

The Emerald tablet of hermes

There are about a million translations and variations of this text; I’ve used one from a book I’ll cite below. I put some of the sections that struck me in bold. The first time I read this text, I got to the end where he says “I have completely explained everything!” and I thought, huh? where’d you do that? 😀 The explanation, presumably, is in the bit about Sun, Earth, elements and so on. That kind of language is typical of old alchemical texts. But in the bits saying “all will become clear” and “this is the pattern,” I can really see how early alchemists would have become preoccupied with creating gold and trying to turn the middle part of the tablet into a scientific process. Sure, there were charlatans who wanted to get rich, but most historical alchemists seemed more focused on figuring out the grand “Pattern.”

Speaking of multiple translations of the Tablet, I almost included one from Isaac Newton today! Maybe we’ll talk about his interest in alchemy next week. 🙂

Source for Text:

Trismegistus, Hermes. The Emerald Tablet of Hermes. Merchant Books, 2013. (This is a tiny book, more like a pamphlet, which contains a dozen different translations or possible versions of the Tablet. I’m a little annoyed that they insist the author is Hermes Trismesgistus and don’t even include an editor’s name, but it’s a neat starting point for research.)