3

HERMES’ TOMB

WHAT WE HAVE SAID about certain ‘pseudo-initiatic’ enterprises makes it easy to understand the reasons why we are very little inclined to address questions more or less directly touching upon the ancient Egyptian tradition. On this subject we can even add that the very fact that present-day Egyptians do not in any way preoccupy themselves with research concerning this vanished civilization should suffice to show that from the point of view that interests us there is no effective benefit in doing so. If it were otherwise, it is quite obvious that they would not have allowed it to be as it were abandoned to the monopoly of foreigners, who in any case have never made it anything more than a matter of erudition. The truth is that between ancient Egypt and present-day Egypt there is no more than a geographical coincidence without the slightest historical continuity; thus the tradition in question is even more completely foreign in the country where it formerly existed than is Druidism for the peoples now inhabiting the ancient Celtic countries; and the fact that many more of its monuments still stand changes nothing in this respect. We insist on clarifying this point once and for all in order to cut short all the illusions entertained only too easily on this subject by those who have never had occasion to examine things more closely; and at the same time, this statement will destroy yet more completely the claims of ‘pseudo-initiates’ who, while relying on the evidence of ancient Egypt, would like to give us to understand that they are connected with something that still subsists in Egypt itself. Moreover, we know that this is not a purely imaginary supposition, and that some, counting on general ignorance, in which, unfortunately, they are not altogether wrong, push their claims to this point.

However, in spite of all this, it so happens that we find ourselves almost obliged to give, insofar as it is possible, some explanations that have lately been asked of us from different quarters as a result of the unbelievable multiplication of certain fantastic stories to which we have been obliged to refer while reviewing the books to which we were alluding just now. Moreover, it must be said that these explanations will not really relate to the Egyptian tradition itself but only to what relates to it in the Arabic tradition. There are at least some rather curious indications that can perhaps contribute in spite of everything to clarifying certain obscure points, although we do not at all intend to exaggerate the importance of the conclusions it is possible to draw from them. We have pointed out previously that no one really knows what purpose the Great Pyramid served, and we could say the same thing of the pyramids in general. It is true that the most common and widespread opinion is that they were tombs; and doubtless there is nothing impossible in this hypothesis itself. But we also know that because of certain preconceived ideas modern archeologists are resolved to discover tombs everywhere, even where there has never been the slightest trace of them, and this is not without arousing in us some suspicion. In any case, they have yet to find a tomb in the Great Pyramid; but even if one were discovered, the enigma would still not be entirely resolved, for this would obviously not exclude its having other uses at the same time, perhaps even more important ones, just as could other Pyramids that have in fact served as tombs; and it is further possible that, as some have thought, the funerary use of these monuments was a more or less late development, and that this was not their original purpose at the time of their construction. If, however, one objects to this that certain ancient information of a more or less traditional character would seem to confirm that they were really tombs, we will say something which may seem strange at first glance but which is precisely what the considerations to follow will tend to make one admit: are not the tombs in question to be understood in a purely symbolic sense? Indeed, some say that the Great Pyramid might be the tomb of Idris, that is, of the prophet Enoch, while the second Pyramid would be that of another personage who would have been his Master, and of whom we will speak again; but, presented in this way and taken in a literal sense, the thing is manifestly absurd since Enoch did not die but was taken up living to Heaven; how then could he have a tomb? One should not, however, be too hasty to speak here in the Western manner of baseless 'legends', for here is the explanation given: it is not Idris' body which was buried in the Pyramid, but his science; by this some understand his books, but what likelihood is there that the books were purely and simply buried, and what interest could this have presented from any point of view?^[1] It would assuredly be much more plausible that the contents of these books should have been carved in hieroglyphics on the inside of the monument; but unfortunately for such a supposition there are in fact neither inscriptions nor symbolic figurations of any kind to be found in the Great Pyramid.^[2] Therefore there remains only one acceptable hypothesis, which is that Idris' science is indeed hidden in the Pyramid, but that it is embedded in its very structure, in its outer and inner arrangement and in its proportions; and everything that may be valid in the 'discoveries' that moderns have made or think they have made on this subject represent in the final analysis only a few minute fragments of this ancient traditional science. This interpretation agrees quite well moreover with another Arab version of the Pyramids' origin, which attributes their construction to the antediluvian king Surid, who having been warned in a dream of the imminence of the Deluge had the Pyramids built according to the plan of the sages, and ordered the priests to place in them the secrets of their sciences and the precepts of their wisdom. Now we know that Enoch or Idris, also antediluvian, is identified with Hermes or Thoth, who represents the source from which the Egyptian priesthood held its knowledge, and so by extension this priesthood itself as the continuator of the same function of traditional teaching. It is thus always the same sacred science which in this way too would have been placed in the Pyramids.^[3] On the other hand, this monument destined to assure the preservation of traditional knowledge in anticipation of the cataclysm, recalls yet another well-known story, that of the two columns raised, according to some, precisely by Enoch, and according to others by Seth, on which the essentials of all the sciences was inscribed; and the mention made here of Seth leads us back to the personage for whom the second Pyramid is reputed to have been the tomb. Indeed, if this was the Master of Idris, he could not have been any other than Shīth, that is, Seth, son of Adam. It is true that some ancient Arab authors call him by the apparently strange names of Aghatīmūn and Adhīmūn, but these are visibly only deformations of the Greek Agathodaemon, which, relating back to the symbolism of the serpent envisaged under its benefic aspect, applies perfectly to Seth, as we have explained elsewhere.^[4] The particular connection thus established between Seth and Enoch is all the more remarkable in that both are also connected with certain traditions concerning a return to the Terrestrial Paradise, that is, to the 'primordial state', and consequently with a 'polar' symbolism that is not unconnected with the orientation of the Pyramids. But this is another question, and we will only note in passing that this fact, which implies clearly enough a reference to 'spiritual centers', would tend to confirm the hypothesis that makes of the Pyramids a place of initiation, which, moreover, would have been the normal way to keep 'alive' the knowledge enclosed in it, at least as long as this initiation subsisted.

Let us add that it is said that Idris or Enoch wrote many inspired books after Adam himself and Seth had already written others;^[5] these books were the prototypes of the sacred books of the Egyptians, and the more recent Hermetic Books represent only as it were a 'readaptation' of them, as is also the case with the various Books of Enoch that have come down to us under this name. On the other hand, the books of Adam, Seth, and Enoch naturally have expressed different aspects of traditional knowledge, each implying a particular relationship with one or another of the sacred sciences, as is always the case for the teaching transmitted by the different Prophets. It might be interesting in these conditions to ask with regard to Enoch and Seth whether there ought not to be something corresponding to these differences in the structure of the two Pyramids we spoke of, and whether perhaps the third Pyramid would not likewise have some connection with Adam, for although we have not found any explicit allusion to this anywhere, it would after all be quite logical to suppose that it ought to complete the ternary of the great antediluvian Prophets.^[6] Of course, we do not at all think that these questions are resolvable at present; besides, all modern 'seekers' have, so to speak, been 'hypnotized' almost exclusively by the Great Pyramid, although it is really not so much larger than the other two that the difference is striking. And when, in order to justify the exceptional importance they attribute to it, they maintain that it is the only one which was oriented exactly, perhaps they are making the error of not considering that certain variations in orientation might well be due not simply to some negligence on the part of the builders, but reflect precisely something connected to different traditional 'epochs'. But how could one expect modern Westerners to be guided in their researches by even the least accurate and appropriate ideas on things of this sort?^[7] Another observation which also has its importance is that the very name Hermes is far from being unknown to the Arab tradition;^[8] should we see only a 'coincidence' in the similarity that it presents with the word Haram (Ahrām in the plural), an Arab designation for the Pyramid, from which it differs only by the addition of a final letter that is not a part of its root? Hermes is called Al-muthalleth bil-hikam, literally 'triple by wisdom',^[9] which is equivalent to the Greek epithet Trismegistus, although it is more explicit, for the 'greatness' which this last expresses is at root really only the result of the wisdom that is the proper attribute of Hermes.^[10] Moreover, this 'triplicity' has still another meaning, for it is sometimes found elaborated in the form of three distinct Hermes: the first, called 'Hermes of Hermes' (Hermes Al-Harāmesah) and considered antediluvian, is properly identified with Idris; the two others, who would be postdiluvian, are the 'Babylonian Hermes' (Al-Bābelī) and the 'Egyptian Hermes' (Al-Misrī). This seems to indicate quite clearly that the Chaldean and Egyptian traditions were derived directly from one and the same principal source, which, given its acknowledged antediluvian character, can hardly have been other than the Atlantean tradition.^[11] Whatever one may think of all these considerations, which are certainly as far from the views of Egyptologists as they are from those of the modern investigators of the ‘secret of the Pyramid’, it is permissible to say that this truly represents ‘Hermes’ tomb’, for the mysteries of his wisdom and his science have been concealed in it in such a way that it is certainly very difficult to find them.^[12]