The Definitions of Hermes Trismegistus to Asclepius: Introduction
The Definitions are aphoristic and dense. They reward unpacking them word by word. I have found it very difficult to discuss the Definitions without providing full quotes. Unlike the Corpus Hermeticum, no copyright-free translation of the Definitions exists, as the text was only discovered and translated relatively recently. This was the impulse that got me started on this project.
Importantly, this is a rendering, not a translation. I am doing for the Definitions what Ursula Le Guin did for Tao Te Ching. I took the Armenian transcript and French translation of the Definitions from Hermès en Haute-Égypte by Jean-Pierre Mahé, machine-translated both, and then compared them against each other and against Mahé's English translation in The Way of Hermes. I also used the original Armenian transcript to check what Mahé added or changed, rather than simply accepting his choices. Since his French and English translations were produced at different times, they do not always agree - in places they appear to reflect a shift in his interpretation. Working across all three versions, with the Armenian as a check on both, gave me a solid basis for interpretative choices.
Where my choices differ meaningfully from Mahé's, I provide footnotes to explain my reasoning. However, my priority is to provide a readable text, grounded in my understanding of philosophical Hermetica and Middle Platonism. Readers wanting the scholarly text should consult Mahé directly.
This work is licensed under CC BY 4.0.