The Korê Kosmou or Pupil of the Eye of the World is a Hermetic text dating to the third century AD. The Greek text was preserved from antiquity by Johannes Stobaeus of Macedonia as part of his Anthology, hence its abbreviated reference as SH23 ( Stobaean Hermetica 23). While most Hermetic writings take the form of fictional dialogues between Hermes Trismegistus and his students, the Korê Kosmou is one of several texts (including SH23-27 and the alchemical Letter of Isis the Prophetess ) in which the knowledge is transmitted from Isis to her son Horus. The Korê Kosmou is the product of several older sources weaved together into a single text, resulting in a narrative which serves as a virtual compendium of Hermetic cosmology and philosophy. The narrative of Isis begins with the origin of the Hermetic tradition at the dawn of creation, continues with the creation of human souls, and concludes (at least in its present form) with a mythic account of the origin of civilization.
Page one of the Anthology /Florilegium of Stobaeus, from the 1536 edition by Vettore Trincavelli ( Public Domain )
The Dawn of Creation
In the Hermetic creation epics, the stars and the seven classical planets are created by a Demiurgic God who sets them on their endless, cyclical courses in order to perpetuate the change of all things in the terrestrial world below. The celestials—which are made of an especially pure form of matter and so never dissolve away themselves—are literally connected to all terrestrial objects and organisms by unseen forces or energies. In this scheme, the movement of that which is above continually affects that which is below, ordering the continual emergence and eventual dissolution of all material bodies made up of the four classical elements. The celestial cycles literally are time, and the ceaseless change perpetuated by time is called becoming ( Corpus Hermeticum /CH 11). The purpose of this endless time-becoming is to forever continue the instantiation of eternal ideas and souls from the mind of the Demiurgic Creator—who exists in the Intelligible realm outside of cosmos and time—in the lower material world. The material tents or coverings of all things, including the bodies of human beings, emerge from and return to the matrix of materiality so that new forms may find expression.
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Jason Jarrell is co-author of Ages of the Giants: A Cultural History of the Tall Ones in Prehistoric America , available from LuLu.com. His website is https://www.paradigmcollision.com/
Top Image : Isis with Osiris in the background ( OLGA RA / Adobe Stock )
By: Jason Jarrell
