Hey clad

[cladking]

Why all the interest in Hermetic Tradition? It is the "secret" of all the ages, as far as I can tell. Why? I wonder what people think was important that was "lost" and worth finding? Every secret society is based on that effen tablet.

Have you ever seen John Dee's Monad? He was a big Hermetic philosopher. Even Pythagorus and Thales got sucked into Hermeticism, and they were smart dudes. The more I read, the less interested I am. I like the history more than any great "mystery" simply because I think math and science are a mystery to most people. The alchemy, or history of discovered elements, is pretty exciting, but it wouldn't make me go put on a robe and fuzzy apron. Fuzzy slippers, maybe.

I like your take on the ancient mysteries ~ they actually mean something physical, not metaphysical. That is worth writing down. Not everybody speaks in riddles. Sometimes people just write stuff down they want to remember...

This is the part that gets crazy.

I don't where to stop taking the ancients literally but I know what happens if you don't stop taking them literally.

You'll end up at "fossilized" gold. This might be auric sulphide that was bound in egyptian red sandstone by siderite under high pressure for countless eons. Over time the sulphur was stripped from the gold molecules leaving a white powder probably called mfzt or "mefat". If egyptian sycamore fig grew in this it fixed the monatomic gold in the fruit and people eating it would live as long as 1000 years. This was the tree of life which grew at the fountain of youth where the ben ben (philosophers stone) was. Fragments of this "knowledge" can be found everywhere. Apparently grapes also fix small amounts of this gold.

People who eat these figs apparently deposit metallic gold on their bones and this is how the ancients discovered the secret.

Of course maybe they didn't mean these words literally and maybe they were confused. I'm awaiting evidence. I don't think they were nearly as confused as modern people who just write off anything they don't understand. Believe it or not there is actually quite a bit of substantiation for all this. Unfortunately little of this substantiation is modern chemical analysis because I just can't find any such information. Attacking the question from ancient times is the wrong direction for this.