The
caduceus is the scepter that the Greeks related to the god Hermes, and
the Romans related to the god Mercury (his alter ego), and it is
characterized by having two snakes wrapped around a rod:
ORIGIN
On the origin of the caduceus,
Blavatsky specified that:
«Thoth, as the Registrar and Recorder of
Osiris in Amenti, the Judgment Hall of the Dead was a psychopompic deity; while
Iamblichus hints that "the cross with a handle (the thau ortau) which Tot holds
in his hand, was none other than the monogram of his name".
Besides the Tau,
as the prototype of Mercury, Thoth carries the serpentrod, emblem of Wisdom, the
rod that became the Caduceus.
Says Mr. Bonwick,
"Hermes was the serpent itself in a mystical sense. He glides like that creature,
noiselessly, without apparent exertion, along the course of ages. He is . . . a
representative of the spangled heavens. But he is the foe of the bad serpent,
for the ibis devoured the snakes of Egypt." »
(TG, Thot)
THE
DIFFERENT MEANINGS
OF
THE CADUCEUS
On what the caduceus symbolizes,
Blavatsky revealed that:
« Caduceus (Gr.). The Greek poets and mythologists
took the idea of the Caduceus of Mercury from the Egyptians.
The Caduceus is found
as two serpents twisted round a rod, on Egyptian monuments built before Osiris.
The Greeks altered this.
We find it again in the hands of Æsculapius assuming a different form to the wand
of Mercurius or Hermes.
It is a cosmic, sidereal
or astronomical, as well as a spiritual and even physiological symbol, its significance
changing with its application.
Metaphysically,
the Caduceus represents the fall of primeval and primordial matter into gross terrestrial
matter, the one Reality becoming Illusion. (See SD I, p.550)
Astronomically,
the head and tail represent the points of the ecliptic where the planets and
even the sun and moon meet in close embrace.
Physiologically,
it is the symbol of the restoration of the equilibrium lost between Life, as a
unit, and the currents of life performing various functions in the human body. »
(TG, Caduceus)
ITS
METAPHYSICAL SYMBOLISM
On what the caduceus metaphysically
symbolizes, Blavatsky added:
«The Caduceus explains the mystery, and the
four-fold Dodecahedron on the model of which the universe is said by Plato to
have been built by the manifested Logos (synthesized by the unmanifested First-Born)
yields geometrically the key to Cosmogony and its microcosmic reflection—our
Earth. »
(TG, Ether)
And in her work, The Secret Doctrine, Blavatsky specified
the following:
«
Occultism,
which knows of the existence and presence in Nature of the One eternal element
at the first differentiation of which the roots of the tree of life are
periodically struck, needs no scientific proofs. It says:
Ancient
Wisdom has solved the problem ages ago. Aye; earnest, as well as mocking
reader, Science is slowly but as surely approaching our domains of the Occult.
It is forced by its own discoveries to adopt nolens
volens our phraseology and symbols.
Chemical
Science is now compelled, by the very force of things, to accept even our
illustration of the evolution of the gods and atoms, so suggestively and
undeniably figured in the caduceus of Mercury, the God of Wisdom, and in the
allegorical language of the Archaic Sages. Says a commentary in the esoteric
doctrine:
“The trunk of the Asvattha
(the tree of Life and Being, the rod of the caduceus) grows from and descends at every Beginning (every
new manvantara) from the two dark wings of the Swan (Hansa) of Life. The two Serpents, the
ever-living and its illusion (Spirit and matter) whose two heads grow from the one head between the
wings, descend along the trunk, interlaced
in close embrace. The two tails join on earth (the manifested Universe) into
one, and this is the great illusion, O
Lanoo!”
Every
one knows what the caduceus is, already modified by the Greeks. The original
symbol — with the triple head of the serpent — became altered into a rod with a
knob, and the two lower heads were separated, thus disfiguring somewhat the
original meaning.
Yet
it is as good an illustration as can be for our purpose, this laya rod entwined
by two serpents. Verily the wonderful powers of the magic caduceus were sung by
all the ancient poets, with a very good reason for those who understood the
secret meaning.
Now
what says the learned President of the Chemical Society of Great Britain, in
that same lecture, which has any reference to, or bearing upon, our
above-mentioned doctrine. Very little; only this — and nothing more:
“In the Birmingham address already referred
to I asked my audience to picture the action of two forces on the original
protyle — one being time, accompanied by a lowering of temperature; the other,
swinging to and fro like a mighty pendulum, having periodic cycles of ebb and
swell, rest and activity, being intimately connected with the imponderable
matter, essence, or source of energy we call electricity.
Now, a simile like this effects its object if
it fixes in the mind the particular fact it is intended to emphasize, but it
must not be expected necessarily to run parallel with all the facts. Besides
the lowering of temperature with the periodic ebb and flow of electricity,
positive or negative, requisite to confer on the newly-born elements their
particular atomicity, it is evident that a third factor must be taken into
account. Nature does not act on a flat plane; she demands space for her
cosmogenic operations, and if we introduce space as the third factor, all
appears clear.
Instead of a pendulum, which, though to a
certain extent a good illustration, is impossible as a fact, let us seek some
more satisfactory way of representing what I conceive may have taken place. Let
us suppose the zigzag diagram not drawn upon a plane, but projected in space of
three dimensions. What figure can we best select to meet all the conditions
involved?
Many of the facts can be well explained by
supposing the projection in space of Professor Emerson Reynolds’ zigzag curve
to be a spiral. This figure is, however, inadmissible, inasmuch as the curve
has to pass through a point neutral as to electricity and chemical energy twice
in each cycle. We must, therefore, adopt some other figure. A figure of eight
(8), or lemniscate, will foreshorten into a zigzag just as well as a spiral,
and it fulfils every condition of the problem.”
A
lemniscate for
the evolution downward, from Spirit into matter; another form of a spiral, perhaps, in its reinvolutionary path
onward, from matter into Spirit, and the necessary gradual and final
reabsorption into the laya
state, that which Science calls in her own way “the point neutral as to
electricity” etc., or the zero
point.
Such
are the Occult facts and statement. They may be left with the greatest security
and confidence to Science, to be justified some day. »
(SD I, p.549-551)
Cid's observation: I am very
impressed by how the coiling of the two snakes corresponds to the shape of DNA,
and apparently this figure is important not only on a scientific level but also
on an esoteric level.
And Blavatsky also indicated that
the occultist Éliphas Lévi had already taught something similar:
«
Eliphas
Levi shows it very truly “a force in Nature,” by means of which “a single man
who can master it . . . might throw the world into confusion and transform its
face”; for it is the “great Arcanum of transcendent Magic.”
Quoting
the words of the great Western Kabalist in their translated form (see The Mysteries of Magic, by
A. E. Waite), we may explain them perhaps the better by the occasional addition
of a word or two to show the difference between Western and Eastern explanations
of the same subject.
The
Author says of the great Magic Agent:
“This
ambient and all-penetrating fluid, this ray detached from the (Central or
‘Spiritual’) Sun’s splendour . . . fixed by the weight of the atmosphere (?!)
and the power of central attraction . . . the Astral Light, this
electromagnetic ether, this vital and luminous caloric, is represented on
ancient monuments by the girdle of Isis which twines round two poles . . . and
in ancient theogonies by the serpent devouring its own tail, emblem of prudence
and of Saturn” — emblem of infinity, immortality, and Kronos — “Time” — not the
god Saturn or the planet.
It is
the winged dragon of Medea, the double serpent of the caduceus, and the tempter
of Genesis; but it is also the brazen snake of Moses encircling the Tau . . .
lastly, it is the devil of exoteric dogmatism, and is really the blind force
(it is not blind, and Levi knew it), which souls must conquer in order to
detach themselves from the chains of Earth; ‘for if they should not,’ they will
be absorbed by the same power which first produced them and will return to the
central and eternal fire.” »
(SD I, p.253)
ESOTERIC
SYMBOLISM
OF
THE SERPENT
About other symbols that at an
esoteric level are associated with the serpents of the caduceus, Blavatsky
commented:
« The sovereign will [of the adept] is
represented in our symbols by the woman who crushes the serpent’s head, and by
the resplendent angel who represses the dragon, and holds him under his foot
and spear; the great magical agent, the dual current of light, the living and
astral fire of the earth, has been represented in the ancient theogonies by the
serpent with the head of a bull, a ram, or a dog.
It is
the double serpent of the caduceus, it is the Old Serpent of Genesis, but it is
also the brazen serpent of Moses entwined around the tau, that is to say, the
generative lingam. It is also the goat of the witch-sabbath, and the Baphomet
of the Templars; it is the Hylê of the Gnostics; it is the double-tailed
serpent which forms the legs of the solar cock of the Abraxas: finally, it is
the Devil of M. Eudes de Mirville.
But in
very fact it is the blind force which souls [i.e., the lower Manas or Nephesh]
have to conquer to liberate themselves from the bonds of the earth; for if
their will does not free them from this fatal attraction, they will be absorbed
in the current by the force which has produced them, and will return to the
central and eternal fire. »
(CW 12, p.373-4)
But Blavatsky also pointed out that
the snake has different symbolisms:
« That the Serpents were ever the emblems of
wisdom and prudence is again shown by the caduceus of Mercury, one with Thot,
the god of wisdom, with Hermes, and so on.
The two
serpents, entwined around the rod, are phallic symbols of Jupiter and other
gods who transformed themselves into snakes for purposes of seducing goddesses
— but only in the unclean fancies of profane symbologists.
The
serpent has ever been the symbol of the adept, and of his powers of immortality
and divine knowledge.
Mercury
in his psychopompic character, conducting and guiding with the caduceus the
souls of the dead to Hades and even raising the dead to life with it, is simply
a very transparent allegory. It shows the dual power of the Secret Wisdom: the
black and the white magic. It shows this personified Wisdom guiding the Soul
after death, and its power to call to life that which is dead — a very deep
metaphor if one thinks over its meaning.
Every
people of antiquity reverenced this symbol, with the exception of Christians,
who chose to forget the brazen Serpent of Moses, and even the implied
acknowledgment of the great wisdom and prudence of the Serpent by Jesus
himself, “Be ye wise
as serpents and harmless as doves.”
The
Chinese, one of the oldest nations of our Fifth Race, made of it the emblem of
their Emperors [which they later transformed into
elongated flying dragons]. »
(SD II, p.364)
