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【0†Hermetism_and_Hieratic_Tradition_in_the.pdf†file-ThQT5DaRdKsVUnJVrMAS71】

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—————
Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

ISSN 2159-3159
Article copyright held by the author(s) and made available under the

Creative Commons Attribution License
CC-BY https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Hermetism and Hieratic Tradition in the

De mysteriis of Iamblichus

Kyle Fraser

CHOLARS HAVE LONG RECOGNIZED the importance of
the testimony of Iamblichus, along with that of his near
contemporary Zosimos of Panopolis, in reconstructing the

wider Greco-Egyptian milieu of Hermetism, and its intersections
with neighbouring esoteric currents, including alchemy, astrol-
ogy, magic, and theurgy.1 In the first section of this paper, I sur-
vey Iamblichus’ allusions to Hermetic authorities and sources,
including some lost Hermetica, and I establish the relevance of
the spiritual ethos of Hermetism to the theurgic project of the De
mysteriis. The literary persona of the prophet Abamon is inter-
preted in the light of the convention of Hermetic pseudonymity,
and the rites and soteriological goals of theurgy are related to
visionary and liturgical practices in the extant Hermetic corpus,
including the use of the so-called ὀνόµατα βάρβαρα. Iamblichus
presents an impassioned defence of the ritual power of such bar-
barous names, insisting that Greek translation of Assyrian and
Egyptian invocations deprives them of ritual potency. In the
second section of the paper, I relate Iamblichus’ discussion of the
ὀνόµατα βάρβαρα, and his concerns about translation, to Corpus
Hermeticum 16, examining a hitherto unappreciated lexical par-
allel. In both sources, the dangers of cultural and linguistic
blending are encapsulated in the use of the rich adjective
ἐξίτηλος to capture the fading of tradition and the depoten-
tialization of ritual speech.

1 See Garth Fowden’s pioneering study, The Egyptian Hermes: A Historical

Approach to the Late Pagan Mind (Cambridge 1986) 116–141.

S

KYLE FRASER 387

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

Iamblichus and the way of Hermes

In his De mysteriis, Iamblichus frames a magisterial defence of
the cult practices of Mediterranean and Near Eastern antiquity.
Under the unifying concept of theurgy (“divine work”) he sub-
sumes the entire sweep of traditional divinatory and sacrificial
technologies, arguing for their theological coherence and even
their salvific necessity.

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ἀσώµατοι θεοί, Myst. 1.19; Saffrey-Segonds 45.15). On the distinction be-
tween material and immaterial deities see also Myst. 5.14, with the analysis of
Shaw, Theurgy and the Soul 135–136.

36 Shaw, Theurgy and the Soul 199–209 and passim.
37 Shaw, Theurgy and the Soul 111.
38 He also mentions at 5.20 intermediate forms of theurgy appropriate to

deities that mediate between the cosmic and hyper-cosmic realms. The
chanting of divine names might have fallen into this liminal category, since
speech offerings are less material than animal or vegetable sacrifices, though
not altogether internalized.

39 Corp.Herm. 11.19–20, 13.11.
40 Corp.Herm. 1.31, 13.18–19; Disc. 8–9 [NHC VI, 6. 57,18–25]; Cf.

Asclepius 41: “Rather let us worship him by giving thanks, for god finds mortal
gratitude to be the best incense” (transl. Copenhaver, Hermetica 92). On
speech offerings see Fowden, Egyptian Hermes 147–148.

41 NHC VI, 6. 56,17–22. For a compelling analysis of these barbarous

KYLE FRASER 397

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

In his extended treatment of Egyptian theology in Book 7,
Iamblichus discusses the theurgic significance of such so-called
barbarous names (ὀνόµατα βάρβαρα), which he divides into two
kinds: the ineffable names (ἄσηµα ὀνόµατα), which are nonsensi-
cal in human terms, and the traditional names or epithets of the
gods in foreign languages, chiefly Assyrian42 and Egyptian. The
use of the first type, the ineffable names, was widespread in late
ancient ritual traditions—obscure names like BAINCHÔÔÔCH or
ABLANATHANALBA, sometimes formulated as palindromes, or
even as strings of Greek vowels are commonplace in the so-
called Greek magical papyri, and they appear also on curse
tablets, protective gemstones, and lamellae. Some of the ineffable
names were, in reality, derivations or corruptions of foreign epi-
thets—for instance, the Egyptian-derived names BAINCHÔÔÔCH
(“spirit of darkness”) and BOLCHOSÊTH (“Baal, who strikes, [that
is] Seth”).43 But Iamblichus surely would not approve of the
modern scholarly interest in tracing the etymological roots of
these words, since their power (on his view) lies precisely in their
opacity to human conceptualization. The deployment of such
unintelligible names seemed to Porphyry to confirm the irration-
ality of theurgy: “For you inquire, ‘What is the point of the

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enance (Religion in Roman Egypt 240). Fowden, as Bull observes (11), seems
undecided as to the priestly status of the Hermetic authors (see Fowden,
Egyptian Hermes 166–168).

408 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

priest-kings of Emesa.76 His was a royal and priestly name,
shared by two Emesene priest-kings (Iamblichus I, d. 31 BCE;
Iamblichus II, d. ca. 17 CE).77 He could thus regard himself as a
priest by birthright, even if not in fact. Whereas Porphyry trans-
lated his Phoenician name, Malchos, into Greek, Iamblichus
retained his Syrian name, merely rendering it in Greek char-
acters.78 Again, whereas Porphyry settled to teach in Rome,
Iamblichus formed a spiritual commune in the outskirts of
Apamea, on the fringes of the Syrian desert. Porphyry’s in-
difference to ethnicity is consistent with his commitments to the
universal culture of Hellenism—the culture of empire.79 And this
cultural universalism maps directly onto his understanding of
metaphysics: his commitment to the Plotinian doctrine of the
undescended intellect, which remains always in union with its
transcendent source, beyond all spatio-temporal distinctions and
cultural entanglements. By contrast, Iamblichus remained con-
vinced that salvation was only possible through the preservation
of the distinctive hieratic traditions of antiquity. He embraced
his Syrian heritage and his priestly name, perhaps seeking
through theurgy to recover his birthright as a technician of the
sacred, a protector of the cultic traditions that bind humanity to
the gods. Of course, Iamblichus thinks and speaks in Greek, and
like the priestly disciples of Hermes, he inhabits a space of cul-

76 On his priestly name and Syrian background see P. Athanassiadi, “The
Oecumenism of Iamblichus: Latent Knowledge and its Awakening,” JRS 85
(1995) 244–250, at 245; and Clarke et al., On the Mysteries xix–xx.

77 On the Emesene dynasty and Iamblichus I and II see R. D. Sullivan,
“The Dynasty of Emesa,” ANRW II.8 (1977) 198–219; W. Ball, Rome in the
East: The Transformation of an Empire (London 2000) 33–47. Ball notes (34) that
a shaikh of the Emesenes bore the name Iamblichus already in the second
century BCE before the founding of the dynasty.

78 See Struck, in Magic and Ritual 397–398. On the name of Porphyry and
his Phoenician background see also Millar, in Philosophia Togata II 248–249.

79 Struck, in Magic and Ritual 396, contrasts the universalizing tendencies of
Porphyry with Iamblichus’ “strong interest in the ‘local’ over and above the
‘imperial’ or the ‘international’.” On the homogenizing universalism of Por-
phyry see also Johnson, Religion and Identity 123.

KYLE FRASER 409

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

Iamblichus and the way of Hermes

In his De mysteriis, Iamblichus frames a magisterial defence of
the cult practices of Mediterranean and Near Eastern antiquity.
Under the unifying concept of theurgy (“divine work”) he sub-
sumes the entire sweep of traditional divinatory and sacrificial
technologies, arguing for their theological coherence and even
their salvific necessity. The original title of his treatise (renamed
in the fifteenth century by its illustrious Renaissance translator,
Marsilio Ficino) was The Reply of the Master Abamon to the Letter of
Porphyry to Anebo and the Solutions to the Questions it Contains.2
Porphyry had directed a series of questions—really, thinly veiled
criticisms3—to one “Anebo,” who was either an Egyptian
student of Iamblichus or, as seems more likely, a fictive repre-
sentative of the Iamblichan school with its Egyptianizing em-
phases.4 If the gods are transcendental—as any good Platonist
must concede—why, he asked, do theurgists employ sacrifices
and invocations, as though unalterable divinities could be per-
suaded by material offerings or random human vocalizations?

2 Ficino’s complete title was De mysteriis Aegyptiorum, Chaldaeorum, Assyriorum.
On this title and Ficino as editor see H. D. Saffrey and A.-Ph. Segonds,
Jamblique, Réponse à Porphyre (De mysteriis) (Paris 2013) IX–XXI.

3 I am not persuaded by the thesis of C. Addey (Divination and Theurgy in
Neoplatonism: Oracles of the Gods [Farnham 2014] 135–136) that Porphyry’s
letter was a dialogic exercise, more exploratory than polemical, nor by P.
Athanassiadi’s image of Porphyry as naïve, hesitant, and deferential to the
authority of Iamblichus (“Dreams, Theurgy and Freelance Divination,” JRS
83 [1993] 115–130, at 117–119). On Porphyry’s polemical intent see H. D.
Saffrey and A.-Ph. Segonds, Porphyre, Lettre à Anébon l’Égyptien (Paris 2012)
XXXVI–XXXVII; and D. J. O’Meara, “The Image of Egyptian Wisdom in Late
Antique Platonism,” in M. Sommer et al. (eds.), Transzendentales Ägypten: Jen-
seits, Himmel, Hölle und das Ende in antik-ägyptischen Diskursen (Paderborn 2024)
259–270, at 262.

4 On the figure of Anebo see Saffrey-Segonds, Porphyre XXX–XXXII; H. D
Saffrey, “Abamon, pseudonyme de Jamblique,” in R. B. Palmer et al. (eds.),
Philomathes: Studies and Essays in the Humanities in Memory of Philip Merlan (The
Hague 1971) 227–239, at 231–233; Addey, Divination and Theurgy 135–136,
with n.38.

388 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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KYLE FRASER 393

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

lations of Egyptian texts is of special interest. He implies that the
Hermetic books are translations of the books of Thoth—the
Egyptian prototype of Hermes Trismegistus. These books pre-
served the essential protocols and procedures of Egyptian cult
ritual.24 Iamblichus perceives the Hermetic writings as a vital
link to this authentic and pure hieratic tradition. In the guise of
the προφήτης Abamon,25 he opens his treatise by declaring his
pious subordination to Hermes Trismegistus, “the god who pre-
sides over rational discourse,” and “the common patron of all
priests,” adding that “it is to him that our ancestors in particular
dedicated the fruits of their wisdom, attributing all their own
writings to Hermes.”26 Thus, we should understand the pseudo-
nym Abamon not merely as a rhetorical conceit, but as the
expression of an initiatic ethos that demands the subordination
of Iamblichus as prophet to the hieratic authority of Thoth-
Hermes. In concealing his own name and authorship, Iambli-
chus pays reverence to Hermes and the Hermetic tradition,
implying that his own work is merely a faithful transmission of
its venerable mysteries, another link in the chain of initiatic
transmission.

Iamblichus insists that the “way” of Hermes was not a matter
of theorizing about the gods—underscoring again his point
about the limitations of knowledge—but a theurgic praxis
through which the soul ascended to the regions beyond fate:

And [the Egyptians] do not merely theorize about these matters
(οὐδ’ ὅλως ψιλῶς θεωροῦσιν), but they recommend that we ascend
through sacred theurgy (διὰ τῆς ἱερατικῆς θεουργίας) to the regions
that are higher, more universal and superior to fate, towards the
god who is the creator, without calling in the aid of matter (µήτε

ὕλην προσποιουµένους) or bringing to bear anything other than the
observation of the propitious time for action. Hermes has also set

24 On the books of Thoth and their cultic significance see Fowden, Egyptian
Hermes 57–68.

25 Abamon is described as προφήτης at Myst. 1.1 [2.17].
26 Myst. 1.1; transl. in Clarke et al. 5.

394 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

out this way (ὁδόν) and the prophet Bitys has given an inter-
pretation of it to King Ammon.27

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17 Kmeph appears as “Emeph” in the manuscripts: see Clarke et al., On the
Mysteries 309 n.407. Iamblichus surveys two Hermetic accounts of the prin-
ciples in Myst. 8.2 and 8.3, respectively. The mythological associations are
outlined in the second ordering (τάξις). But the systems seem consistent in
their underlying metaphysics, as argued persuasively by Bull, Tradition of Her-
mes 132–133 (with n.162) and assumed by Adamson, in Histories of the Hidden
God 67–68.

18 Myst. 8.3 [195.14–23].
19 Myst. 8.4 [196.20–26].
20 According to one Seleucus, there were 20,000 Hermetic books, while the

priestly scholar Manetho reports 36,525 (Myst. 8.1), a figure that may be
based on the Sothic cycle (Saffrey-Segonds, Jamblique 326 n.2). Even account-

392 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

collection preserves only a few exemplars, perhaps those least
offensive to Christian sensibilities.21 Still, Iamblichus’ general
presentation of the spiritual ethos of the Hermetic tradition
accords well with our extant Hermetic corpus.

In particular, Iamblichus shares with the authors of the
Hermetica a nostalgia for the old ways of Egypt, for the time-
honoured temple cults and their priestly wisdom, which seemed
(at least in the eyes of traditionalists) to be fast deteriorating
under Roman occupation. Certainly, the Egyptian temples
faced significant pressures in the imperial age due to the loss of
state funding, and certain fundamentals of traditional priestly
knowledge declined, notably the understanding of hieroglyphic
script. The abbreviated Demotic script remained in use for
religious and literary purposes, but as Frankfurter notes, it was
“essentially a scribal conceit,” since “by the second century C.E.
even the most insular, conservative priesthoods commonly used
and conversed in Greek.”22 With the development of Old Cop-
tic, beginning in the first century C.E., the Greek script was even
deployed in liturgical contexts as a means of standardizing the
pronunciation of Demotic words.23 In the Corpus Hermeticum,
concerns about the contamination of the Egyptian language
(notably in Corp.Herm. 16) reflect an indigenous, perhaps even
priestly, reaction to these inexorable processes of linguistic
blending. These concerns are shared by Iamblichus, as we shall
discover.

Iamblichus’ claim that the books of Hermes are Greek trans-

ing for exaggeration, or astronomical conceits, the Hermetic literature was
massive in scope.

21 See B. P. Copenhaver, Hermetica: The Greek Corpus Hermeticum and the Latin
Asclepius in a New English Translation (Cambridge 1992) xl–xlv.

22 D. Frankfurter, Religion in Roman Egypt: Assimilation and Resistance (Prince-
ton 1998) 250.

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as the principle of intellection (νοητάρχης), and identified in one
Hermetic account with the deity Kmeph.17 From this primal
Intellect arises the Demiurgic mind, whose various powers and
activities (δυνάµεις τε καὶ ἐνεργείας) are veiled mythologically in
the names and attributes of the deities Amoun, Ptah, and

Osiris.18
Iamblichus assures Porphyry that the writings circulating

under the name of Hermes Trismegistus contain authentic
Egyptian doctrine, even though they are expressed in the Greek
idiom and employ the terminology of Greek philosophy. The
reason for this, he says, is that the Hermetica were translated
into Greek by men knowledgeable in philosophy.19 Iamblichus’
references to Hermetic sources are typically vague and specific
borrowings are difficult to establish. There was a considerable
Hermetic literature in later antiquity,20 of which our Byzantine

Hermes Trismegistus: The Egyptian Priestly Figure as a Teacher of Hellenized Wisdom
(Leiden 2018) 131–146, who stresses parallels with Poimandres (Corp.Herm. 1);
Adamson, in Histories of the Hidden God 67–77, on parallels with the Sethian
Eugnostos (NH III, 3 and V, 1); O’Meara, in Transzendentales Ägypten 266–267;
D. Clark, “Iamblichus’ Egyptian Neoplatonic Theology in De Mysteriis,” Inter-
national Journal of the Platonic Tradition 2 (2008) 164–205.

17 Kmeph appears as “Emeph” in the manuscripts: see Clarke et al., On the
Mysteries 309 n.407. Iamblichus surveys two Hermetic accounts of the prin-
ciples in Myst. 8.2 and 8.3, respectively. The mythological associations are
outlined in the second ordering (τάξις). But the systems seem consistent in
their underlying metaphysics, as argued persuasively by Bull, Tradition of Her-
mes 132–133 (with n.162) and assumed by Adamson, in Histories of the Hidden
God 67–68.

18 Myst. 8.3 [195.14–23].
19 Myst. 8.4 [196.20–26].
20 According to one Seleucus, there were 20,000 Hermetic books, while the

priestly scholar Manetho reports 36,525 (Myst. 8.1), a figure that may be
based on the Sothic cycle (Saffrey-Segonds, Jamblique 326 n.2). Even account-

392 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

collection preserves only a few exemplars, perhaps those least
offensive to Christian sensibilities.21 Still, Iamblichus’ general
presentation of the spiritual ethos of the Hermetic tradition
accords well with our extant Hermetic corpus.

In particular, Iamblichus shares with the authors of the
Hermetica a nostalgia for the old ways of Egypt, for the time-
honoured temple cults and their priestly wisdom, which seemed
(at least in the eyes of traditionalists) to be fast deteriorating
under Roman occupation.

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4 On the figure of Anebo see Saffrey-Segonds, Porphyre XXX–XXXII; H. D
Saffrey, “Abamon, pseudonyme de Jamblique,” in R. B. Palmer et al. (eds.),
Philomathes: Studies and Essays in the Humanities in Memory of Philip Merlan (The
Hague 1971) 227–239, at 231–233; Addey, Divination and Theurgy 135–136,
with n.38.

388 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

To Porphyry, the theurgic turn initiated by Iamblichus, with its
pronounced focus on cult, seemed an aberration from the con-
templative ideals of true Platonism.5 In response, Iamblichus,
writing in the guise the Egyptian prophet “Abamon,”6 suggests
that Porphyry’s concerns are premised on a dualistic interpre-
tation of Platonic metaphysics. By arguing from the perspective
of an uncompromising transcendence, Porphyry has lost sight of
divine immanence and the unbroken continuity of the cosmos.
Just as light illumines all things from outside, without loss or
rupture, so, Iamblichus insists, the gods are present immaterially
in material beings.

Porphyry followed Plotinus in holding that the highest part of
the soul, the pure intellect (nous), remains grounded in the divine
Mind, never descending into fatal embodiment; and so, by with-
drawing from the external world of materiality and contingency,
the philosopher discovers that he is always already at one with
the divine.7 For Iamblichus, this pure noeticism might well de-
scribe the state of the holy man, who has already transcended
fate, but it did not offer a way of salvation for the alienated
person, entangled in the bonds of materiality. The Plotinian ap-
proach, at least as Porphyry represented it, threatened to reduce
philosophy to the methodologies of human intellection: it as-
sumes that we can think our way to union with Divinity. In the
final analysis, knowledge is a barrier to the attainment of salvific

5 As A. P. Johnson argues (Religion and Identity in Porphyry of Tyre: The Limits

of Hellenism in Late Antiquity [Cambridge 2013] 105), Porphyry was “a con-
sistent critic of traditional forms of ritual.” He rejected blood sacrifice as pol-
luting and dangerous (e.g. Abst. 2.42–47), though conceding the legitimacy of
vegetable sacrifices to the celestial deities (Abst. 2.32, 37).

6 On the possible meanings of the Egyptian names Anebo and Abamon see
the interesting (albeit speculative) analysis of Elsa Oréal reported in Saffrey-
Segonds, Porphyre XXXII–XXXVI.

7 On the Plotinian doctrine of the undescended soul as the metaphysical
ground of Porphyry’s anti-ritualism see G. Shaw, Theurgy and the Soul: The
Neoplatonism of Iamblichus (University Park 1995) 11–14 and passim; Saffrey-
Segonds, Jamblique XLIX–LI.

KYLE FRASER 389

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68 Myst. 7.5 [191.13–15].

406 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

capacity to tap into the deep structure of reality. Language slips
into a merely representational mode, deepening the alienation
of the soul, which longs to be reintegrated with its divine source.

In the eyes of Porphyry, what Iamblichus called theurgy was
just a loftier name for ‘magic’—the barbarous names of theur-
gists are the very same devices by which lowly magicians attempt
to bind the gods to their will.69 Magic, as Porphyry understands
it, is essentially coercive and it is premised on bad theology. Like
many Greco-Roman elites, he perceives it as a foreign super-
stition, fundamentally at odds with the sober ideals of the uni-
versal Hellenic culture. In this way, as Struck notes, the Hellenic
“culture of contemplation” is set against the barbarous culture
of ritual action, or, in Porphyry’s polemical terms, γοητεία.70

Deploying his own cultural stereotypes, Iamblichus represents
Porphyry’s disdain for the hieratic traditions of the barbaroi as
typical Hellenic hubris. To suggest that divine transcendence
precludes the efficacious activity of the gods in sacred names and
icons is to deprive the cosmos and the embodied soul of divine
presence—effectively turning the universe into a desacralized
wasteland:

But, above all, this doctrine constitutes the ruination of sacred
ritual and theurgical communion of gods with men, by banishing
the presence (παρουσίαν) of the higher classes of beings outside the
confines of the earth. For it amounts to nothing else but saying
that the divine is set apart from the earthly realm, and that it does
not mingle with humanity, and that this realm is bereft (ἔρηµος) of
divinity.71

These words echo the dire prophecy of Hermes in the Perfect
Discourse, a passage that survives in its Latin translation, in

69 On the rhetorical dimensions of ‘magic’, as understood by Porphyry, see

Struck, in Magic and Ritual 387–392.
70 On the impasse between the cultures of contemplation and action see

Struck, in Magic and Ritual 389–393.
71 Myst. 1.8 [21.10–16], transl. Clarke et al. 35, but following Saffrey-

Segonds in rendering Ὃλως δὲ as “above all” (surtout), rather than “generally”
(see Jamblique 243 n.2).

KYLE FRASER 407

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

Asclepius 24–26, and in a Coptic fragment (NHC VI, 8).

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Certainly, the Egyptian temples
faced significant pressures in the imperial age due to the loss of
state funding, and certain fundamentals of traditional priestly
knowledge declined, notably the understanding of hieroglyphic
script. The abbreviated Demotic script remained in use for
religious and literary purposes, but as Frankfurter notes, it was
“essentially a scribal conceit,” since “by the second century C.E.
even the most insular, conservative priesthoods commonly used
and conversed in Greek.”22 With the development of Old Cop-
tic, beginning in the first century C.E., the Greek script was even
deployed in liturgical contexts as a means of standardizing the
pronunciation of Demotic words.23 In the Corpus Hermeticum,
concerns about the contamination of the Egyptian language
(notably in Corp.Herm. 16) reflect an indigenous, perhaps even
priestly, reaction to these inexorable processes of linguistic
blending. These concerns are shared by Iamblichus, as we shall
discover.

Iamblichus’ claim that the books of Hermes are Greek trans-

ing for exaggeration, or astronomical conceits, the Hermetic literature was
massive in scope.

21 See B. P. Copenhaver, Hermetica: The Greek Corpus Hermeticum and the Latin
Asclepius in a New English Translation (Cambridge 1992) xl–xlv.

22 D. Frankfurter, Religion in Roman Egypt: Assimilation and Resistance (Prince-
ton 1998) 250.

23 Frankfurter, Religion in Roman Egypt 250–251. On Old-Coptic glosses of
Demotic in the London and Leiden magical papyri see J. Dieleman, Priests,
Tongues, and Rites. The London-Leiden Magical Manuscripts and Translation in
Egyptian Ritual (100–300 CE) (Leiden 2005) 26–27 and passim.

KYLE FRASER 393

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

lations of Egyptian texts is of special interest. He implies that the
Hermetic books are translations of the books of Thoth—the
Egyptian prototype of Hermes Trismegistus. These books pre-
served the essential protocols and procedures of Egyptian cult
ritual.24 Iamblichus perceives the Hermetic writings as a vital
link to this authentic and pure hieratic tradition. In the guise of
the προφήτης Abamon,25 he opens his treatise by declaring his
pious subordination to Hermes Trismegistus, “the god who pre-
sides over rational discourse,” and “the common patron of all
priests,” adding that “it is to him that our ancestors in particular
dedicated the fruits of their wisdom, attributing all their own
writings to Hermes.”26 Thus, we should understand the pseudo-
nym Abamon not merely as a rhetorical conceit, but as the
expression of an initiatic ethos that demands the subordination
of Iamblichus as prophet to the hieratic authority of Thoth-
Hermes. In concealing his own name and authorship, Iambli-
chus pays reverence to Hermes and the Hermetic tradition,
implying that his own work is merely a faithful transmission of
its venerable mysteries, another link in the chain of initiatic
transmission.

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Iamblichus
presents an impassioned defence of the ritual power of such bar-
barous names, insisting that Greek translation of Assyrian and
Egyptian invocations deprives them of ritual potency. In the
second section of the paper, I relate Iamblichus’ discussion of the
ὀνόµατα βάρβαρα, and his concerns about translation, to Corpus
Hermeticum 16, examining a hitherto unappreciated lexical par-
allel. In both sources, the dangers of cultural and linguistic
blending are encapsulated in the use of the rich adjective
ἐξίτηλος to capture the fading of tradition and the depoten-
tialization of ritual speech.

1 See Garth Fowden’s pioneering study, The Egyptian Hermes: A Historical

Approach to the Late Pagan Mind (Cambridge 1986) 116–141.

S

KYLE FRASER 387

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Iamblichus and the way of Hermes

In his De mysteriis, Iamblichus frames a magisterial defence of
the cult practices of Mediterranean and Near Eastern antiquity.
Under the unifying concept of theurgy (“divine work”) he sub-
sumes the entire sweep of traditional divinatory and sacrificial
technologies, arguing for their theological coherence and even
their salvific necessity. The original title of his treatise (renamed
in the fifteenth century by its illustrious Renaissance translator,
Marsilio Ficino) was The Reply of the Master Abamon to the Letter of
Porphyry to Anebo and the Solutions to the Questions it Contains.2
Porphyry had directed a series of questions—really, thinly veiled
criticisms3—to one “Anebo,” who was either an Egyptian
student of Iamblichus or, as seems more likely, a fictive repre-
sentative of the Iamblichan school with its Egyptianizing em-
phases.4 If the gods are transcendental—as any good Platonist
must concede—why, he asked, do theurgists employ sacrifices
and invocations, as though unalterable divinities could be per-
suaded by material offerings or random human vocalizations?

2 Ficino’s complete title was De mysteriis Aegyptiorum, Chaldaeorum, Assyriorum.
On this title and Ficino as editor see H. D. Saffrey and A.-Ph. Segonds,
Jamblique, Réponse à Porphyre (De mysteriis) (Paris 2013) IX–XXI.

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some lost, like the writings of the prophet “Bitys,”13 and the
astrological manual Salmeschiniaka, which dealt with the risings
and settings of stars and technical details of horoscopic astrology
relating to the decans and planetary rulers. Porphyry and
Iamblichus discuss this manual in connection with the astral

theology of the priest and Stoic philosopher Chaeremon (first
century CE), who evidently endorsed its teachings.14 According
to Iamblichus the study of such astral phenomena was pre-
liminary to the deeper mysteries of Hermetism and occupied the
lowest rung (ἐν τοῖς ἐσχάτοις) in the Egyptian understanding of

causes (τὴν παρ᾽ Αἰγυπτίοις αἰτιολογίαν).15 He also draws upon
unnamed “theological Hermetica”16 that related the mythologi-

12 Myst. 7.5 [191.23–24].
13 Myst. 8.5. Bitys is also referenced by the alchemist Zosimos of Panopolis

and he may be identical to “Pitys,” the alleged author of a series of necro-
mantic rites in PGM 4. On Bitys see Fowden, Egyptian Hermes 150–153.

14 Myst. 8.4; Epist. ad Aneb. fr.81 (Saffrey-Segonds, Porphyre 75–77). Porphyry
states that the decans, horoscopic signs, and “powerful leaders” discussed by
Chaeremon were named in the Salmeschiniaka. According to Hephaestion of
Thebes, the astrological writings associated with “Nechepso” also drew from
this manual, which must have been extant by the second century BCE. On
the testimonials relating to the Salmeschiniaka see G. Adamson, “The Old
Gods of Egypt in Lost Hermetica and Early Sethianism,” in A. D. DeConick
et al. (eds.), Histories of the Hidden God: Concealment and Revelation in Western
Gnostic, Esoteric, and Mystical Traditions (Durham 2013) 58–86, at 60–67.

15 Myst. 8.4 [197.7–12]. See O’Meara, in Transzendentales Ägypten 263.
16 As Fowden calls them: Egyptian Hermes 137–139. On Iamblichus’ discus-

sion of Egyptian theology in Myst. 8.2–3 see also C. H. Bull, The Tradition of

KYLE FRASER 391

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cal deities of Egypt to a hierarchy of hyper-cosmic and cosmic
deities. At the summit of the hierarchy is the indivisible One (τὸ

ἓν ἀµερές), from which arises a self-begotten Monad, described

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In his extended treatment of Egyptian theology in Book 7,
Iamblichus discusses the theurgic significance of such so-called
barbarous names (ὀνόµατα βάρβαρα), which he divides into two
kinds: the ineffable names (ἄσηµα ὀνόµατα), which are nonsensi-
cal in human terms, and the traditional names or epithets of the
gods in foreign languages, chiefly Assyrian42 and Egyptian. The
use of the first type, the ineffable names, was widespread in late
ancient ritual traditions—obscure names like BAINCHÔÔÔCH or
ABLANATHANALBA, sometimes formulated as palindromes, or
even as strings of Greek vowels are commonplace in the so-
called Greek magical papyri, and they appear also on curse
tablets, protective gemstones, and lamellae. Some of the ineffable
names were, in reality, derivations or corruptions of foreign epi-
thets—for instance, the Egyptian-derived names BAINCHÔÔÔCH
(“spirit of darkness”) and BOLCHOSÊTH (“Baal, who strikes, [that
is] Seth”).43 But Iamblichus surely would not approve of the
modern scholarly interest in tracing the etymological roots of
these words, since their power (on his view) lies precisely in their
opacity to human conceptualization. The deployment of such
unintelligible names seemed to Porphyry to confirm the irration-
ality of theurgy: “For you inquire, ‘What is the point of the

names, which identifies close parallels in the magical formulary P. Leiden J 395
(PGM 13) and on a series of Horus amulets, see C. H. Bull, “Monkey Business:
Magical Vowels and Cosmic Levels in the Discourse on the Eighth and the Ninth
(NHC VI, 6),” SMSR 83 (2017) 75–94, at 82–84.

42 Presumably “Assyrian” means Syrian, in keeping with typical Greek
usage: see F. Millar, “Porphyry: Ethnicity, Language, and Alien Wisdom,” in
J. Barnes et al. (eds.), Philosophia Togata II Plato and Aristotle at Rome (Oxford
1997) 241–262, at 247. More generically it may denote regions of the ‘Upper
Near East’: see P. Struck, “Speech Acts and the Stakes of Hellenism in Late
Antiquity,” in P. Mirecki et al. (eds.), Magic and Ritual in the Ancient World
(Leiden 2002) 387–403, at 396.

43 As translated by J. G. Gager in the glossary of Curse Tablets and Binding
Spells from the Ancient World (Oxford 1992) 265–269; see also the glossary with
tentative translations in W. M. Brashear, “The Greek Magical Papyri: An
Introduction and Survey; Annotated Bibliography (1928–1994),” ANRW II
18.5 (1995) 3380–3684, at 3576–3603.

398 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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Return-
ing from earth to heaven, divinity will abandon Egypt; the land
that was the seat of religion will be widowed by the gods and
deprived of their presence (vidvata numinum praesentia destituetur).”73
In both sources, the efficacy of the time-honoured cults depends
upon the active and benevolent presence of the gods in their
sacred icons and holy sites; and, in turn, it is the devoted worship
of the gods that sustains that presence,74 without which the earth
would be reduced to a wasteland.

Conclusion

Just as Iamblichus concealed his identity under the guise of
Abamon, the anonymous authors of the Hermetica attributed
their writings to Hermes or his student Asclepius. Following the
lead of Garth Fowden, Christian Bull has made a compelling
case for the authenticity of the Egyptian mis-en-scène of the Her-
metic dialogues, suggesting that the authors may well have been
Hellenized Egyptian priests.75 Iamblichus too understood him-
self as a priest—at least in spirit. A Syrian by birth, Yamliku
(literally, “may he rule”) was descended from the hereditary

72 P.Coll.Youtie 30 (TM 18193). On the date and background of the
Hermetic apocalypse see C. H. Bull, “Prophesying the Demise of Egyptian
Religion in Late Antiquity,” Numen 68 (2021) 180–203, at 186–187.

73 Asclepius 24 [II 327.3–7].
74 παρουσίαν: Myst. 1.8 [21.12]; praesentia: Asclepius 24 [II 327.7].
75 Bull, Tradition of Hermes 12. Frankfurter also argues for a priestly prov-

enance (Religion in Roman Egypt 240). Fowden, as Bull observes (11), seems
undecided as to the priestly status of the Hermetic authors (see Fowden,
Egyptian Hermes 166–168).

408 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

priest-kings of Emesa.76 His was a royal and priestly name,
shared by two Emesene priest-kings (Iamblichus I, d. 31 BCE;
Iamblichus II, d. ca. 17 CE).77 He could thus regard himself as a
priest by birthright, even if not in fact. Whereas Porphyry trans-
lated his Phoenician name, Malchos, into Greek, Iamblichus
retained his Syrian name, merely rendering it in Greek char-
acters.78 Again, whereas Porphyry settled to teach in Rome,
Iamblichus formed a spiritual commune in the outskirts of
Apamea, on the fringes of the Syrian desert. Porphyry’s in-
difference to ethnicity is consistent with his commitments to the
universal culture of Hellenism—the culture of empire.79 And this
cultural universalism maps directly onto his understanding of
metaphysics: his commitment to the Plotinian doctrine of the
undescended intellect, which remains always in union with its
transcendent source, beyond all spatio-temporal distinctions and
cultural entanglements. By contrast, Iamblichus remained con-
vinced that salvation was only possible through the preservation
of the distinctive hieratic traditions of antiquity.

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But, above all, this doctrine constitutes the ruination of sacred
ritual and theurgical communion of gods with men, by banishing
the presence (παρουσίαν) of the higher classes of beings outside the
confines of the earth. For it amounts to nothing else but saying
that the divine is set apart from the earthly realm, and that it does
not mingle with humanity, and that this realm is bereft (ἔρηµος) of
divinity.71

These words echo the dire prophecy of Hermes in the Perfect
Discourse, a passage that survives in its Latin translation, in

69 On the rhetorical dimensions of ‘magic’, as understood by Porphyry, see

Struck, in Magic and Ritual 387–392.
70 On the impasse between the cultures of contemplation and action see

Struck, in Magic and Ritual 389–393.
71 Myst. 1.8 [21.10–16], transl. Clarke et al. 35, but following Saffrey-

Segonds in rendering Ὃλως δὲ as “above all” (surtout), rather than “generally”
(see Jamblique 243 n.2).

KYLE FRASER 407

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

Asclepius 24–26, and in a Coptic fragment (NHC VI, 8). Hermes
predicts a time when foreigners will occupy Egypt, enacting laws
that proscribe the traditional cults: probably an allusion to the
Roman prohibition of Egyptian oracular processions and related
divinatory practices under the prefect Aemilius Saturninus in
199 CE.72 Through this neglect of divine cult, Hermes warns,
Egypt will be deserted by the gods: “All of their holy veneration
(sancta veneratio) will prove vain and will come to nothing. Return-
ing from earth to heaven, divinity will abandon Egypt; the land
that was the seat of religion will be widowed by the gods and
deprived of their presence (vidvata numinum praesentia destituetur).”73
In both sources, the efficacy of the time-honoured cults depends
upon the active and benevolent presence of the gods in their
sacred icons and holy sites; and, in turn, it is the devoted worship
of the gods that sustains that presence,74 without which the earth
would be reduced to a wasteland.

Conclusion

Just as Iamblichus concealed his identity under the guise of
Abamon, the anonymous authors of the Hermetica attributed
their writings to Hermes or his student Asclepius. Following the
lead of Garth Fowden, Christian Bull has made a compelling
case for the authenticity of the Egyptian mis-en-scène of the Her-
metic dialogues, suggesting that the authors may well have been
Hellenized Egyptian priests.75 Iamblichus too understood him-
self as a priest—at least in spirit. A Syrian by birth, Yamliku
(literally, “may he rule”) was descended from the hereditary

72 P.Coll.Youtie 30 (TM 18193). On the date and background of the
Hermetic apocalypse see C. H. Bull, “Prophesying the Demise of Egyptian
Religion in Late Antiquity,” Numen 68 (2021) 180–203, at 186–187.

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14 Myst. 8.4; Epist. ad Aneb. fr.81 (Saffrey-Segonds, Porphyre 75–77). Porphyry
states that the decans, horoscopic signs, and “powerful leaders” discussed by
Chaeremon were named in the Salmeschiniaka. According to Hephaestion of
Thebes, the astrological writings associated with “Nechepso” also drew from
this manual, which must have been extant by the second century BCE. On
the testimonials relating to the Salmeschiniaka see G. Adamson, “The Old
Gods of Egypt in Lost Hermetica and Early Sethianism,” in A. D. DeConick
et al. (eds.), Histories of the Hidden God: Concealment and Revelation in Western
Gnostic, Esoteric, and Mystical Traditions (Durham 2013) 58–86, at 60–67.

15 Myst. 8.4 [197.7–12]. See O’Meara, in Transzendentales Ägypten 263.
16 As Fowden calls them: Egyptian Hermes 137–139. On Iamblichus’ discus-

sion of Egyptian theology in Myst. 8.2–3 see also C. H. Bull, The Tradition of

KYLE FRASER 391

—————
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cal deities of Egypt to a hierarchy of hyper-cosmic and cosmic
deities. At the summit of the hierarchy is the indivisible One (τὸ

ἓν ἀµερές), from which arises a self-begotten Monad, described

as the principle of intellection (νοητάρχης), and identified in one
Hermetic account with the deity Kmeph.17 From this primal
Intellect arises the Demiurgic mind, whose various powers and
activities (δυνάµεις τε καὶ ἐνεργείας) are veiled mythologically in
the names and attributes of the deities Amoun, Ptah, and

Osiris.18
Iamblichus assures Porphyry that the writings circulating

under the name of Hermes Trismegistus contain authentic
Egyptian doctrine, even though they are expressed in the Greek
idiom and employ the terminology of Greek philosophy. The
reason for this, he says, is that the Hermetica were translated
into Greek by men knowledgeable in philosophy.19 Iamblichus’
references to Hermetic sources are typically vague and specific
borrowings are difficult to establish. There was a considerable
Hermetic literature in later antiquity,20 of which our Byzantine

Hermes Trismegistus: The Egyptian Priestly Figure as a Teacher of Hellenized Wisdom
(Leiden 2018) 131–146, who stresses parallels with Poimandres (Corp.Herm. 1);
Adamson, in Histories of the Hidden God 67–77, on parallels with the Sethian
Eugnostos (NH III, 3 and V, 1); O’Meara, in Transzendentales Ägypten 266–267;
D. Clark, “Iamblichus’ Egyptian Neoplatonic Theology in De Mysteriis,” Inter-
national Journal of the Platonic Tradition 2 (2008) 164–205.

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10 Myst. 1.3 [7.6–8], following the French translation of Saffrey-Segonds.
11 Myst. 1.3 [6.9–10]: “We are enveloped (περιεχόµεθα) in [divine com-

munion] and filled (πληρούµεθα) by it.” Notice that the dominant metaphors
are of touch or commingling.

390 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

with the nature of the gods, could the soul be awakened to its
latent divinity and reintegrated with its transcendental source.

Iamblichus represents theurgy as an initiated tradition (παρά-

δοσις) descending ultimately from the hieratic cults of the
Egyptians, who were “the first to be allotted communion
(µετουσίαν) with the gods.”12 He does not present himself as an
innovator, but as a faithful exponent of the “way of Hermes,”
referring repeatedly to Hermetic opinions, authors, and texts—

some lost, like the writings of the prophet “Bitys,”13 and the
astrological manual Salmeschiniaka, which dealt with the risings
and settings of stars and technical details of horoscopic astrology
relating to the decans and planetary rulers. Porphyry and
Iamblichus discuss this manual in connection with the astral

theology of the priest and Stoic philosopher Chaeremon (first
century CE), who evidently endorsed its teachings.14 According
to Iamblichus the study of such astral phenomena was pre-
liminary to the deeper mysteries of Hermetism and occupied the
lowest rung (ἐν τοῖς ἐσχάτοις) in the Egyptian understanding of

causes (τὴν παρ᾽ Αἰγυπτίοις αἰτιολογίαν).15 He also draws upon
unnamed “theological Hermetica”16 that related the mythologi-

12 Myst. 7.5 [191.23–24].
13 Myst. 8.5. Bitys is also referenced by the alchemist Zosimos of Panopolis

and he may be identical to “Pitys,” the alleged author of a series of necro-
mantic rites in PGM 4. On Bitys see Fowden, Egyptian Hermes 150–153.

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not bound to matter.35

He is frustratingly silent as to the character of this immaterial
cult. It may have involved visualization of geometrical icons of
the gods, as Shaw has argued,36 and presumably the chanting of
divine names, a practice that “awakened corresponding sun-
thêmata in the soul,”37 thereby expanding its receptivity to divine
illumination.38 Similar practices are illustrated in the Hermetica:
for instance, the initiate is instructed to become like God by
imagining that their mind contains all cosmic powers.39 There
are also references to speech offerings (λογικαὶ θυσίαι), hymns of
praise and thanksgiving,40 sometimes incorporating the ritual
utterance of divine names, as notably in the Coptic Discourse on
the Eighth and Ninth (NH VI, 6. 52,1–63,32) where the ascent to
the Ogdoad is facilitated by the singing of a hymn that incor-
porates Greek vocalic incantations and the “barbarous” names
ZŌXATHAZŌ and ZŌZAZŌTH.41

35 Myst. 5.19 [168.15–24]. Saffrey and Segonds suppose that the gods who

are of singular form or species (µονοειδεῖς) are the planetary deities (Jamblique
313); but as these gods do rule over nature, the reference must be to their
intelligible superiors, who are completely removed from matter (οἱ παντελῶς

ἀσώµατοι θεοί, Myst. 1.19; Saffrey-Segonds 45.15). On the distinction be-
tween material and immaterial deities see also Myst. 5.14, with the analysis of
Shaw, Theurgy and the Soul 135–136.

36 Shaw, Theurgy and the Soul 199–209 and passim.
37 Shaw, Theurgy and the Soul 111.
38 He also mentions at 5.20 intermediate forms of theurgy appropriate to

deities that mediate between the cosmic and hyper-cosmic realms. The
chanting of divine names might have fallen into this liminal category, since
speech offerings are less material than animal or vegetable sacrifices, though
not altogether internalized.

39 Corp.Herm. 11.19–20, 13.11.
40 Corp.Herm. 1.31, 13.18–19; Disc. 8–9 [NHC VI, 6. 57,18–25]; Cf.

Asclepius 41: “Rather let us worship him by giving thanks, for god finds mortal
gratitude to be the best incense” (transl. Copenhaver, Hermetica 92). On
speech offerings see Fowden, Egyptian Hermes 147–148.

41 NHC VI, 6. 56,17–22. For a compelling analysis of these barbarous

KYLE FRASER 397

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The very quality of the sound (αὐτὸ τὸ τῆς φωνῆς ποιὸν) and the
[ ]51 of the Egyptian names intrinsically contain the energy of
the beings they name (ἐνέργειαν τῶν λεγοµένων). As far as you are
able, O King, you who are capable of all things, preserve the
discourse untranslated, lest mysteries of such importance fall into
Greek hands; lest the haughty speech (ὑπερήφανος φράσις) of the
Greeks, which is both vague and, as it were, ostentatious (κεκαλ-

λωπισµένη), make ineffectual (ἐξίτηλον) what is sacred and well
founded: the energetic idiom (ἐνεργετικὴν … φράσιν) of our names.
For the Greeks, O King, have empty speeches, effective only for
syllogistic, and that is the character of Greek philosophy, a babble
of speech (λόγων ψόφος). For our part, we do not employ speeches
but efficacious sounds (φωναῖς µεσταῖς τῶν ἔργων).52

The Greeks employed the onomatopoeic word “barbarous” to

capture the chatter (bar bar) of foreign languages like Egyptian.
Asclepius cleverly reverses this Hellenocentric assessment. He
contrasts the grandiloquence of Greek, its attention to osten-
tatious style and rhetoric, with the ritual power of Egyptian.
Playing on the phonetic similarity of the words φιλοσοφία and

ψόφος (‘mere sound’)53 he declares that Greek philosophy is

51 The noun corresponding to the feminine article at Corp.Herm. 16.2.7 is

missing in the manuscripts, as is perhaps indicated in Paris.gr. 1220 (14th cent.)
by the erasure of approximately four letters between Αἰγυπτίων and ὀνοµάτων:
see Nock-Festugière, Hermès Trismégiste I XVII n.2; II 232 n.5 and the ap.crit.

52 Corp.Herm. 16.2 [II 232.7–17], my translation.
53 On this pun see Copenhaver, Hermetica 202.

KYLE FRASER 401

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

impotent babble. Egyptian speech, by contrast, is energetic
(ἐνεργετικήν). More specifically, the sounds of Egyptian names
contain the energy of the very beings they name (ἐνέργειαν τῶν

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KYLE FRASER 395

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prepared for this ascent through a praxis involving visualization
and prayer, an internalized theurgy in which the soul served as
the receptacle of divine illumination, the “womb” of noetic re-
birth.31 The material side of theurgic cult—the consecration of
physical receptacles and the offering of sacrifices—was not
neglected, as evident in the famous ‘god-making’ passage in the
Latin Asclepius.32 However, material offerings were deemed ap-
propriate only for the cult of ministering daimons and cosmic
divinities. As Iamblichus testifies, the Hermetic ascent beyond
fatality, “towards the god who is the creator,” did not rely on the
aid of matter (µήτε ὕλην προσποιουµένους).33 The supreme deity
was approached only through spiritual modes of sacrifice. Even
to offer him incense, Hermes says, is “akin to sacrilege, for he
wants nothing who is himself all things or in whom all things
are.”34

In his extensive treatment of sacrifice, Iamblichus echoes this
Hermetic principle that cult must be adapted to the complexity
of the divine hierarchy:

Whenever we offer cult to the gods who rule over soul and nature,
it is not inappropriate to offer them natural powers … But when
we endeavour to honour those gods that are in and of themselves
singular in form, it is fitting to bestow on them honours that are

more advanced rite of visionary ascent described in Disc. 8–9: Tradition of
Hermes 244–245, 314–315, 372. This debate notwithstanding, Corp.Herm.
13.15 does anticipate the soul’s eventual return to the Ogdoad, though
without specifying whether it can be experienced through visionary praxis (as
in Disc. 8–9 and Corp.Herm. 4) or only postmortem (as, apparently, in Corp.
Herm. 1).

31 Corp.Herm. 13.2 [II 200.17–201.1]: “O child, [the womb] is the wisdom
of understanding in silence, and the seed is the true good” (transl. Copen-
haver, Hermetica 49).

32 Asclepius 38. Hermes describes the consecration of temple statues
(“earthly gods”), created from materials sympathetically attuned to celestial
harmonies.

33 Myst. 8.4 [198.2].
34 Asclepius 41[II 352.12–15] (transl. Copenhaver, Hermetica 92).

396 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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not bound to matter.35

He is frustratingly silent as to the character of this immaterial
cult.
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—————
Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

ISSN 2159-3159
Article copyright held by the author(s) and made available under the

Creative Commons Attribution License
CC-BY https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Hermetism and Hieratic Tradition in the

De mysteriis of Iamblichus

Kyle Fraser

CHOLARS HAVE LONG RECOGNIZED the importance of
the testimony of Iamblichus, along with that of his near
contemporary Zosimos of Panopolis, in reconstructing the

wider Greco-Egyptian milieu of Hermetism, and its intersections
with neighbouring esoteric currents, including alchemy, astrol-
ogy, magic, and theurgy.1 In the first section of this paper, I sur-
vey Iamblichus’ allusions to Hermetic authorities and sources,
including some lost Hermetica, and I establish the relevance of
the spiritual ethos of Hermetism to the theurgic project of the De
mysteriis. The literary persona of the prophet Abamon is inter-
preted in the light of the convention of Hermetic pseudonymity,
and the rites and soteriological goals of theurgy are related to
visionary and liturgical practices in the extant Hermetic corpus,
including the use of the so-called ὀνόµατα βάρβαρα. Iamblichus
presents an impassioned defence of the ritual power of such bar-
barous names, insisting that Greek translation of Assyrian and
Egyptian invocations deprives them of ritual potency. In the
second section of the paper, I relate Iamblichus’ discussion of the
ὀνόµατα βάρβαρα, and his concerns about translation, to Corpus
Hermeticum 16, examining a hitherto unappreciated lexical par-
allel. In both sources, the dangers of cultural and linguistic
blending are encapsulated in the use of the rich adjective
ἐξίτηλος to capture the fading of tradition and the depoten-
tialization of ritual speech.

1 See Garth Fowden’s pioneering study, The Egyptian Hermes: A Historical

Approach to the Late Pagan Mind (Cambridge 1986) 116–141.

S

KYLE FRASER 387

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

Iamblichus and the way of Hermes

In his De mysteriis, Iamblichus frames a magisterial defence of
the cult practices of Mediterranean and Near Eastern antiquity.
Under the unifying concept of theurgy (“divine work”) he sub-
sumes the entire sweep of traditional divinatory and sacrificial
technologies, arguing for their theological coherence and even
their salvific necessity.

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14 Myst. 8.4; Epist. ad Aneb. fr.81 (Saffrey-Segonds, Porphyre 75–77). Porphyry
states that the decans, horoscopic signs, and “powerful leaders” discussed by
Chaeremon were named in the Salmeschiniaka. According to Hephaestion of
Thebes, the astrological writings associated with “Nechepso” also drew from
this manual, which must have been extant by the second century BCE. On
the testimonials relating to the Salmeschiniaka see G. Adamson, “The Old
Gods of Egypt in Lost Hermetica and Early Sethianism,” in A. D. DeConick
et al. (eds.), Histories of the Hidden God: Concealment and Revelation in Western
Gnostic, Esoteric, and Mystical Traditions (Durham 2013) 58–86, at 60–67.

15 Myst. 8.4 [197.7–12]. See O’Meara, in Transzendentales Ägypten 263.
16 As Fowden calls them: Egyptian Hermes 137–139. On Iamblichus’ discus-

sion of Egyptian theology in Myst. 8.2–3 see also C. H. Bull, The Tradition of

KYLE FRASER 391

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

cal deities of Egypt to a hierarchy of hyper-cosmic and cosmic
deities. At the summit of the hierarchy is the indivisible One (τὸ

ἓν ἀµερές), from which arises a self-begotten Monad, described

as the principle of intellection (νοητάρχης), and identified in one
Hermetic account with the deity Kmeph.17 From this primal
Intellect arises the Demiurgic mind, whose various powers and
activities (δυνάµεις τε καὶ ἐνεργείας) are veiled mythologically in
the names and attributes of the deities Amoun, Ptah, and

Osiris.18
Iamblichus assures Porphyry that the writings circulating

under the name of Hermes Trismegistus contain authentic
Egyptian doctrine, even though they are expressed in the Greek
idiom and employ the terminology of Greek philosophy. The
reason for this, he says, is that the Hermetica were translated
into Greek by men knowledgeable in philosophy.19 Iamblichus’
references to Hermetic sources are typically vague and specific
borrowings are difficult to establish. There was a considerable
Hermetic literature in later antiquity,20 of which our Byzantine

Hermes Trismegistus: The Egyptian Priestly Figure as a Teacher of Hellenized Wisdom
(Leiden 2018) 131–146, who stresses parallels with Poimandres (Corp.Herm. 1);
Adamson, in Histories of the Hidden God 67–77, on parallels with the Sethian
Eugnostos (NH III, 3 and V, 1); O’Meara, in Transzendentales Ägypten 266–267;
D. Clark, “Iamblichus’ Egyptian Neoplatonic Theology in De Mysteriis,” Inter-
national Journal of the Platonic Tradition 2 (2008) 164–205.

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4 On the figure of Anebo see Saffrey-Segonds, Porphyre XXX–XXXII; H. D
Saffrey, “Abamon, pseudonyme de Jamblique,” in R. B. Palmer et al. (eds.),
Philomathes: Studies and Essays in the Humanities in Memory of Philip Merlan (The
Hague 1971) 227–239, at 231–233; Addey, Divination and Theurgy 135–136,
with n.38.

388 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

To Porphyry, the theurgic turn initiated by Iamblichus, with its
pronounced focus on cult, seemed an aberration from the con-
templative ideals of true Platonism.5 In response, Iamblichus,
writing in the guise the Egyptian prophet “Abamon,”6 suggests
that Porphyry’s concerns are premised on a dualistic interpre-
tation of Platonic metaphysics. By arguing from the perspective
of an uncompromising transcendence, Porphyry has lost sight of
divine immanence and the unbroken continuity of the cosmos.
Just as light illumines all things from outside, without loss or
rupture, so, Iamblichus insists, the gods are present immaterially
in material beings.

Porphyry followed Plotinus in holding that the highest part of
the soul, the pure intellect (nous), remains grounded in the divine
Mind, never descending into fatal embodiment; and so, by with-
drawing from the external world of materiality and contingency,
the philosopher discovers that he is always already at one with
the divine.7 For Iamblichus, this pure noeticism might well de-
scribe the state of the holy man, who has already transcended
fate, but it did not offer a way of salvation for the alienated
person, entangled in the bonds of materiality. The Plotinian ap-
proach, at least as Porphyry represented it, threatened to reduce
philosophy to the methodologies of human intellection: it as-
sumes that we can think our way to union with Divinity. In the
final analysis, knowledge is a barrier to the attainment of salvific

5 As A. P. Johnson argues (Religion and Identity in Porphyry of Tyre: The Limits

of Hellenism in Late Antiquity [Cambridge 2013] 105), Porphyry was “a con-
sistent critic of traditional forms of ritual.” He rejected blood sacrifice as pol-
luting and dangerous (e.g. Abst. 2.42–47), though conceding the legitimacy of
vegetable sacrifices to the celestial deities (Abst. 2.32, 37).

6 On the possible meanings of the Egyptian names Anebo and Abamon see
the interesting (albeit speculative) analysis of Elsa Oréal reported in Saffrey-
Segonds, Porphyre XXXII–XXXVI.

7 On the Plotinian doctrine of the undescended soul as the metaphysical
ground of Porphyry’s anti-ritualism see G. Shaw, Theurgy and the Soul: The
Neoplatonism of Iamblichus (University Park 1995) 11–14 and passim; Saffrey-
Segonds, Jamblique XLIX–LI.

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ἀσώµατοι θεοί, Myst. 1.19; Saffrey-Segonds 45.15). On the distinction be-
tween material and immaterial deities see also Myst. 5.14, with the analysis of
Shaw, Theurgy and the Soul 135–136.

36 Shaw, Theurgy and the Soul 199–209 and passim.
37 Shaw, Theurgy and the Soul 111.
38 He also mentions at 5.20 intermediate forms of theurgy appropriate to

deities that mediate between the cosmic and hyper-cosmic realms. The
chanting of divine names might have fallen into this liminal category, since
speech offerings are less material than animal or vegetable sacrifices, though
not altogether internalized.

39 Corp.Herm. 11.19–20, 13.11.
40 Corp.Herm. 1.31, 13.18–19; Disc. 8–9 [NHC VI, 6. 57,18–25]; Cf.

Asclepius 41: “Rather let us worship him by giving thanks, for god finds mortal
gratitude to be the best incense” (transl. Copenhaver, Hermetica 92). On
speech offerings see Fowden, Egyptian Hermes 147–148.

41 NHC VI, 6. 56,17–22. For a compelling analysis of these barbarous

KYLE FRASER 397

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In his extended treatment of Egyptian theology in Book 7,
Iamblichus discusses the theurgic significance of such so-called
barbarous names (ὀνόµατα βάρβαρα), which he divides into two
kinds: the ineffable names (ἄσηµα ὀνόµατα), which are nonsensi-
cal in human terms, and the traditional names or epithets of the
gods in foreign languages, chiefly Assyrian42 and Egyptian. The
use of the first type, the ineffable names, was widespread in late
ancient ritual traditions—obscure names like BAINCHÔÔÔCH or
ABLANATHANALBA, sometimes formulated as palindromes, or
even as strings of Greek vowels are commonplace in the so-
called Greek magical papyri, and they appear also on curse
tablets, protective gemstones, and lamellae. Some of the ineffable
names were, in reality, derivations or corruptions of foreign epi-
thets—for instance, the Egyptian-derived names BAINCHÔÔÔCH
(“spirit of darkness”) and BOLCHOSÊTH (“Baal, who strikes, [that
is] Seth”).43 But Iamblichus surely would not approve of the
modern scholarly interest in tracing the etymological roots of
these words, since their power (on his view) lies precisely in their
opacity to human conceptualization. The deployment of such
unintelligible names seemed to Porphyry to confirm the irration-
ality of theurgy: “For you inquire, ‘What is the point of the

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as the principle of intellection (νοητάρχης), and identified in one
Hermetic account with the deity Kmeph.17 From this primal
Intellect arises the Demiurgic mind, whose various powers and
activities (δυνάµεις τε καὶ ἐνεργείας) are veiled mythologically in
the names and attributes of the deities Amoun, Ptah, and

Osiris.18
Iamblichus assures Porphyry that the writings circulating

under the name of Hermes Trismegistus contain authentic
Egyptian doctrine, even though they are expressed in the Greek
idiom and employ the terminology of Greek philosophy. The
reason for this, he says, is that the Hermetica were translated
into Greek by men knowledgeable in philosophy.19 Iamblichus’
references to Hermetic sources are typically vague and specific
borrowings are difficult to establish. There was a considerable
Hermetic literature in later antiquity,20 of which our Byzantine

Hermes Trismegistus: The Egyptian Priestly Figure as a Teacher of Hellenized Wisdom
(Leiden 2018) 131–146, who stresses parallels with Poimandres (Corp.Herm. 1);
Adamson, in Histories of the Hidden God 67–77, on parallels with the Sethian
Eugnostos (NH III, 3 and V, 1); O’Meara, in Transzendentales Ägypten 266–267;
D. Clark, “Iamblichus’ Egyptian Neoplatonic Theology in De Mysteriis,” Inter-
national Journal of the Platonic Tradition 2 (2008) 164–205.

17 Kmeph appears as “Emeph” in the manuscripts: see Clarke et al., On the
Mysteries 309 n.407. Iamblichus surveys two Hermetic accounts of the prin-
ciples in Myst. 8.2 and 8.3, respectively. The mythological associations are
outlined in the second ordering (τάξις). But the systems seem consistent in
their underlying metaphysics, as argued persuasively by Bull, Tradition of Her-
mes 132–133 (with n.162) and assumed by Adamson, in Histories of the Hidden
God 67–68.

18 Myst. 8.3 [195.14–23].
19 Myst. 8.4 [196.20–26].
20 According to one Seleucus, there were 20,000 Hermetic books, while the

priestly scholar Manetho reports 36,525 (Myst. 8.1), a figure that may be
based on the Sothic cycle (Saffrey-Segonds, Jamblique 326 n.2). Even account-

392 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

collection preserves only a few exemplars, perhaps those least
offensive to Christian sensibilities.21 Still, Iamblichus’ general
presentation of the spiritual ethos of the Hermetic tradition
accords well with our extant Hermetic corpus.

In particular, Iamblichus shares with the authors of the
Hermetica a nostalgia for the old ways of Egypt, for the time-
honoured temple cults and their priestly wisdom, which seemed
(at least in the eyes of traditionalists) to be fast deteriorating
under Roman occupation.

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But, above all, this doctrine constitutes the ruination of sacred
ritual and theurgical communion of gods with men, by banishing
the presence (παρουσίαν) of the higher classes of beings outside the
confines of the earth. For it amounts to nothing else but saying
that the divine is set apart from the earthly realm, and that it does
not mingle with humanity, and that this realm is bereft (ἔρηµος) of
divinity.71

These words echo the dire prophecy of Hermes in the Perfect
Discourse, a passage that survives in its Latin translation, in

69 On the rhetorical dimensions of ‘magic’, as understood by Porphyry, see

Struck, in Magic and Ritual 387–392.
70 On the impasse between the cultures of contemplation and action see

Struck, in Magic and Ritual 389–393.
71 Myst. 1.8 [21.10–16], transl. Clarke et al. 35, but following Saffrey-

Segonds in rendering Ὃλως δὲ as “above all” (surtout), rather than “generally”
(see Jamblique 243 n.2).

KYLE FRASER 407

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

Asclepius 24–26, and in a Coptic fragment (NHC VI, 8). Hermes
predicts a time when foreigners will occupy Egypt, enacting laws
that proscribe the traditional cults: probably an allusion to the
Roman prohibition of Egyptian oracular processions and related
divinatory practices under the prefect Aemilius Saturninus in
199 CE.72 Through this neglect of divine cult, Hermes warns,
Egypt will be deserted by the gods: “All of their holy veneration
(sancta veneratio) will prove vain and will come to nothing. Return-
ing from earth to heaven, divinity will abandon Egypt; the land
that was the seat of religion will be widowed by the gods and
deprived of their presence (vidvata numinum praesentia destituetur).”73
In both sources, the efficacy of the time-honoured cults depends
upon the active and benevolent presence of the gods in their
sacred icons and holy sites; and, in turn, it is the devoted worship
of the gods that sustains that presence,74 without which the earth
would be reduced to a wasteland.

Conclusion

Just as Iamblichus concealed his identity under the guise of
Abamon, the anonymous authors of the Hermetica attributed
their writings to Hermes or his student Asclepius. Following the
lead of Garth Fowden, Christian Bull has made a compelling
case for the authenticity of the Egyptian mis-en-scène of the Her-
metic dialogues, suggesting that the authors may well have been
Hellenized Egyptian priests.75 Iamblichus too understood him-
self as a priest—at least in spirit. A Syrian by birth, Yamliku
(literally, “may he rule”) was descended from the hereditary

72 P.Coll.Youtie 30 (TM 18193). On the date and background of the
Hermetic apocalypse see C. H. Bull, “Prophesying the Demise of Egyptian
Religion in Late Antiquity,” Numen 68 (2021) 180–203, at 186–187.

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KYLE FRASER 393

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lations of Egyptian texts is of special interest. He implies that the
Hermetic books are translations of the books of Thoth—the
Egyptian prototype of Hermes Trismegistus. These books pre-
served the essential protocols and procedures of Egyptian cult
ritual.24 Iamblichus perceives the Hermetic writings as a vital
link to this authentic and pure hieratic tradition. In the guise of
the προφήτης Abamon,25 he opens his treatise by declaring his
pious subordination to Hermes Trismegistus, “the god who pre-
sides over rational discourse,” and “the common patron of all
priests,” adding that “it is to him that our ancestors in particular
dedicated the fruits of their wisdom, attributing all their own
writings to Hermes.”26 Thus, we should understand the pseudo-
nym Abamon not merely as a rhetorical conceit, but as the
expression of an initiatic ethos that demands the subordination
of Iamblichus as prophet to the hieratic authority of Thoth-
Hermes. In concealing his own name and authorship, Iambli-
chus pays reverence to Hermes and the Hermetic tradition,
implying that his own work is merely a faithful transmission of
its venerable mysteries, another link in the chain of initiatic
transmission.

Iamblichus insists that the “way” of Hermes was not a matter
of theorizing about the gods—underscoring again his point
about the limitations of knowledge—but a theurgic praxis
through which the soul ascended to the regions beyond fate:

And [the Egyptians] do not merely theorize about these matters
(οὐδ’ ὅλως ψιλῶς θεωροῦσιν), but they recommend that we ascend
through sacred theurgy (διὰ τῆς ἱερατικῆς θεουργίας) to the regions
that are higher, more universal and superior to fate, towards the
god who is the creator, without calling in the aid of matter (µήτε

ὕλην προσποιουµένους) or bringing to bear anything other than the
observation of the propitious time for action. Hermes has also set

24 On the books of Thoth and their cultic significance see Fowden, Egyptian
Hermes 57–68.

25 Abamon is described as προφήτης at Myst. 1.1 [2.17].
26 Myst. 1.1; transl. in Clarke et al. 5.

394 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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out this way (ὁδόν) and the prophet Bitys has given an inter-
pretation of it to King Ammon.27

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This Hermetic assessment of the superiority of Egyptian as a
ritual language finds a striking parallel in the arguments of
Iamblichus in defence of the theurgic use of barbarous names.
Porphyry had ridiculed the theurgic fascination with foreign
names, especially Egyptian-sounding names. “For the god in-
voked presumably would not be of Egyptian birth. Even if he is
Egyptian, he certainly does not (οὔ τί γε) use Egyptian speech,
nor any human speech at all.”57 Words, Porphyry thinks, are
merely conventional signifiers—linguistic fictions. Surely, the
gods are oblivious to our petty ethnic and linguistic categories.
Iamblichus rejects this representational theory of language:58

“But,” you say, “the listener looks to the meaning (τὰ σηµαινό-

µενα), so that as long as the concept (ἔννοια) remains the same, it
is sufficient, no matter what name is used.” But the situation is not
as you suppose. For if the names were established by convention,
then it would not matter whether some were used instead of
others. But if they are joined to the nature of what exists (τῇ φύσει
συνήρτηται τῶν ὄντων), then those that are better adapted to it will
be more precious to the gods.59

Like our Hermetic author, Iamblichus alludes to the iconicity of
the Egyptian names, which are “joined to the nature of what
exists,” in contrast to the merely conventional character of

56 Frankfurter, Religion in Roman Egypt 248–253.
57 Saffrey-Segonds, Porphyre 72.
58 On the Greek philosophical debate as to whether language is natural or

conventional see Struck, in Magic and Ritual 391–392.
59 Myst. 7.5 [190.26–191.7]; transl. Clarke et al. 299, with some modifi-

cations.

KYLE FRASER 403

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Greek names.60 In translating the Egyptian names into the more
prolix Greek idiom one loses not only their nuance and pre-
cision, but their ritual power:

Moreover, even if one could translate them, they would not retain
the same power (δύναµιν). For the barbarian names possess
weightiness and great precision, participating in less ambiguity,
variability, and multiplicity of expression.61

Again, the grandiloquence of Greek is contrasted unfavour-
ably with the directness of Egyptian; and echoing our Hermetic
author, Iamblichus urges that the traditional invocations should
be preserved in their original tongue, lest they be drained of
sacrality and efficacy:

And it is necessary that the prayers of the ancients, like sacred
places of sanctuary, are preserved ever the same and in the same
manner, with no diminishment or embellishment from alien
sources. For this is the reason that all these things in place at the
present time have become ineffectual (ἐξίτηλα), both the names
and the prayers, because they are endlessly altered according to
the inventiveness and illegality of the Hellenes.62

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conventional see Struck, in Magic and Ritual 391–392.
59 Myst. 7.5 [190.26–191.7]; transl. Clarke et al. 299, with some modifi-

cations.

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

Greek names.60 In translating the Egyptian names into the more
prolix Greek idiom one loses not only their nuance and pre-
cision, but their ritual power:

Moreover, even if one could translate them, they would not retain
the same power (δύναµιν). For the barbarian names possess
weightiness and great precision, participating in less ambiguity,
variability, and multiplicity of expression.61

Again, the grandiloquence of Greek is contrasted unfavour-
ably with the directness of Egyptian; and echoing our Hermetic
author, Iamblichus urges that the traditional invocations should
be preserved in their original tongue, lest they be drained of
sacrality and efficacy:

And it is necessary that the prayers of the ancients, like sacred
places of sanctuary, are preserved ever the same and in the same
manner, with no diminishment or embellishment from alien
sources. For this is the reason that all these things in place at the
present time have become ineffectual (ἐξίτηλα), both the names
and the prayers, because they are endlessly altered according to
the inventiveness and illegality of the Hellenes.62

Here we encounter an intriguing lexical parallel with the ex-
hortation of Asclepius to king Ammon in Corp.Herm. 16. In both
texts, the rich adjective ἐξίτηλος (which I render as “ineffectual”)
captures the depotentializing of the Egyptian language through
Greek translation. In common usage, this adjective describes
what fades through the long passage of time. Xenophon and
Pausanias use the word to describe the fading of colours.63 Pollux
includes the word amongst a cluster of comparable terms de-

60 On the agreement of Iamblichus with the understanding of the Egyptian

language in Corp.Herm. 16 see J. Assmann, “La théorie de la ‘parole divine’
(mdw ntr) chez Jamblique et dans les sources égyptiennes,” appendix to Images
et rites de la mort dans l’Égypte ancienne. L’apport des liturgies funéraires (Paris 2000)
107–127, at 108–112.

61 Myst. 7.5 [191.13–18], transl. Clarke et al. 299, slightly modified.
62 Myst. 7.5 [192.15–22], transl. Clarke et al. 301, slightly modified.
63 Xen. Oec. 10.3, Paus. 10.38.9–10.

404 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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scriptive of ancient inscriptions on stelae (Onom.

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Iamblichus and the way of Hermes

In his De mysteriis, Iamblichus frames a magisterial defence of
the cult practices of Mediterranean and Near Eastern antiquity.
Under the unifying concept of theurgy (“divine work”) he sub-
sumes the entire sweep of traditional divinatory and sacrificial
technologies, arguing for their theological coherence and even
their salvific necessity. The original title of his treatise (renamed
in the fifteenth century by its illustrious Renaissance translator,
Marsilio Ficino) was The Reply of the Master Abamon to the Letter of
Porphyry to Anebo and the Solutions to the Questions it Contains.2
Porphyry had directed a series of questions—really, thinly veiled
criticisms3—to one “Anebo,” who was either an Egyptian
student of Iamblichus or, as seems more likely, a fictive repre-
sentative of the Iamblichan school with its Egyptianizing em-
phases.4 If the gods are transcendental—as any good Platonist
must concede—why, he asked, do theurgists employ sacrifices
and invocations, as though unalterable divinities could be per-
suaded by material offerings or random human vocalizations?

2 Ficino’s complete title was De mysteriis Aegyptiorum, Chaldaeorum, Assyriorum.
On this title and Ficino as editor see H. D. Saffrey and A.-Ph. Segonds,
Jamblique, Réponse à Porphyre (De mysteriis) (Paris 2013) IX–XXI.

3 I am not persuaded by the thesis of C. Addey (Divination and Theurgy in
Neoplatonism: Oracles of the Gods [Farnham 2014] 135–136) that Porphyry’s
letter was a dialogic exercise, more exploratory than polemical, nor by P.
Athanassiadi’s image of Porphyry as naïve, hesitant, and deferential to the
authority of Iamblichus (“Dreams, Theurgy and Freelance Divination,” JRS
83 [1993] 115–130, at 117–119). On Porphyry’s polemical intent see H. D.
Saffrey and A.-Ph. Segonds, Porphyre, Lettre à Anébon l’Égyptien (Paris 2012)
XXXVI–XXXVII; and D. J. O’Meara, “The Image of Egyptian Wisdom in Late
Antique Platonism,” in M. Sommer et al. (eds.), Transzendentales Ägypten: Jen-
seits, Himmel, Hölle und das Ende in antik-ägyptischen Diskursen (Paderborn 2024)
259–270, at 262.

4 On the figure of Anebo see Saffrey-Segonds, Porphyre XXX–XXXII; H. D
Saffrey, “Abamon, pseudonyme de Jamblique,” in R. B. Palmer et al. (eds.),
Philomathes: Studies and Essays in the Humanities in Memory of Philip Merlan (The
Hague 1971) 227–239, at 231–233; Addey, Divination and Theurgy 135–136,
with n.38.

388 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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enance (Religion in Roman Egypt 240). Fowden, as Bull observes (11), seems
undecided as to the priestly status of the Hermetic authors (see Fowden,
Egyptian Hermes 166–168).

408 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

priest-kings of Emesa.76 His was a royal and priestly name,
shared by two Emesene priest-kings (Iamblichus I, d. 31 BCE;
Iamblichus II, d. ca. 17 CE).77 He could thus regard himself as a
priest by birthright, even if not in fact. Whereas Porphyry trans-
lated his Phoenician name, Malchos, into Greek, Iamblichus
retained his Syrian name, merely rendering it in Greek char-
acters.78 Again, whereas Porphyry settled to teach in Rome,
Iamblichus formed a spiritual commune in the outskirts of
Apamea, on the fringes of the Syrian desert. Porphyry’s in-
difference to ethnicity is consistent with his commitments to the
universal culture of Hellenism—the culture of empire.79 And this
cultural universalism maps directly onto his understanding of
metaphysics: his commitment to the Plotinian doctrine of the
undescended intellect, which remains always in union with its
transcendent source, beyond all spatio-temporal distinctions and
cultural entanglements. By contrast, Iamblichus remained con-
vinced that salvation was only possible through the preservation
of the distinctive hieratic traditions of antiquity. He embraced
his Syrian heritage and his priestly name, perhaps seeking
through theurgy to recover his birthright as a technician of the
sacred, a protector of the cultic traditions that bind humanity to
the gods. Of course, Iamblichus thinks and speaks in Greek, and
like the priestly disciples of Hermes, he inhabits a space of cul-

76 On his priestly name and Syrian background see P. Athanassiadi, “The
Oecumenism of Iamblichus: Latent Knowledge and its Awakening,” JRS 85
(1995) 244–250, at 245; and Clarke et al., On the Mysteries xix–xx.

77 On the Emesene dynasty and Iamblichus I and II see R. D. Sullivan,
“The Dynasty of Emesa,” ANRW II.8 (1977) 198–219; W. Ball, Rome in the
East: The Transformation of an Empire (London 2000) 33–47. Ball notes (34) that
a shaikh of the Emesenes bore the name Iamblichus already in the second
century BCE before the founding of the dynasty.

78 See Struck, in Magic and Ritual 397–398. On the name of Porphyry and
his Phoenician background see also Millar, in Philosophia Togata II 248–249.

79 Struck, in Magic and Ritual 396, contrasts the universalizing tendencies of
Porphyry with Iamblichus’ “strong interest in the ‘local’ over and above the
‘imperial’ or the ‘international’.” On the homogenizing universalism of Por-
phyry see also Johnson, Religion and Identity 123.

KYLE FRASER 409

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Of course, Iamblichus thinks and speaks in Greek, and
like the priestly disciples of Hermes, he inhabits a space of cul-

76 On his priestly name and Syrian background see P. Athanassiadi, “The
Oecumenism of Iamblichus: Latent Knowledge and its Awakening,” JRS 85
(1995) 244–250, at 245; and Clarke et al., On the Mysteries xix–xx.

77 On the Emesene dynasty and Iamblichus I and II see R. D. Sullivan,
“The Dynasty of Emesa,” ANRW II.8 (1977) 198–219; W. Ball, Rome in the
East: The Transformation of an Empire (London 2000) 33–47. Ball notes (34) that
a shaikh of the Emesenes bore the name Iamblichus already in the second
century BCE before the founding of the dynasty.

78 See Struck, in Magic and Ritual 397–398. On the name of Porphyry and
his Phoenician background see also Millar, in Philosophia Togata II 248–249.

79 Struck, in Magic and Ritual 396, contrasts the universalizing tendencies of
Porphyry with Iamblichus’ “strong interest in the ‘local’ over and above the
‘imperial’ or the ‘international’.” On the homogenizing universalism of Por-
phyry see also Johnson, Religion and Identity 123.

KYLE FRASER 409

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

tural liminality, an inbetweenness, marked by nostalgia for a
fading tradition, a nostalgia succinctly encapsulated in the rich—

and, ironically, Greek—term ἐξίτηλος.80

April, 2025 University of King’s College

Halifax, Nova Scotia
kyle.fraser@ukings.ca

80 I am grateful to the anonymous reviewer for their helpful recom-

mendations. Thanks also to Dr. Richard Gordon for his learned comments
and corrections on an earlier draft, and to Dr. Gregory Shaw for his en-
couraging feedback.

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68 Myst. 7.5 [191.13–15].

406 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

capacity to tap into the deep structure of reality. Language slips
into a merely representational mode, deepening the alienation
of the soul, which longs to be reintegrated with its divine source.

In the eyes of Porphyry, what Iamblichus called theurgy was
just a loftier name for ‘magic’—the barbarous names of theur-
gists are the very same devices by which lowly magicians attempt
to bind the gods to their will.69 Magic, as Porphyry understands
it, is essentially coercive and it is premised on bad theology. Like
many Greco-Roman elites, he perceives it as a foreign super-
stition, fundamentally at odds with the sober ideals of the uni-
versal Hellenic culture. In this way, as Struck notes, the Hellenic
“culture of contemplation” is set against the barbarous culture
of ritual action, or, in Porphyry’s polemical terms, γοητεία.70

Deploying his own cultural stereotypes, Iamblichus represents
Porphyry’s disdain for the hieratic traditions of the barbaroi as
typical Hellenic hubris. To suggest that divine transcendence
precludes the efficacious activity of the gods in sacred names and
icons is to deprive the cosmos and the embodied soul of divine
presence—effectively turning the universe into a desacralized
wasteland:

But, above all, this doctrine constitutes the ruination of sacred
ritual and theurgical communion of gods with men, by banishing
the presence (παρουσίαν) of the higher classes of beings outside the
confines of the earth. For it amounts to nothing else but saying
that the divine is set apart from the earthly realm, and that it does
not mingle with humanity, and that this realm is bereft (ἔρηµος) of
divinity.71

These words echo the dire prophecy of Hermes in the Perfect
Discourse, a passage that survives in its Latin translation, in

69 On the rhetorical dimensions of ‘magic’, as understood by Porphyry, see

Struck, in Magic and Ritual 387–392.
70 On the impasse between the cultures of contemplation and action see

Struck, in Magic and Ritual 389–393.
71 Myst. 1.8 [21.10–16], transl. Clarke et al. 35, but following Saffrey-

Segonds in rendering Ὃλως δὲ as “above all” (surtout), rather than “generally”
(see Jamblique 243 n.2).

KYLE FRASER 407

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

Asclepius 24–26, and in a Coptic fragment (NHC VI, 8).

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KYLE FRASER 395

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prepared for this ascent through a praxis involving visualization
and prayer, an internalized theurgy in which the soul served as
the receptacle of divine illumination, the “womb” of noetic re-
birth.31 The material side of theurgic cult—the consecration of
physical receptacles and the offering of sacrifices—was not
neglected, as evident in the famous ‘god-making’ passage in the
Latin Asclepius.32 However, material offerings were deemed ap-
propriate only for the cult of ministering daimons and cosmic
divinities. As Iamblichus testifies, the Hermetic ascent beyond
fatality, “towards the god who is the creator,” did not rely on the
aid of matter (µήτε ὕλην προσποιουµένους).33 The supreme deity
was approached only through spiritual modes of sacrifice. Even
to offer him incense, Hermes says, is “akin to sacrilege, for he
wants nothing who is himself all things or in whom all things
are.”34

In his extensive treatment of sacrifice, Iamblichus echoes this
Hermetic principle that cult must be adapted to the complexity
of the divine hierarchy:

Whenever we offer cult to the gods who rule over soul and nature,
it is not inappropriate to offer them natural powers … But when
we endeavour to honour those gods that are in and of themselves
singular in form, it is fitting to bestow on them honours that are

more advanced rite of visionary ascent described in Disc. 8–9: Tradition of
Hermes 244–245, 314–315, 372. This debate notwithstanding, Corp.Herm.
13.15 does anticipate the soul’s eventual return to the Ogdoad, though
without specifying whether it can be experienced through visionary praxis (as
in Disc. 8–9 and Corp.Herm. 4) or only postmortem (as, apparently, in Corp.
Herm. 1).

31 Corp.Herm. 13.2 [II 200.17–201.1]: “O child, [the womb] is the wisdom
of understanding in silence, and the seed is the true good” (transl. Copen-
haver, Hermetica 49).

32 Asclepius 38. Hermes describes the consecration of temple statues
(“earthly gods”), created from materials sympathetically attuned to celestial
harmonies.

33 Myst. 8.4 [198.2].
34 Asclepius 41[II 352.12–15] (transl. Copenhaver, Hermetica 92).

396 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

not bound to matter.35

He is frustratingly silent as to the character of this immaterial
cult.

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Iamblichus
presents an impassioned defence of the ritual power of such bar-
barous names, insisting that Greek translation of Assyrian and
Egyptian invocations deprives them of ritual potency. In the
second section of the paper, I relate Iamblichus’ discussion of the
ὀνόµατα βάρβαρα, and his concerns about translation, to Corpus
Hermeticum 16, examining a hitherto unappreciated lexical par-
allel. In both sources, the dangers of cultural and linguistic
blending are encapsulated in the use of the rich adjective
ἐξίτηλος to capture the fading of tradition and the depoten-
tialization of ritual speech.

1 See Garth Fowden’s pioneering study, The Egyptian Hermes: A Historical

Approach to the Late Pagan Mind (Cambridge 1986) 116–141.

S

KYLE FRASER 387

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

Iamblichus and the way of Hermes

In his De mysteriis, Iamblichus frames a magisterial defence of
the cult practices of Mediterranean and Near Eastern antiquity.
Under the unifying concept of theurgy (“divine work”) he sub-
sumes the entire sweep of traditional divinatory and sacrificial
technologies, arguing for their theological coherence and even
their salvific necessity. The original title of his treatise (renamed
in the fifteenth century by its illustrious Renaissance translator,
Marsilio Ficino) was The Reply of the Master Abamon to the Letter of
Porphyry to Anebo and the Solutions to the Questions it Contains.2
Porphyry had directed a series of questions—really, thinly veiled
criticisms3—to one “Anebo,” who was either an Egyptian
student of Iamblichus or, as seems more likely, a fictive repre-
sentative of the Iamblichan school with its Egyptianizing em-
phases.4 If the gods are transcendental—as any good Platonist
must concede—why, he asked, do theurgists employ sacrifices
and invocations, as though unalterable divinities could be per-
suaded by material offerings or random human vocalizations?

2 Ficino’s complete title was De mysteriis Aegyptiorum, Chaldaeorum, Assyriorum.
On this title and Ficino as editor see H. D. Saffrey and A.-Ph. Segonds,
Jamblique, Réponse à Porphyre (De mysteriis) (Paris 2013) IX–XXI.

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Certainly, the Egyptian temples
faced significant pressures in the imperial age due to the loss of
state funding, and certain fundamentals of traditional priestly
knowledge declined, notably the understanding of hieroglyphic
script. The abbreviated Demotic script remained in use for
religious and literary purposes, but as Frankfurter notes, it was
“essentially a scribal conceit,” since “by the second century C.E.
even the most insular, conservative priesthoods commonly used
and conversed in Greek.”22 With the development of Old Cop-
tic, beginning in the first century C.E., the Greek script was even
deployed in liturgical contexts as a means of standardizing the
pronunciation of Demotic words.23 In the Corpus Hermeticum,
concerns about the contamination of the Egyptian language
(notably in Corp.Herm. 16) reflect an indigenous, perhaps even
priestly, reaction to these inexorable processes of linguistic
blending. These concerns are shared by Iamblichus, as we shall
discover.

Iamblichus’ claim that the books of Hermes are Greek trans-

ing for exaggeration, or astronomical conceits, the Hermetic literature was
massive in scope.

21 See B. P. Copenhaver, Hermetica: The Greek Corpus Hermeticum and the Latin
Asclepius in a New English Translation (Cambridge 1992) xl–xlv.

22 D. Frankfurter, Religion in Roman Egypt: Assimilation and Resistance (Prince-
ton 1998) 250.

23 Frankfurter, Religion in Roman Egypt 250–251. On Old-Coptic glosses of
Demotic in the London and Leiden magical papyri see J. Dieleman, Priests,
Tongues, and Rites. The London-Leiden Magical Manuscripts and Translation in
Egyptian Ritual (100–300 CE) (Leiden 2005) 26–27 and passim.

KYLE FRASER 393

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

lations of Egyptian texts is of special interest. He implies that the
Hermetic books are translations of the books of Thoth—the
Egyptian prototype of Hermes Trismegistus. These books pre-
served the essential protocols and procedures of Egyptian cult
ritual.24 Iamblichus perceives the Hermetic writings as a vital
link to this authentic and pure hieratic tradition. In the guise of
the προφήτης Abamon,25 he opens his treatise by declaring his
pious subordination to Hermes Trismegistus, “the god who pre-
sides over rational discourse,” and “the common patron of all
priests,” adding that “it is to him that our ancestors in particular
dedicated the fruits of their wisdom, attributing all their own
writings to Hermes.”26 Thus, we should understand the pseudo-
nym Abamon not merely as a rhetorical conceit, but as the
expression of an initiatic ethos that demands the subordination
of Iamblichus as prophet to the hieratic authority of Thoth-
Hermes. In concealing his own name and authorship, Iambli-
chus pays reverence to Hermes and the Hermetic tradition,
implying that his own work is merely a faithful transmission of
its venerable mysteries, another link in the chain of initiatic
transmission.

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Return-
ing from earth to heaven, divinity will abandon Egypt; the land
that was the seat of religion will be widowed by the gods and
deprived of their presence (vidvata numinum praesentia destituetur).”73
In both sources, the efficacy of the time-honoured cults depends
upon the active and benevolent presence of the gods in their
sacred icons and holy sites; and, in turn, it is the devoted worship
of the gods that sustains that presence,74 without which the earth
would be reduced to a wasteland.

Conclusion

Just as Iamblichus concealed his identity under the guise of
Abamon, the anonymous authors of the Hermetica attributed
their writings to Hermes or his student Asclepius. Following the
lead of Garth Fowden, Christian Bull has made a compelling
case for the authenticity of the Egyptian mis-en-scène of the Her-
metic dialogues, suggesting that the authors may well have been
Hellenized Egyptian priests.75 Iamblichus too understood him-
self as a priest—at least in spirit. A Syrian by birth, Yamliku
(literally, “may he rule”) was descended from the hereditary

72 P.Coll.Youtie 30 (TM 18193). On the date and background of the
Hermetic apocalypse see C. H. Bull, “Prophesying the Demise of Egyptian
Religion in Late Antiquity,” Numen 68 (2021) 180–203, at 186–187.

73 Asclepius 24 [II 327.3–7].
74 παρουσίαν: Myst. 1.8 [21.12]; praesentia: Asclepius 24 [II 327.7].
75 Bull, Tradition of Hermes 12. Frankfurter also argues for a priestly prov-

enance (Religion in Roman Egypt 240). Fowden, as Bull observes (11), seems
undecided as to the priestly status of the Hermetic authors (see Fowden,
Egyptian Hermes 166–168).

408 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

priest-kings of Emesa.76 His was a royal and priestly name,
shared by two Emesene priest-kings (Iamblichus I, d. 31 BCE;
Iamblichus II, d. ca. 17 CE).77 He could thus regard himself as a
priest by birthright, even if not in fact. Whereas Porphyry trans-
lated his Phoenician name, Malchos, into Greek, Iamblichus
retained his Syrian name, merely rendering it in Greek char-
acters.78 Again, whereas Porphyry settled to teach in Rome,
Iamblichus formed a spiritual commune in the outskirts of
Apamea, on the fringes of the Syrian desert. Porphyry’s in-
difference to ethnicity is consistent with his commitments to the
universal culture of Hellenism—the culture of empire.79 And this
cultural universalism maps directly onto his understanding of
metaphysics: his commitment to the Plotinian doctrine of the
undescended intellect, which remains always in union with its
transcendent source, beyond all spatio-temporal distinctions and
cultural entanglements. By contrast, Iamblichus remained con-
vinced that salvation was only possible through the preservation
of the distinctive hieratic traditions of antiquity.

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not bound to matter.35

He is frustratingly silent as to the character of this immaterial
cult. It may have involved visualization of geometrical icons of
the gods, as Shaw has argued,36 and presumably the chanting of
divine names, a practice that “awakened corresponding sun-
thêmata in the soul,”37 thereby expanding its receptivity to divine
illumination.38 Similar practices are illustrated in the Hermetica:
for instance, the initiate is instructed to become like God by
imagining that their mind contains all cosmic powers.39 There
are also references to speech offerings (λογικαὶ θυσίαι), hymns of
praise and thanksgiving,40 sometimes incorporating the ritual
utterance of divine names, as notably in the Coptic Discourse on
the Eighth and Ninth (NH VI, 6. 52,1–63,32) where the ascent to
the Ogdoad is facilitated by the singing of a hymn that incor-
porates Greek vocalic incantations and the “barbarous” names
ZŌXATHAZŌ and ZŌZAZŌTH.41

35 Myst. 5.19 [168.15–24]. Saffrey and Segonds suppose that the gods who

are of singular form or species (µονοειδεῖς) are the planetary deities (Jamblique
313); but as these gods do rule over nature, the reference must be to their
intelligible superiors, who are completely removed from matter (οἱ παντελῶς

ἀσώµατοι θεοί, Myst. 1.19; Saffrey-Segonds 45.15). On the distinction be-
tween material and immaterial deities see also Myst. 5.14, with the analysis of
Shaw, Theurgy and the Soul 135–136.

36 Shaw, Theurgy and the Soul 199–209 and passim.
37 Shaw, Theurgy and the Soul 111.
38 He also mentions at 5.20 intermediate forms of theurgy appropriate to

deities that mediate between the cosmic and hyper-cosmic realms. The
chanting of divine names might have fallen into this liminal category, since
speech offerings are less material than animal or vegetable sacrifices, though
not altogether internalized.

39 Corp.Herm. 11.19–20, 13.11.
40 Corp.Herm. 1.31, 13.18–19; Disc. 8–9 [NHC VI, 6. 57,18–25]; Cf.

Asclepius 41: “Rather let us worship him by giving thanks, for god finds mortal
gratitude to be the best incense” (transl. Copenhaver, Hermetica 92). On
speech offerings see Fowden, Egyptian Hermes 147–148.

41 NHC VI, 6. 56,17–22. For a compelling analysis of these barbarous

KYLE FRASER 397

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29 “I am no longer what I was—I have been born in Mind, ἐγεννήθην ἐν νῷ,
Corp.Herm. 13.3 [II 201.16]. References to the Greek of the Corpus Hermeticum
and the Latin of the Asclepius follow A. D. Nock and A.-J. Festugière, Hermès
Trismégiste, Corpus Hermeticum I–II (Paris 1946), cited by tractate and section,
followed in brackets by the editors’ page and line numbers.

30 The description of initiatic “rebirth” in Corp.Herm. 13 does not explicitly
reference the soul’s ascent through the celestial spheres. J.-P. Mahé argues
that rebirth takes place in the Ogdoad and Ennead, and that the soul’s
heavenly ascent is implied. Despite differences in terminology, “rebirth” and
“ascension” refer to the same mystery: see Mahé, Hermès Trismégiste V CCIV–

CCXVI, and “Accolade ou baiser? Sur un rite hermétique de régénération:
ἀσπάζεσθαι en NH VI, 57,26 et 65,4,” in L. Painchaud et al. (eds.), Coptica –

Gnostica – Manichaica. Mélanges offerts à Wolf-Peter Funk (Laval 2006) 557–565, at
560–563. In contrast, Bull regards Hermetic rebirth as preliminary to the

KYLE FRASER 395

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

prepared for this ascent through a praxis involving visualization
and prayer, an internalized theurgy in which the soul served as
the receptacle of divine illumination, the “womb” of noetic re-
birth.31 The material side of theurgic cult—the consecration of
physical receptacles and the offering of sacrifices—was not
neglected, as evident in the famous ‘god-making’ passage in the
Latin Asclepius.32 However, material offerings were deemed ap-
propriate only for the cult of ministering daimons and cosmic
divinities. As Iamblichus testifies, the Hermetic ascent beyond
fatality, “towards the god who is the creator,” did not rely on the
aid of matter (µήτε ὕλην προσποιουµένους).33 The supreme deity
was approached only through spiritual modes of sacrifice. Even
to offer him incense, Hermes says, is “akin to sacrilege, for he
wants nothing who is himself all things or in whom all things
are.”34

In his extensive treatment of sacrifice, Iamblichus echoes this
Hermetic principle that cult must be adapted to the complexity
of the divine hierarchy:

Whenever we offer cult to the gods who rule over soul and nature,
it is not inappropriate to offer them natural powers … But when
we endeavour to honour those gods that are in and of themselves
singular in form, it is fitting to bestow on them honours that are

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

scriptive of ancient inscriptions on stelae (Onom. 5.149–150): the
adjective ἐξίτηλα is grouped together with (inter alia) ἀµυδρά and
ἀµαυρά (both meaning dim or faint), δύσγνωστα (hard to discern)
and ἄγνωστα (unintelligible). In the most literal sense, then,
ἐξίτηλος describes what is physically fading in colour or outline.
By extension, it also captures what is fading in memory, as in the
well-known and oft-quoted opening line of the proem of Herod-
otus (1.1): “This is the presentation of the history of Herodotus
of Halicarnassus, so that the accomplishments of men should not
be forgotten in time (τῷ χρόνῳ ἐξίτηλα γένηται).” Both of these
complementary meanings of ἐξίτηλος are relevant to the shared
concern of our sources that the hieratic tradition of Egypt is
fading because of the encroachment of Greek language and
culture. They fear (quite understandably) that the hieroglyphic
script is falling into obsolescence—fading from the memory of
the priesthood, most of whom by the close of the fourth century
could no longer decipher the inscriptions on the ancient temples
and stelae.

But the term has still more subtle nuances. It can also convey
the idea of weakening or dilution. For instance, Athenaeus,
citing Phylarchus, refers to the counteracting effect of the scent
of quinces (“Cydonian apples”) on the powers (δυνάµεις) of cer-
tain poisons. According to one anecdote, a Pharian poison
became weak (ἐξίτηλον γενέσθαι) and lost its specific power (ἴδιαν

δύναµιν) when it was stored in a vessel redolent of quinces.64
Plato uses the term similarly. In the Critias, he speaks of the
weakening of the divine spark in the souls of the Atlanteans
through its admixture with the mortal body and its desires: “the
divine portion within them began to fade (ἐξίτηλος ἐγίγνετο) as a
result of constantly being diluted by large measures of mortality,
and their mortal nature began to predominate.”65 In the
Republic, the degrading effect of an unjust city on the soul of a

64 Deipn. 81E–F (FGrHist 81 F 10).
65 Crit. 121A8–B1; following the translation in R. Waterfield, Plato: Timaeus

and Critias (Oxford 2008) 121.

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—————
Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

ISSN 2159-3159
Article copyright held by the author(s) and made available under the

Creative Commons Attribution License
CC-BY https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Hermetism and Hieratic Tradition in the

De mysteriis of Iamblichus

Kyle Fraser

CHOLARS HAVE LONG RECOGNIZED the importance of
the testimony of Iamblichus, along with that of his near
contemporary Zosimos of Panopolis, in reconstructing the

wider Greco-Egyptian milieu of Hermetism, and its intersections
with neighbouring esoteric currents, including alchemy, astrol-
ogy, magic, and theurgy.1 In the first section of this paper, I sur-
vey Iamblichus’ allusions to Hermetic authorities and sources,
including some lost Hermetica, and I establish the relevance of
the spiritual ethos of Hermetism to the theurgic project of the De
mysteriis. The literary persona of the prophet Abamon is inter-
preted in the light of the convention of Hermetic pseudonymity,
and the rites and soteriological goals of theurgy are related to
visionary and liturgical practices in the extant Hermetic corpus,
including the use of the so-called ὀνόµατα βάρβαρα. Iamblichus
presents an impassioned defence of the ritual power of such bar-
barous names, insisting that Greek translation of Assyrian and
Egyptian invocations deprives them of ritual potency. In the
second section of the paper, I relate Iamblichus’ discussion of the
ὀνόµατα βάρβαρα, and his concerns about translation, to Corpus
Hermeticum 16, examining a hitherto unappreciated lexical par-
allel. In both sources, the dangers of cultural and linguistic
blending are encapsulated in the use of the rich adjective
ἐξίτηλος to capture the fading of tradition and the depoten-
tialization of ritual speech.

1 See Garth Fowden’s pioneering study, The Egyptian Hermes: A Historical

Approach to the Late Pagan Mind (Cambridge 1986) 116–141.

S

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Iamblichus and the way of Hermes

In his De mysteriis, Iamblichus frames a magisterial defence of
the cult practices of Mediterranean and Near Eastern antiquity.
Under the unifying concept of theurgy (“divine work”) he sub-
sumes the entire sweep of traditional divinatory and sacrificial
technologies, arguing for their theological coherence and even
their salvific necessity.

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KYLE FRASER 395

—————
Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

prepared for this ascent through a praxis involving visualization
and prayer, an internalized theurgy in which the soul served as
the receptacle of divine illumination, the “womb” of noetic re-
birth.31 The material side of theurgic cult—the consecration of
physical receptacles and the offering of sacrifices—was not
neglected, as evident in the famous ‘god-making’ passage in the
Latin Asclepius.32 However, material offerings were deemed ap-
propriate only for the cult of ministering daimons and cosmic
divinities. As Iamblichus testifies, the Hermetic ascent beyond
fatality, “towards the god who is the creator,” did not rely on the
aid of matter (µήτε ὕλην προσποιουµένους).33 The supreme deity
was approached only through spiritual modes of sacrifice. Even
to offer him incense, Hermes says, is “akin to sacrilege, for he
wants nothing who is himself all things or in whom all things
are.”34

In his extensive treatment of sacrifice, Iamblichus echoes this
Hermetic principle that cult must be adapted to the complexity
of the divine hierarchy:

Whenever we offer cult to the gods who rule over soul and nature,
it is not inappropriate to offer them natural powers … But when
we endeavour to honour those gods that are in and of themselves
singular in form, it is fitting to bestow on them honours that are

more advanced rite of visionary ascent described in Disc. 8–9: Tradition of
Hermes 244–245, 314–315, 372. This debate notwithstanding, Corp.Herm.
13.15 does anticipate the soul’s eventual return to the Ogdoad, though
without specifying whether it can be experienced through visionary praxis (as
in Disc. 8–9 and Corp.Herm. 4) or only postmortem (as, apparently, in Corp.
Herm. 1).

31 Corp.Herm. 13.2 [II 200.17–201.1]: “O child, [the womb] is the wisdom
of understanding in silence, and the seed is the true good” (transl. Copen-
haver, Hermetica 49).

32 Asclepius 38. Hermes describes the consecration of temple statues
(“earthly gods”), created from materials sympathetically attuned to celestial
harmonies.

33 Myst. 8.4 [198.2].
34 Asclepius 41[II 352.12–15] (transl. Copenhaver, Hermetica 92).

396 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

not bound to matter.35

He is frustratingly silent as to the character of this immaterial
cult.

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14 Myst. 8.4; Epist. ad Aneb. fr.81 (Saffrey-Segonds, Porphyre 75–77). Porphyry
states that the decans, horoscopic signs, and “powerful leaders” discussed by
Chaeremon were named in the Salmeschiniaka. According to Hephaestion of
Thebes, the astrological writings associated with “Nechepso” also drew from
this manual, which must have been extant by the second century BCE. On
the testimonials relating to the Salmeschiniaka see G. Adamson, “The Old
Gods of Egypt in Lost Hermetica and Early Sethianism,” in A. D. DeConick
et al. (eds.), Histories of the Hidden God: Concealment and Revelation in Western
Gnostic, Esoteric, and Mystical Traditions (Durham 2013) 58–86, at 60–67.

15 Myst. 8.4 [197.7–12]. See O’Meara, in Transzendentales Ägypten 263.
16 As Fowden calls them: Egyptian Hermes 137–139. On Iamblichus’ discus-

sion of Egyptian theology in Myst. 8.2–3 see also C. H. Bull, The Tradition of

KYLE FRASER 391

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

cal deities of Egypt to a hierarchy of hyper-cosmic and cosmic
deities. At the summit of the hierarchy is the indivisible One (τὸ

ἓν ἀµερές), from which arises a self-begotten Monad, described

as the principle of intellection (νοητάρχης), and identified in one
Hermetic account with the deity Kmeph.17 From this primal
Intellect arises the Demiurgic mind, whose various powers and
activities (δυνάµεις τε καὶ ἐνεργείας) are veiled mythologically in
the names and attributes of the deities Amoun, Ptah, and

Osiris.18
Iamblichus assures Porphyry that the writings circulating

under the name of Hermes Trismegistus contain authentic
Egyptian doctrine, even though they are expressed in the Greek
idiom and employ the terminology of Greek philosophy. The
reason for this, he says, is that the Hermetica were translated
into Greek by men knowledgeable in philosophy.19 Iamblichus’
references to Hermetic sources are typically vague and specific
borrowings are difficult to establish. There was a considerable
Hermetic literature in later antiquity,20 of which our Byzantine

Hermes Trismegistus: The Egyptian Priestly Figure as a Teacher of Hellenized Wisdom
(Leiden 2018) 131–146, who stresses parallels with Poimandres (Corp.Herm. 1);
Adamson, in Histories of the Hidden God 67–77, on parallels with the Sethian
Eugnostos (NH III, 3 and V, 1); O’Meara, in Transzendentales Ägypten 266–267;
D. Clark, “Iamblichus’ Egyptian Neoplatonic Theology in De Mysteriis,” Inter-
national Journal of the Platonic Tradition 2 (2008) 164–205.

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Certainly, the Egyptian temples
faced significant pressures in the imperial age due to the loss of
state funding, and certain fundamentals of traditional priestly
knowledge declined, notably the understanding of hieroglyphic
script. The abbreviated Demotic script remained in use for
religious and literary purposes, but as Frankfurter notes, it was
“essentially a scribal conceit,” since “by the second century C.E.
even the most insular, conservative priesthoods commonly used
and conversed in Greek.”22 With the development of Old Cop-
tic, beginning in the first century C.E., the Greek script was even
deployed in liturgical contexts as a means of standardizing the
pronunciation of Demotic words.23 In the Corpus Hermeticum,
concerns about the contamination of the Egyptian language
(notably in Corp.Herm. 16) reflect an indigenous, perhaps even
priestly, reaction to these inexorable processes of linguistic
blending. These concerns are shared by Iamblichus, as we shall
discover.

Iamblichus’ claim that the books of Hermes are Greek trans-

ing for exaggeration, or astronomical conceits, the Hermetic literature was
massive in scope.

21 See B. P. Copenhaver, Hermetica: The Greek Corpus Hermeticum and the Latin
Asclepius in a New English Translation (Cambridge 1992) xl–xlv.

22 D. Frankfurter, Religion in Roman Egypt: Assimilation and Resistance (Prince-
ton 1998) 250.

23 Frankfurter, Religion in Roman Egypt 250–251. On Old-Coptic glosses of
Demotic in the London and Leiden magical papyri see J. Dieleman, Priests,
Tongues, and Rites. The London-Leiden Magical Manuscripts and Translation in
Egyptian Ritual (100–300 CE) (Leiden 2005) 26–27 and passim.

KYLE FRASER 393

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

lations of Egyptian texts is of special interest. He implies that the
Hermetic books are translations of the books of Thoth—the
Egyptian prototype of Hermes Trismegistus. These books pre-
served the essential protocols and procedures of Egyptian cult
ritual.24 Iamblichus perceives the Hermetic writings as a vital
link to this authentic and pure hieratic tradition. In the guise of
the προφήτης Abamon,25 he opens his treatise by declaring his
pious subordination to Hermes Trismegistus, “the god who pre-
sides over rational discourse,” and “the common patron of all
priests,” adding that “it is to him that our ancestors in particular
dedicated the fruits of their wisdom, attributing all their own
writings to Hermes.”26 Thus, we should understand the pseudo-
nym Abamon not merely as a rhetorical conceit, but as the
expression of an initiatic ethos that demands the subordination
of Iamblichus as prophet to the hieratic authority of Thoth-
Hermes. In concealing his own name and authorship, Iambli-
chus pays reverence to Hermes and the Hermetic tradition,
implying that his own work is merely a faithful transmission of
its venerable mysteries, another link in the chain of initiatic
transmission.

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29 “I am no longer what I was—I have been born in Mind, ἐγεννήθην ἐν νῷ,
Corp.Herm. 13.3 [II 201.16]. References to the Greek of the Corpus Hermeticum
and the Latin of the Asclepius follow A. D. Nock and A.-J. Festugière, Hermès
Trismégiste, Corpus Hermeticum I–II (Paris 1946), cited by tractate and section,
followed in brackets by the editors’ page and line numbers.

30 The description of initiatic “rebirth” in Corp.Herm. 13 does not explicitly
reference the soul’s ascent through the celestial spheres. J.-P. Mahé argues
that rebirth takes place in the Ogdoad and Ennead, and that the soul’s
heavenly ascent is implied. Despite differences in terminology, “rebirth” and
“ascension” refer to the same mystery: see Mahé, Hermès Trismégiste V CCIV–

CCXVI, and “Accolade ou baiser? Sur un rite hermétique de régénération:
ἀσπάζεσθαι en NH VI, 57,26 et 65,4,” in L. Painchaud et al. (eds.), Coptica –

Gnostica – Manichaica. Mélanges offerts à Wolf-Peter Funk (Laval 2006) 557–565, at
560–563. In contrast, Bull regards Hermetic rebirth as preliminary to the

KYLE FRASER 395

—————
Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

prepared for this ascent through a praxis involving visualization
and prayer, an internalized theurgy in which the soul served as
the receptacle of divine illumination, the “womb” of noetic re-
birth.31 The material side of theurgic cult—the consecration of
physical receptacles and the offering of sacrifices—was not
neglected, as evident in the famous ‘god-making’ passage in the
Latin Asclepius.32 However, material offerings were deemed ap-
propriate only for the cult of ministering daimons and cosmic
divinities. As Iamblichus testifies, the Hermetic ascent beyond
fatality, “towards the god who is the creator,” did not rely on the
aid of matter (µήτε ὕλην προσποιουµένους).33 The supreme deity
was approached only through spiritual modes of sacrifice. Even
to offer him incense, Hermes says, is “akin to sacrilege, for he
wants nothing who is himself all things or in whom all things
are.”34

In his extensive treatment of sacrifice, Iamblichus echoes this
Hermetic principle that cult must be adapted to the complexity
of the divine hierarchy:

Whenever we offer cult to the gods who rule over soul and nature,
it is not inappropriate to offer them natural powers … But when
we endeavour to honour those gods that are in and of themselves
singular in form, it is fitting to bestow on them honours that are

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some lost, like the writings of the prophet “Bitys,”13 and the
astrological manual Salmeschiniaka, which dealt with the risings
and settings of stars and technical details of horoscopic astrology
relating to the decans and planetary rulers. Porphyry and
Iamblichus discuss this manual in connection with the astral

theology of the priest and Stoic philosopher Chaeremon (first
century CE), who evidently endorsed its teachings.14 According
to Iamblichus the study of such astral phenomena was pre-
liminary to the deeper mysteries of Hermetism and occupied the
lowest rung (ἐν τοῖς ἐσχάτοις) in the Egyptian understanding of

causes (τὴν παρ᾽ Αἰγυπτίοις αἰτιολογίαν).15 He also draws upon
unnamed “theological Hermetica”16 that related the mythologi-

12 Myst. 7.5 [191.23–24].
13 Myst. 8.5. Bitys is also referenced by the alchemist Zosimos of Panopolis

and he may be identical to “Pitys,” the alleged author of a series of necro-
mantic rites in PGM 4. On Bitys see Fowden, Egyptian Hermes 150–153.

14 Myst. 8.4; Epist. ad Aneb. fr.81 (Saffrey-Segonds, Porphyre 75–77). Porphyry
states that the decans, horoscopic signs, and “powerful leaders” discussed by
Chaeremon were named in the Salmeschiniaka. According to Hephaestion of
Thebes, the astrological writings associated with “Nechepso” also drew from
this manual, which must have been extant by the second century BCE. On
the testimonials relating to the Salmeschiniaka see G. Adamson, “The Old
Gods of Egypt in Lost Hermetica and Early Sethianism,” in A. D. DeConick
et al. (eds.), Histories of the Hidden God: Concealment and Revelation in Western
Gnostic, Esoteric, and Mystical Traditions (Durham 2013) 58–86, at 60–67.

15 Myst. 8.4 [197.7–12]. See O’Meara, in Transzendentales Ägypten 263.
16 As Fowden calls them: Egyptian Hermes 137–139. On Iamblichus’ discus-

sion of Egyptian theology in Myst. 8.2–3 see also C. H. Bull, The Tradition of

KYLE FRASER 391

—————
Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

cal deities of Egypt to a hierarchy of hyper-cosmic and cosmic
deities. At the summit of the hierarchy is the indivisible One (τὸ

ἓν ἀµερές), from which arises a self-begotten Monad, described

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The visionary experience of an ascent through the heavens, be-
yond the fatal influence of the planets and stars, towards union
with the supreme God, is indeed the central mystery of the
initiatic tractates in our Hermetic corpus. Passing in sequence
through the seven planetary spheres, the initiate sheds the vices
and corrupting influences of the planets, and enters finally into
the supra-cosmic realms of the Ogdoad and Ennead where they
reunite with the Father and his Powers.28

This mystery is described in Corp.Herm. 13 as a rebirth in
Mind,29 a total conversion of the soul, whereby it comes to know
itself as containing, and thus transcending, the very cosmic
powers that formerly held it in bondage.30 The Hermetic initiate

27 Myst. 8.4–5 [197.23–198.6]; transl. Clarke et al. 317, slightly modified.
28 I leave to one side the precise relationship of the Ogdoad and Ennead

and the related and vexed distinction between the supreme deity and the
Hermetic demiurge, on which see the helpful note in Copenhaver, Hermetica
104–105. The soul’s heavenly ascent is most fully elaborated in the Discourse
on the Eighth and Ninth (NHC VI, 6. 55,24–61,17; J.-P. Mahé, Hermès Trismégiste
V [Paris 2019] 73–111). It also features prominently in Corp.Herm. 4 and
1.24–26, although in Corp.Herm. 1 the ascent is described as a postmortem
experience rather than a visionary ritual.

29 “I am no longer what I was—I have been born in Mind, ἐγεννήθην ἐν νῷ,
Corp.Herm. 13.3 [II 201.16]. References to the Greek of the Corpus Hermeticum
and the Latin of the Asclepius follow A. D. Nock and A.-J. Festugière, Hermès
Trismégiste, Corpus Hermeticum I–II (Paris 1946), cited by tractate and section,
followed in brackets by the editors’ page and line numbers.

30 The description of initiatic “rebirth” in Corp.Herm. 13 does not explicitly
reference the soul’s ascent through the celestial spheres. J.-P. Mahé argues
that rebirth takes place in the Ogdoad and Ennead, and that the soul’s
heavenly ascent is implied. Despite differences in terminology, “rebirth” and
“ascension” refer to the same mystery: see Mahé, Hermès Trismégiste V CCIV–

CCXVI, and “Accolade ou baiser? Sur un rite hermétique de régénération:
ἀσπάζεσθαι en NH VI, 57,26 et 65,4,” in L. Painchaud et al. (eds.), Coptica –

Gnostica – Manichaica. Mélanges offerts à Wolf-Peter Funk (Laval 2006) 557–565, at
560–563. In contrast, Bull regards Hermetic rebirth as preliminary to the

KYLE FRASER 395

—————
Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

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Whenever we offer cult to the gods who rule over soul and nature,
it is not inappropriate to offer them natural powers … But when
we endeavour to honour those gods that are in and of themselves
singular in form, it is fitting to bestow on them honours that are

more advanced rite of visionary ascent described in Disc. 8–9: Tradition of
Hermes 244–245, 314–315, 372. This debate notwithstanding, Corp.Herm.
13.15 does anticipate the soul’s eventual return to the Ogdoad, though
without specifying whether it can be experienced through visionary praxis (as
in Disc. 8–9 and Corp.Herm. 4) or only postmortem (as, apparently, in Corp.
Herm. 1).

31 Corp.Herm. 13.2 [II 200.17–201.1]: “O child, [the womb] is the wisdom
of understanding in silence, and the seed is the true good” (transl. Copen-
haver, Hermetica 49).

32 Asclepius 38. Hermes describes the consecration of temple statues
(“earthly gods”), created from materials sympathetically attuned to celestial
harmonies.

33 Myst. 8.4 [198.2].
34 Asclepius 41[II 352.12–15] (transl. Copenhaver, Hermetica 92).

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not bound to matter.35

He is frustratingly silent as to the character of this immaterial
cult. It may have involved visualization of geometrical icons of
the gods, as Shaw has argued,36 and presumably the chanting of
divine names, a practice that “awakened corresponding sun-
thêmata in the soul,”37 thereby expanding its receptivity to divine
illumination.38 Similar practices are illustrated in the Hermetica:
for instance, the initiate is instructed to become like God by
imagining that their mind contains all cosmic powers.39 There
are also references to speech offerings (λογικαὶ θυσίαι), hymns of
praise and thanksgiving,40 sometimes incorporating the ritual
utterance of divine names, as notably in the Coptic Discourse on
the Eighth and Ninth (NH VI, 6. 52,1–63,32) where the ascent to
the Ogdoad is facilitated by the singing of a hymn that incor-
porates Greek vocalic incantations and the “barbarous” names
ZŌXATHAZŌ and ZŌZAZŌTH.41

35 Myst. 5.19 [168.15–24]. Saffrey and Segonds suppose that the gods who

are of singular form or species (µονοειδεῖς) are the planetary deities (Jamblique
313); but as these gods do rule over nature, the reference must be to their
intelligible superiors, who are completely removed from matter (οἱ παντελῶς

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not bound to matter.35

He is frustratingly silent as to the character of this immaterial
cult. It may have involved visualization of geometrical icons of
the gods, as Shaw has argued,36 and presumably the chanting of
divine names, a practice that “awakened corresponding sun-
thêmata in the soul,”37 thereby expanding its receptivity to divine
illumination.38 Similar practices are illustrated in the Hermetica:
for instance, the initiate is instructed to become like God by
imagining that their mind contains all cosmic powers.39 There
are also references to speech offerings (λογικαὶ θυσίαι), hymns of
praise and thanksgiving,40 sometimes incorporating the ritual
utterance of divine names, as notably in the Coptic Discourse on
the Eighth and Ninth (NH VI, 6. 52,1–63,32) where the ascent to
the Ogdoad is facilitated by the singing of a hymn that incor-
porates Greek vocalic incantations and the “barbarous” names
ZŌXATHAZŌ and ZŌZAZŌTH.41

35 Myst. 5.19 [168.15–24]. Saffrey and Segonds suppose that the gods who

are of singular form or species (µονοειδεῖς) are the planetary deities (Jamblique
313); but as these gods do rule over nature, the reference must be to their
intelligible superiors, who are completely removed from matter (οἱ παντελῶς

ἀσώµατοι θεοί, Myst. 1.19; Saffrey-Segonds 45.15). On the distinction be-
tween material and immaterial deities see also Myst. 5.14, with the analysis of
Shaw, Theurgy and the Soul 135–136.

36 Shaw, Theurgy and the Soul 199–209 and passim.
37 Shaw, Theurgy and the Soul 111.
38 He also mentions at 5.20 intermediate forms of theurgy appropriate to

deities that mediate between the cosmic and hyper-cosmic realms. The
chanting of divine names might have fallen into this liminal category, since
speech offerings are less material than animal or vegetable sacrifices, though
not altogether internalized.

39 Corp.Herm. 11.19–20, 13.11.
40 Corp.Herm. 1.31, 13.18–19; Disc. 8–9 [NHC VI, 6. 57,18–25]; Cf.

Asclepius 41: “Rather let us worship him by giving thanks, for god finds mortal
gratitude to be the best incense” (transl. Copenhaver, Hermetica 92). On
speech offerings see Fowden, Egyptian Hermes 147–148.

41 NHC VI, 6. 56,17–22. For a compelling analysis of these barbarous

KYLE FRASER 397

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as the principle of intellection (νοητάρχης), and identified in one
Hermetic account with the deity Kmeph.17 From this primal
Intellect arises the Demiurgic mind, whose various powers and
activities (δυνάµεις τε καὶ ἐνεργείας) are veiled mythologically in
the names and attributes of the deities Amoun, Ptah, and

Osiris.18
Iamblichus assures Porphyry that the writings circulating

under the name of Hermes Trismegistus contain authentic
Egyptian doctrine, even though they are expressed in the Greek
idiom and employ the terminology of Greek philosophy. The
reason for this, he says, is that the Hermetica were translated
into Greek by men knowledgeable in philosophy.19 Iamblichus’
references to Hermetic sources are typically vague and specific
borrowings are difficult to establish. There was a considerable
Hermetic literature in later antiquity,20 of which our Byzantine

Hermes Trismegistus: The Egyptian Priestly Figure as a Teacher of Hellenized Wisdom
(Leiden 2018) 131–146, who stresses parallels with Poimandres (Corp.Herm. 1);
Adamson, in Histories of the Hidden God 67–77, on parallels with the Sethian
Eugnostos (NH III, 3 and V, 1); O’Meara, in Transzendentales Ägypten 266–267;
D. Clark, “Iamblichus’ Egyptian Neoplatonic Theology in De Mysteriis,” Inter-
national Journal of the Platonic Tradition 2 (2008) 164–205.

17 Kmeph appears as “Emeph” in the manuscripts: see Clarke et al., On the
Mysteries 309 n.407. Iamblichus surveys two Hermetic accounts of the prin-
ciples in Myst. 8.2 and 8.3, respectively. The mythological associations are
outlined in the second ordering (τάξις). But the systems seem consistent in
their underlying metaphysics, as argued persuasively by Bull, Tradition of Her-
mes 132–133 (with n.162) and assumed by Adamson, in Histories of the Hidden
God 67–68.

18 Myst. 8.3 [195.14–23].
19 Myst. 8.4 [196.20–26].
20 According to one Seleucus, there were 20,000 Hermetic books, while the

priestly scholar Manetho reports 36,525 (Myst. 8.1), a figure that may be
based on the Sothic cycle (Saffrey-Segonds, Jamblique 326 n.2). Even account-

392 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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collection preserves only a few exemplars, perhaps those least
offensive to Christian sensibilities.21 Still, Iamblichus’ general
presentation of the spiritual ethos of the Hermetic tradition
accords well with our extant Hermetic corpus.

In particular, Iamblichus shares with the authors of the
Hermetica a nostalgia for the old ways of Egypt, for the time-
honoured temple cults and their priestly wisdom, which seemed
(at least in the eyes of traditionalists) to be fast deteriorating
under Roman occupation.

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17 Kmeph appears as “Emeph” in the manuscripts: see Clarke et al., On the
Mysteries 309 n.407. Iamblichus surveys two Hermetic accounts of the prin-
ciples in Myst. 8.2 and 8.3, respectively. The mythological associations are
outlined in the second ordering (τάξις). But the systems seem consistent in
their underlying metaphysics, as argued persuasively by Bull, Tradition of Her-
mes 132–133 (with n.162) and assumed by Adamson, in Histories of the Hidden
God 67–68.

18 Myst. 8.3 [195.14–23].
19 Myst. 8.4 [196.20–26].
20 According to one Seleucus, there were 20,000 Hermetic books, while the

priestly scholar Manetho reports 36,525 (Myst. 8.1), a figure that may be
based on the Sothic cycle (Saffrey-Segonds, Jamblique 326 n.2). Even account-

392 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

—————
Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

collection preserves only a few exemplars, perhaps those least
offensive to Christian sensibilities.21 Still, Iamblichus’ general
presentation of the spiritual ethos of the Hermetic tradition
accords well with our extant Hermetic corpus.

In particular, Iamblichus shares with the authors of the
Hermetica a nostalgia for the old ways of Egypt, for the time-
honoured temple cults and their priestly wisdom, which seemed
(at least in the eyes of traditionalists) to be fast deteriorating
under Roman occupation. Certainly, the Egyptian temples
faced significant pressures in the imperial age due to the loss of
state funding, and certain fundamentals of traditional priestly
knowledge declined, notably the understanding of hieroglyphic
script. The abbreviated Demotic script remained in use for
religious and literary purposes, but as Frankfurter notes, it was
“essentially a scribal conceit,” since “by the second century C.E.
even the most insular, conservative priesthoods commonly used
and conversed in Greek.”22 With the development of Old Cop-
tic, beginning in the first century C.E., the Greek script was even
deployed in liturgical contexts as a means of standardizing the
pronunciation of Demotic words.23 In the Corpus Hermeticum,
concerns about the contamination of the Egyptian language
(notably in Corp.Herm. 16) reflect an indigenous, perhaps even
priestly, reaction to these inexorable processes of linguistic
blending. These concerns are shared by Iamblichus, as we shall
discover.

Iamblichus’ claim that the books of Hermes are Greek trans-

ing for exaggeration, or astronomical conceits, the Hermetic literature was
massive in scope.

21 See B. P. Copenhaver, Hermetica: The Greek Corpus Hermeticum and the Latin
Asclepius in a New English Translation (Cambridge 1992) xl–xlv.

22 D. Frankfurter, Religion in Roman Egypt: Assimilation and Resistance (Prince-
ton 1998) 250.

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10 Myst. 1.3 [7.6–8], following the French translation of Saffrey-Segonds.
11 Myst. 1.3 [6.9–10]: “We are enveloped (περιεχόµεθα) in [divine com-

munion] and filled (πληρούµεθα) by it.” Notice that the dominant metaphors
are of touch or commingling.

390 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

with the nature of the gods, could the soul be awakened to its
latent divinity and reintegrated with its transcendental source.

Iamblichus represents theurgy as an initiated tradition (παρά-

δοσις) descending ultimately from the hieratic cults of the
Egyptians, who were “the first to be allotted communion
(µετουσίαν) with the gods.”12 He does not present himself as an
innovator, but as a faithful exponent of the “way of Hermes,”
referring repeatedly to Hermetic opinions, authors, and texts—

some lost, like the writings of the prophet “Bitys,”13 and the
astrological manual Salmeschiniaka, which dealt with the risings
and settings of stars and technical details of horoscopic astrology
relating to the decans and planetary rulers. Porphyry and
Iamblichus discuss this manual in connection with the astral

theology of the priest and Stoic philosopher Chaeremon (first
century CE), who evidently endorsed its teachings.14 According
to Iamblichus the study of such astral phenomena was pre-
liminary to the deeper mysteries of Hermetism and occupied the
lowest rung (ἐν τοῖς ἐσχάτοις) in the Egyptian understanding of

causes (τὴν παρ᾽ Αἰγυπτίοις αἰτιολογίαν).15 He also draws upon
unnamed “theological Hermetica”16 that related the mythologi-

12 Myst. 7.5 [191.23–24].
13 Myst. 8.5. Bitys is also referenced by the alchemist Zosimos of Panopolis

and he may be identical to “Pitys,” the alleged author of a series of necro-
mantic rites in PGM 4. On Bitys see Fowden, Egyptian Hermes 150–153.

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Iamblichus
presents an impassioned defence of the ritual power of such bar-
barous names, insisting that Greek translation of Assyrian and
Egyptian invocations deprives them of ritual potency. In the
second section of the paper, I relate Iamblichus’ discussion of the
ὀνόµατα βάρβαρα, and his concerns about translation, to Corpus
Hermeticum 16, examining a hitherto unappreciated lexical par-
allel. In both sources, the dangers of cultural and linguistic
blending are encapsulated in the use of the rich adjective
ἐξίτηλος to capture the fading of tradition and the depoten-
tialization of ritual speech.

1 See Garth Fowden’s pioneering study, The Egyptian Hermes: A Historical

Approach to the Late Pagan Mind (Cambridge 1986) 116–141.

S

KYLE FRASER 387

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

Iamblichus and the way of Hermes

In his De mysteriis, Iamblichus frames a magisterial defence of
the cult practices of Mediterranean and Near Eastern antiquity.
Under the unifying concept of theurgy (“divine work”) he sub-
sumes the entire sweep of traditional divinatory and sacrificial
technologies, arguing for their theological coherence and even
their salvific necessity. The original title of his treatise (renamed
in the fifteenth century by its illustrious Renaissance translator,
Marsilio Ficino) was The Reply of the Master Abamon to the Letter of
Porphyry to Anebo and the Solutions to the Questions it Contains.2
Porphyry had directed a series of questions—really, thinly veiled
criticisms3—to one “Anebo,” who was either an Egyptian
student of Iamblichus or, as seems more likely, a fictive repre-
sentative of the Iamblichan school with its Egyptianizing em-
phases.4 If the gods are transcendental—as any good Platonist
must concede—why, he asked, do theurgists employ sacrifices
and invocations, as though unalterable divinities could be per-
suaded by material offerings or random human vocalizations?

2 Ficino’s complete title was De mysteriis Aegyptiorum, Chaldaeorum, Assyriorum.
On this title and Ficino as editor see H. D. Saffrey and A.-Ph. Segonds,
Jamblique, Réponse à Porphyre (De mysteriis) (Paris 2013) IX–XXI.

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conventional see Struck, in Magic and Ritual 391–392.
59 Myst. 7.5 [190.26–191.7]; transl. Clarke et al. 299, with some modifi-

cations.

KYLE FRASER 403

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

Greek names.60 In translating the Egyptian names into the more
prolix Greek idiom one loses not only their nuance and pre-
cision, but their ritual power:

Moreover, even if one could translate them, they would not retain
the same power (δύναµιν). For the barbarian names possess
weightiness and great precision, participating in less ambiguity,
variability, and multiplicity of expression.61

Again, the grandiloquence of Greek is contrasted unfavour-
ably with the directness of Egyptian; and echoing our Hermetic
author, Iamblichus urges that the traditional invocations should
be preserved in their original tongue, lest they be drained of
sacrality and efficacy:

And it is necessary that the prayers of the ancients, like sacred
places of sanctuary, are preserved ever the same and in the same
manner, with no diminishment or embellishment from alien
sources. For this is the reason that all these things in place at the
present time have become ineffectual (ἐξίτηλα), both the names
and the prayers, because they are endlessly altered according to
the inventiveness and illegality of the Hellenes.62

Here we encounter an intriguing lexical parallel with the ex-
hortation of Asclepius to king Ammon in Corp.Herm. 16. In both
texts, the rich adjective ἐξίτηλος (which I render as “ineffectual”)
captures the depotentializing of the Egyptian language through
Greek translation. In common usage, this adjective describes
what fades through the long passage of time. Xenophon and
Pausanias use the word to describe the fading of colours.63 Pollux
includes the word amongst a cluster of comparable terms de-

60 On the agreement of Iamblichus with the understanding of the Egyptian

language in Corp.Herm. 16 see J. Assmann, “La théorie de la ‘parole divine’
(mdw ntr) chez Jamblique et dans les sources égyptiennes,” appendix to Images
et rites de la mort dans l’Égypte ancienne. L’apport des liturgies funéraires (Paris 2000)
107–127, at 108–112.

61 Myst. 7.5 [191.13–18], transl. Clarke et al. 299, slightly modified.
62 Myst. 7.5 [192.15–22], transl. Clarke et al. 301, slightly modified.
63 Xen. Oec. 10.3, Paus. 10.38.9–10.

404 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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scriptive of ancient inscriptions on stelae (Onom.

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Iamblichus and the way of Hermes

In his De mysteriis, Iamblichus frames a magisterial defence of
the cult practices of Mediterranean and Near Eastern antiquity.
Under the unifying concept of theurgy (“divine work”) he sub-
sumes the entire sweep of traditional divinatory and sacrificial
technologies, arguing for their theological coherence and even
their salvific necessity. The original title of his treatise (renamed
in the fifteenth century by its illustrious Renaissance translator,
Marsilio Ficino) was The Reply of the Master Abamon to the Letter of
Porphyry to Anebo and the Solutions to the Questions it Contains.2
Porphyry had directed a series of questions—really, thinly veiled
criticisms3—to one “Anebo,” who was either an Egyptian
student of Iamblichus or, as seems more likely, a fictive repre-
sentative of the Iamblichan school with its Egyptianizing em-
phases.4 If the gods are transcendental—as any good Platonist
must concede—why, he asked, do theurgists employ sacrifices
and invocations, as though unalterable divinities could be per-
suaded by material offerings or random human vocalizations?

2 Ficino’s complete title was De mysteriis Aegyptiorum, Chaldaeorum, Assyriorum.
On this title and Ficino as editor see H. D. Saffrey and A.-Ph. Segonds,
Jamblique, Réponse à Porphyre (De mysteriis) (Paris 2013) IX–XXI.

3 I am not persuaded by the thesis of C. Addey (Divination and Theurgy in
Neoplatonism: Oracles of the Gods [Farnham 2014] 135–136) that Porphyry’s
letter was a dialogic exercise, more exploratory than polemical, nor by P.
Athanassiadi’s image of Porphyry as naïve, hesitant, and deferential to the
authority of Iamblichus (“Dreams, Theurgy and Freelance Divination,” JRS
83 [1993] 115–130, at 117–119). On Porphyry’s polemical intent see H. D.
Saffrey and A.-Ph. Segonds, Porphyre, Lettre à Anébon l’Égyptien (Paris 2012)
XXXVI–XXXVII; and D. J. O’Meara, “The Image of Egyptian Wisdom in Late
Antique Platonism,” in M. Sommer et al. (eds.), Transzendentales Ägypten: Jen-
seits, Himmel, Hölle und das Ende in antik-ägyptischen Diskursen (Paderborn 2024)
259–270, at 262.

4 On the figure of Anebo see Saffrey-Segonds, Porphyre XXX–XXXII; H. D
Saffrey, “Abamon, pseudonyme de Jamblique,” in R. B. Palmer et al. (eds.),
Philomathes: Studies and Essays in the Humanities in Memory of Philip Merlan (The
Hague 1971) 227–239, at 231–233; Addey, Divination and Theurgy 135–136,
with n.38.

388 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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68 Myst. 7.5 [191.13–15].

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capacity to tap into the deep structure of reality. Language slips
into a merely representational mode, deepening the alienation
of the soul, which longs to be reintegrated with its divine source.

In the eyes of Porphyry, what Iamblichus called theurgy was
just a loftier name for ‘magic’—the barbarous names of theur-
gists are the very same devices by which lowly magicians attempt
to bind the gods to their will.69 Magic, as Porphyry understands
it, is essentially coercive and it is premised on bad theology. Like
many Greco-Roman elites, he perceives it as a foreign super-
stition, fundamentally at odds with the sober ideals of the uni-
versal Hellenic culture. In this way, as Struck notes, the Hellenic
“culture of contemplation” is set against the barbarous culture
of ritual action, or, in Porphyry’s polemical terms, γοητεία.70

Deploying his own cultural stereotypes, Iamblichus represents
Porphyry’s disdain for the hieratic traditions of the barbaroi as
typical Hellenic hubris. To suggest that divine transcendence
precludes the efficacious activity of the gods in sacred names and
icons is to deprive the cosmos and the embodied soul of divine
presence—effectively turning the universe into a desacralized
wasteland:

But, above all, this doctrine constitutes the ruination of sacred
ritual and theurgical communion of gods with men, by banishing
the presence (παρουσίαν) of the higher classes of beings outside the
confines of the earth. For it amounts to nothing else but saying
that the divine is set apart from the earthly realm, and that it does
not mingle with humanity, and that this realm is bereft (ἔρηµος) of
divinity.71

These words echo the dire prophecy of Hermes in the Perfect
Discourse, a passage that survives in its Latin translation, in

69 On the rhetorical dimensions of ‘magic’, as understood by Porphyry, see

Struck, in Magic and Ritual 387–392.
70 On the impasse between the cultures of contemplation and action see

Struck, in Magic and Ritual 389–393.
71 Myst. 1.8 [21.10–16], transl. Clarke et al. 35, but following Saffrey-

Segonds in rendering Ὃλως δὲ as “above all” (surtout), rather than “generally”
(see Jamblique 243 n.2).

KYLE FRASER 407

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Asclepius 24–26, and in a Coptic fragment (NHC VI, 8).

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enance (Religion in Roman Egypt 240). Fowden, as Bull observes (11), seems
undecided as to the priestly status of the Hermetic authors (see Fowden,
Egyptian Hermes 166–168).

408 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

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Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

priest-kings of Emesa.76 His was a royal and priestly name,
shared by two Emesene priest-kings (Iamblichus I, d. 31 BCE;
Iamblichus II, d. ca. 17 CE).77 He could thus regard himself as a
priest by birthright, even if not in fact. Whereas Porphyry trans-
lated his Phoenician name, Malchos, into Greek, Iamblichus
retained his Syrian name, merely rendering it in Greek char-
acters.78 Again, whereas Porphyry settled to teach in Rome,
Iamblichus formed a spiritual commune in the outskirts of
Apamea, on the fringes of the Syrian desert. Porphyry’s in-
difference to ethnicity is consistent with his commitments to the
universal culture of Hellenism—the culture of empire.79 And this
cultural universalism maps directly onto his understanding of
metaphysics: his commitment to the Plotinian doctrine of the
undescended intellect, which remains always in union with its
transcendent source, beyond all spatio-temporal distinctions and
cultural entanglements. By contrast, Iamblichus remained con-
vinced that salvation was only possible through the preservation
of the distinctive hieratic traditions of antiquity. He embraced
his Syrian heritage and his priestly name, perhaps seeking
through theurgy to recover his birthright as a technician of the
sacred, a protector of the cultic traditions that bind humanity to
the gods. Of course, Iamblichus thinks and speaks in Greek, and
like the priestly disciples of Hermes, he inhabits a space of cul-

76 On his priestly name and Syrian background see P. Athanassiadi, “The
Oecumenism of Iamblichus: Latent Knowledge and its Awakening,” JRS 85
(1995) 244–250, at 245; and Clarke et al., On the Mysteries xix–xx.

77 On the Emesene dynasty and Iamblichus I and II see R. D. Sullivan,
“The Dynasty of Emesa,” ANRW II.8 (1977) 198–219; W. Ball, Rome in the
East: The Transformation of an Empire (London 2000) 33–47. Ball notes (34) that
a shaikh of the Emesenes bore the name Iamblichus already in the second
century BCE before the founding of the dynasty.

78 See Struck, in Magic and Ritual 397–398. On the name of Porphyry and
his Phoenician background see also Millar, in Philosophia Togata II 248–249.

79 Struck, in Magic and Ritual 396, contrasts the universalizing tendencies of
Porphyry with Iamblichus’ “strong interest in the ‘local’ over and above the
‘imperial’ or the ‘international’.” On the homogenizing universalism of Por-
phyry see also Johnson, Religion and Identity 123.

KYLE FRASER 409

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This Hermetic assessment of the superiority of Egyptian as a
ritual language finds a striking parallel in the arguments of
Iamblichus in defence of the theurgic use of barbarous names.
Porphyry had ridiculed the theurgic fascination with foreign
names, especially Egyptian-sounding names. “For the god in-
voked presumably would not be of Egyptian birth. Even if he is
Egyptian, he certainly does not (οὔ τί γε) use Egyptian speech,
nor any human speech at all.”57 Words, Porphyry thinks, are
merely conventional signifiers—linguistic fictions. Surely, the
gods are oblivious to our petty ethnic and linguistic categories.
Iamblichus rejects this representational theory of language:58

“But,” you say, “the listener looks to the meaning (τὰ σηµαινό-

µενα), so that as long as the concept (ἔννοια) remains the same, it
is sufficient, no matter what name is used.” But the situation is not
as you suppose. For if the names were established by convention,
then it would not matter whether some were used instead of
others. But if they are joined to the nature of what exists (τῇ φύσει
συνήρτηται τῶν ὄντων), then those that are better adapted to it will
be more precious to the gods.59

Like our Hermetic author, Iamblichus alludes to the iconicity of
the Egyptian names, which are “joined to the nature of what
exists,” in contrast to the merely conventional character of

56 Frankfurter, Religion in Roman Egypt 248–253.
57 Saffrey-Segonds, Porphyre 72.
58 On the Greek philosophical debate as to whether language is natural or

conventional see Struck, in Magic and Ritual 391–392.
59 Myst. 7.5 [190.26–191.7]; transl. Clarke et al. 299, with some modifi-

cations.

KYLE FRASER 403

—————
Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

Greek names.60 In translating the Egyptian names into the more
prolix Greek idiom one loses not only their nuance and pre-
cision, but their ritual power:

Moreover, even if one could translate them, they would not retain
the same power (δύναµιν). For the barbarian names possess
weightiness and great precision, participating in less ambiguity,
variability, and multiplicity of expression.61

Again, the grandiloquence of Greek is contrasted unfavour-
ably with the directness of Egyptian; and echoing our Hermetic
author, Iamblichus urges that the traditional invocations should
be preserved in their original tongue, lest they be drained of
sacrality and efficacy:

And it is necessary that the prayers of the ancients, like sacred
places of sanctuary, are preserved ever the same and in the same
manner, with no diminishment or embellishment from alien
sources. For this is the reason that all these things in place at the
present time have become ineffectual (ἐξίτηλα), both the names
and the prayers, because they are endlessly altered according to
the inventiveness and illegality of the Hellenes.62

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KYLE FRASER 393

—————
Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

lations of Egyptian texts is of special interest. He implies that the
Hermetic books are translations of the books of Thoth—the
Egyptian prototype of Hermes Trismegistus. These books pre-
served the essential protocols and procedures of Egyptian cult
ritual.24 Iamblichus perceives the Hermetic writings as a vital
link to this authentic and pure hieratic tradition. In the guise of
the προφήτης Abamon,25 he opens his treatise by declaring his
pious subordination to Hermes Trismegistus, “the god who pre-
sides over rational discourse,” and “the common patron of all
priests,” adding that “it is to him that our ancestors in particular
dedicated the fruits of their wisdom, attributing all their own
writings to Hermes.”26 Thus, we should understand the pseudo-
nym Abamon not merely as a rhetorical conceit, but as the
expression of an initiatic ethos that demands the subordination
of Iamblichus as prophet to the hieratic authority of Thoth-
Hermes. In concealing his own name and authorship, Iambli-
chus pays reverence to Hermes and the Hermetic tradition,
implying that his own work is merely a faithful transmission of
its venerable mysteries, another link in the chain of initiatic
transmission.

Iamblichus insists that the “way” of Hermes was not a matter
of theorizing about the gods—underscoring again his point
about the limitations of knowledge—but a theurgic praxis
through which the soul ascended to the regions beyond fate:

And [the Egyptians] do not merely theorize about these matters
(οὐδ’ ὅλως ψιλῶς θεωροῦσιν), but they recommend that we ascend
through sacred theurgy (διὰ τῆς ἱερατικῆς θεουργίας) to the regions
that are higher, more universal and superior to fate, towards the
god who is the creator, without calling in the aid of matter (µήτε

ὕλην προσποιουµένους) or bringing to bear anything other than the
observation of the propitious time for action. Hermes has also set

24 On the books of Thoth and their cultic significance see Fowden, Egyptian
Hermes 57–68.

25 Abamon is described as προφήτης at Myst. 1.1 [2.17].
26 Myst. 1.1; transl. in Clarke et al. 5.

394 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

—————
Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

out this way (ὁδόν) and the prophet Bitys has given an inter-
pretation of it to King Ammon.27

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The emphasis is not on the visual iconicity of the hiero-
glyphs—as one might expect in a traditional priestly context—
but their correct vocalization. As Frankfurter observes, this con-

54 On the iconicity and ritual power of the hieroglyphs see D. Frankfurter,

“The Magic of Writing and the Writing of Magic,” Helios 21 (1994) 189–221.
55 Fowden sees the concern over translation in Corp.Herm. 16 as reflecting

“an ethnic Egyptian point of view” (Egyptian Hermes 37). Likewise, Frankfurter
judges that the text “does reliably report a priestly view of Egyptian language
and writing in contrast to Greek” (Religion in Roman Egypt 253). See, similarly,
J. P. Sørensen, “Ancient Egyptian Religious Thought and the XVIth Hermetic
Tractate,” in G. Englund (ed.), The Religion of the Ancient Egyptians: Cognitive
Structures and Popular Expressions (Uppsala 1989) 41–57, at 42.

402 HERMETISM AND HIERATIC TRADITION

—————
Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 65 (2025) 386–409

cern with fixing the liturgical pronunciation of Egyptian words
developed in tandem with the evolution of Old Coptic. Roman-
era priests took advantage of the phonic accuracy of the Greek
vocalic system in order to standardize the enunciation of
Demotic words.56 Thus, the nativist position articulated in our
Hermetic text, with its appeals to the purity of the Egyptian
language, already reflects a Hellenized priestly perspective.

This Hermetic assessment of the superiority of Egyptian as a
ritual language finds a striking parallel in the arguments of
Iamblichus in defence of the theurgic use of barbarous names.
Porphyry had ridiculed the theurgic fascination with foreign
names, especially Egyptian-sounding names. “For the god in-
voked presumably would not be of Egyptian birth. Even if he is
Egyptian, he certainly does not (οὔ τί γε) use Egyptian speech,
nor any human speech at all.”57 Words, Porphyry thinks, are
merely conventional signifiers—linguistic fictions. Surely, the
gods are oblivious to our petty ethnic and linguistic categories.
Iamblichus rejects this representational theory of language:58

“But,” you say, “the listener looks to the meaning (τὰ σηµαινό-

µενα), so that as long as the concept (ἔννοια) remains the same, it
is sufficient, no matter what name is used.” But the situation is not
as you suppose. For if the names were established by convention,
then it would not matter whether some were used instead of
others. But if they are joined to the nature of what exists (τῇ φύσει
συνήρτηται τῶν ὄντων), then those that are better adapted to it will
be more precious to the gods.59

Like our Hermetic author, Iamblichus alludes to the iconicity of
the Egyptian names, which are “joined to the nature of what
exists,” in contrast to the merely conventional character of
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