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Jehan’s Last Steps – a remarkable mysterious story

In 1934 the Berliner Illustrirte Zeitung published in Issue 48 an article by Otto Rahn entitled: Jehans Letzer Gang (Jehan’s Last Steps). The piece told the story of one Jehan Tessenre, a young family man moments away from his execution by Hugeunot troops in reprisal for the death of sixty—two of their brethren. They had been betrayed by Jehan to the townsfolk of Tarascon who lost no time in tossing them off the same high...

The true matter of the philosopher’s stone

The Stone is everywhere to be found, but nowhere seen. The Stone is also within …  Mention of the philosopher’s stone in writing can be found as far back as Cheirokmeta by Zosimos of Panopolis (c. 300 AD). Alchemical writers assign a longer history. Elias Ashmole and the anonymous author of Gloria Mundi (1620) claim that its history goes back to Adam who acquired the knowledge of the stone directly from the biblical God. This...

The money alchemists

printing press
The destruction of the worldwide economic order in the wake of World War II encouraged world leaders in 1944 to form a meeting to generate alternatives. This conference, referred to as Bretton Woods, resulted in the development of a new global fixed exchange rate regime with the U.S. dollar playing a central role. Under the Bretton Woods system, an ounce of gold could be bought at a fixed international rate of $35 per ounce (+/-...

Imagination and phantasy

When following Otto Maier’s path one will meet somewhere on his/her road, Böhme. Like the contemporary student of the inner world, alchemists were concerned about differentiating imagination from fantasy. They were aware that true imagination possesses a power and depth that fantasy does not possess. Jakob Boehme was one of those who warned against the delusions of fantasy. Struggle for redemption Böhme was a mystic. Although not a practicing alchemist, he used the terminology and symbols...

Laurin ‘s marvels and his enchanted Rose garden

laurin rosengarten
Laurin ‘s marvels. Are you worthy to enter the Rosengarten? King Laurin ’s greatest marvel is his understanding of day and night, which is also that of life and death. Oh, how we would like to possess that knowledge! It is in these terms that men lament, but they need not. As one can always ascend to Laurin ’s marvellous kingdom. In spite of the silk threads which protect it. Still, one must be a...

Goethe the Alchemist

Faust
The secret teachings of Goethe. That Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832), Germany’s greatest poet, had an interest in the occult and alchemy is clear from Faust. Based on an historical character, the original Faust legend goes back to medieval times and prior to Goethe‘s there were earlier dramatic renditions of the tale, notably Christopher Marlowe’s. Yet it is to Goethe’s Faust (Part I 1808; Part II 1833) that most of us turn when we think...

The mysterious relic — The Gral

Gral Relic
The mysterious relic —which could be at one and the same time a chalice, a book, a stone, or a person— was seen as existing both on the earth and at a remove from it. In the poem The Later Titurel, it hovers above the world, untouched by human hands and supported by angels. In the Perceval of Chrétien de Troyes and the Parzival of Wolfram von Eschenbach, it is kept in a secret chamber...

The Arabic Idris and the Alchemical Mercury

The name of Hermes, whether or not qualified as Trismegistus, henceforth served as guarantee or signature for a host of esoteric books on magic, astrology, medicine, etc., throughout the Middle Ages, and this despite the fact that, with the exception of the Asclepius, the Corpus Hermeticum was unknown. Picatrix At the same time, an inspired imagery unfolded in both Latin and Arabic literature in a succession of “visionary recitals” (as Henry Corbin calls them), constellated...

Dream journeys and the mythical reality

Otto Maier Dreams
In physics, we speak of energy and its various manifestations, such as electricity, light, heat, etc. The situation in psychology is precisely the same. Here, too, we are dealing primarily with energy . . . with measures of intensity, with greater or lesser quantities. It can appear in various guises. . . . As I worked with my fantasies, I became aware that the unconscious undergoes or produces change. Only after I had familiarized myself...

The Lost History of Esoteric Writing

Esoteric writing
Philosophical esotericism —the practice of communicating one’s unorthodox thoughts “between the lines”— was a common practice until the end of the eighteenth century. The famous Encyclopédie of Diderot, for instance, not only discusses this practice in over twenty different articles, but admits to employing it itself. The history of Western thought contains hundreds of such statements by major philosophers testifying to the use of esoteric writing in their own work or others’. Despite this long...

The Philosopher’s Stone appeared in the low countries

Alchemist
At the present time, our materialistic science derides alchemists as misplaced mystics who pursued a dream of finding a chemical compound that might transform base metals into gold. Indeed, they recognize that much scientific breakthrough was achieved through these pursuits, but they throw out out the goal of the alchemists as simply a fanciful or impossible plan and fantasy. However, there exist fascinating incidents, a few so deeply curious that the mind can barely cope...

The Alchemy of Freedom: The Philosophers’ Stone and the Secrets of Existence

Hameed Ali (A. H. Almaas)
Well-known spiritual teacher A. H. Almaas uses the metaphor of the mysterious philosopher’s stone to discuss a tremendous liberating power that leads to endless enlightenment.  An introducrion by Almaas: TRUE NATURE, the fundamental nature of what we are—and of everything—is what matters most when it comes to spiritual transformation. It is the single most important element for liberation. The more we understand it, the more we realize that it is not simply the most important element; in fact,...
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