Alchemy

Almost everyone believes they know that the alchemists were those who devoted themselves to the attempt of transforming lead into gold—that is, that they were either charlatans or poor deluded souls.

Yet the moment one opens any authentic text written by an adept, one finds the warning that the book in one’s hands speaks of something entirely different from the transmutation of base metals into ringing gold. Indeed, those who busied themselves with physical metals are often derided as “coal burners.”

What, then, is alchemy about? What do these books mean—writings that appear, and indeed are, incomprehensible if one does not possess their key?

First of all, it must be understood that alchemy was never merely a European phenomenon, spreading through the continent from the late Middle Ages and lingering, in faint traces, even to our own time. Rather, alchemy is a science that may truly be called universal. It was cultivated in ancient Egypt, in Greece and Rome, in India, in China, and among the Arabs—always in essentially the same terms as those later used by the Renaissance adepts, who expressed it through the symbolism of metals and laboratory operations.

It is indeed true that alchemy was the forerunner of chemistry, in the sense that the latter sprang from the former—as is generally acknowledged, and as the very words themselves attest. Yet one must clearly understand that the alchemy from which chemistry emerged was not the true alchemy.

The authentic Art does not concern itself with physical operations upon metallic substances or their derivatives, but only with what might be called its exoteric aspect. Those who misunderstood its real nature and took literally the instructions about calcination, sublimation, or the use of alembics, ended up experimenting with actual materials—and in doing so, stumbled upon discoveries that later flowed into modern science. Naturally, the adepts did not disdain to write things that were scientifically valid even on this outer level. They used metals and laboratory work as symbols of something higher, yet still took care that the material correspondences of those symbols were sound. But all this notwithstanding, the truth that interested the alchemists was “spiritual”, not material.

Their writings were, in a sense, pre-scientific texts whose surface explorations gave rise to modern chemistry; yet the scientific layer was only the outer garment, used to convey teachings of an entirely different order. Essentially, alchemy once held the same dual meaning that yoga does: its outer, exoteric aspect was meant to bring about physical and mental well-being, while its true, esoteric purpose was the transmutation of the individual.

What, then, is alchemy really about?

Simply put, it is a continuation—expressed in cryptic terms—of the various branches of the Sacred Science to which it belongs. Egyptian alchemy, which later became Arabic alchemy and in turn the European alchemy of the Renaissance, is the Hermetic continuation of the esoteric and operative knowledge of ancient Egypt. (The very word alchemy derives from the hieroglyphic kmt, meaning “black land,” the name the Egyptians gave their own country, with the addition of the Arabic article al.) But since Egyptologists ignore this body of knowledge, and since the alchemists themselves refused to reveal it openly—wrapping it instead in symbols that defy interpretation—nothing more can be said of it.

Renaissance alchemy—and even in the last century there were adepts of the highest order, such as Fulcanelli—uses the symbols of chemical substances and of metals to explain how to derive, from the unknown prima materia, the Philosopher’s Stone: the jewel that fulfills every desire (this definition, incidentally, recurs also in Tibetan texts, though Tibet knew no alchemical schools). Each alchemist employs these emblems in his own way: what sulphur means for Basil Valentine is not what it means for Philalethes. Likewise, all alchemists speak of the* prima materia*—that upon which one must work to obtain the result, and which all are said to possess by nature—yet none ever says what it truly is, each veiling it in enigmatic descriptions.

All describe the athanor, the vessel in which the fire must be kept for the cooking of the mysterious compound, yet none explains what that vessel really is (for, as one will have guessed, it is not a clay pot meant for boiling material mixtures).

Again, all speak of the Sun and the Moon, of green lions and homunculi, of the Androgyne and the King, of dew and tincture, and of many other notions drawn from the most diverse realms, yet never reveal what these terms actually designate.

It is also well known that alchemists deliberately invert and intermix the stages of the Work, so that the adept must discern for himself not only what is to be done, but also in what sequence the operations must proceed. The only certain datum is that the Work consists of three stages: the Work of Black, the Work of White, and the Work of Red—Nigredo, Albedo, and Rubedo. (Keeping this in mind, one may understand the remark that R. A. Schwaller de Lubicz, in the last years of his life, in his Swiss retreat, succeeded in obtaining the red hue of the stained glass of Chartres Cathedral.)

One might therefore conclude that alchemy is a vast and immense koan. In Zen Buddhism, koans are paradoxical riddles given by the master to the disciple, so that by meditating upon them he may reach satori—hastily rendered as “enlightenment.” (In truth, koan and satori mark only the threshold of the temple accessible to ordinary men; beyond them lie the secret instructions.)

Yet alchemy is not a mental exercise pursued for its own sake: it contains genuine operative practices.

The difficulty in understanding the writings of the alchemists lies in the fact that they are addressed solely to adepts—that is, to those who already know what the texts are truly about. For those who do not, they remain incomprehensible; and any attempt to explain them rationally—or psychologically, as Jung tried to do—is vain, for the esoteric sciences exist in a dimension beyond reason. The alchemists veiled their knowledge in secrecy not only to escape the tortures of the Inquisition, but for a deeper reason: such truths, as Plato says, “cannot be communicated like other forms of knowledge.”

Nevertheless, to read the books of the adepts is in itself a good and fruitful act; for awakening may be approached even through reading alone. Indeed, this is precisely the path indicated by the Mutus Liber, composed solely of a series of emblematic plates, bearing the motto: Ora, Lege, Lege, Lege, Relege, Labora et Invenies — that is: Pray, read, read, read, reread, work, and you shall find.

(The Flammarion Engraving, 1888)