It seems to me that the concept of "immortality" as we usually think of it is linked to the perpetuation of Ego and the fear of its dissolution through the coporeal death. Hermeticism on the other hand is the technology of eliminating/ liberating the Ego to embody pure Essence. In a way this is the true immortality because the Essence is not destroyed in the cycles of birth and death. Hermeticism is practically the antithesis of the first type of immortality, but would support the latter.

> I'm unclear as to how Hermeticists define immortality. Is it in the sense of an immortal
> soul which transmigrates while retaining core characteristics and awareness? Or are
> you speaking of a permanent corporal life? If the latter I'm assuming to achieve
> immortality the practicioner would have to sort of 'bump out' the soul living in
> another's earthly body and replace it with his/her own? Or perhaps share custody.

Hermeticism, in my experience, doesn’t come to a clear conclusion about what immortality is and isn’t. In many cases it is defined in a most literal sense as the everlasting body and eternal soul forever bound and unextinguishable. In other cases it is implied that immortality is that of the “mind”, inclusion of the soul in said “mind” is not clearly stated but is heavily implied. There is also the prescription of the life as an idea or set of ideas that do not die as we do.

Specifically I think I am referring to the immortality, however unclear, of the “mind”. I think the terms I’ll use will be that of ‘awareness’ for self awareness, ‘mind’ for the complex system of thought, logic and emotion, ‘body’ for the physical vessel and ‘soul’ for the underlying divine spark and order.

> I think that in order to ethically justify such an action you would have to use a 'might
> makes right' argument. But these types of justifications are so easily abused. Reading
> your post, I'm reminded of the character from Silence of the Lambs. He had the will
> and ability to 'hold onto another persons body', by literally taking their skin! Is the
> forcefull expulsion of anothers soul for personal empowerment on this same level?

What does that say about your current relationship between your mind and body? I mean technically your mind is not in communication with your body on an internal level but it does maintain a status of dominion over your body. What is so different about your current state than the “Silence of the Lambs” example?

It isn’t necessarily a ‘might makes right’ argument, the ethical considerations depend entirely upon technique, intent and implementation. For instance, if you could firmly attach your “mind” to a new life before any other “mind” even had the chance to exist then you would be preempting any ownership conflicts, in which case you could hardly be said to be holding the body hostage. If one had such deep insight into the future existence of new lives you could even pick a doomed ‘marriage’ of mind and body, and simply use what would otherwise be wasted.

Intent, technique, implementation…

> But what is the mechanism that brings souls into this life? If its just random energy
> changing states, and you've found someway to beat the odds and retain awareness, than
> I'd have an easier time saying that 'ownership' of a body would be up for grabs.
> However, if there is reason and purpose to life....

Fundamental questions indeed, of which I have my opinions.

Mainly I would say that the ‘cojoining’ of the soul to the body is fundamentally different from the ‘marriage’ of the mind to the body. A platonic soul would be inherent in the body from before the very start and would still exist past the bodies end. Although the prime postulate of the platonic soul is an implied lack of true uniqueness, so more than one person could operate with much of the same soul stuff. Whereas the mind develops slowly with the growth and experiences of the life. The mind is highly influenced by the soul, and quite possibly limited in the scope and paths available for development by the soul, but the awareness you experience is not an inherent aspect of the soul or the body, more accurately it is a derivative of the two.

In such, there isn’t so much of a singular and unique controlling force for each person and body, more correctly we all pull from a pool of mind pattern stuff that is compatible with human bodies, and therefore moving from one body to the next isn’t really a transfer of consciousness so much as it is a cloning of your unique soul bond and mind/body ‘marriage’. The soul itself is beyond manipulation at that level, but one could, and would probably have to, choose a vessel with much the same soul print or one of a high degree of compatibility.

The actual feeling of self awareness can’t really be transferred from one person to another without destroying the vacated being in process (it would be critical to be simultaneous with the transfer, or else its just copying) or somehow making a ‘clean swap’ if a self awareness already exists in the chosen vessel. I think it would be easier to avoid the complications of this sort of methodology, I really don’t see it as necessary if one involves other methodologies in their practice.

Specifically I would state that among the other methodologies that would allow one to avoid such complications are the removal of the awareness from the body. As much as many paths focus on the super instatement of the awareness within the body (Ashtanaga Yoga and Bardons Hermetics), once you have reached a maximum effective state of super bodily awareness the next step is to move the awareness to a neutral ground. This is an important methodology for more reasons than simply avoiding awareness transfer complications. Primarily there are enormous advantages to moving from the primary awareness arrangement of the mind moderating communication between the soul and the body to the arrangement of the soul moderating the communication between the mind and body. As one can see this opens the mind to paths and scope beyond which the soul would have been capable of allowing.

> Immortality and reincarnation bring up a slew of interconnected ideas that need to be
> answered before you can give your final answer. What is soul? What is mind? How are
> they connected? What is death? What do we mean by physical? How do we justify our
> arguments for these things?

Yes indeed.

> I haven't done much research on Hermeticism. Does Hermeticism answer these
> questions? Or do Hermetic teachings need refining? Interested to here your response.

Different Hermetic authors have attempted to answer all of these questions. How successful they are is a subjective observation of each Hermeticist. Primarily it is important to remember that Hermeticism is a non-dogmatic following of ideas, answers are reached individually and passive consensus is probably the best judgment of correctness, but is by no means a concrete flag of the fact of any statement or postulate. Some good books that cover these subjects would be “The Corpus Hermetica(I prefer the Copenhaver translation), The Hermetic Library” and Plotinus’s “The Enneads.” What’s far more important is if it works for you?

I have found the metaphysical discussions of immortality, reincarnation, etc. in all traditions to be confused.

I have concluded (for now!) that the point of the whole exercise is eliminate egoic reaction to death.

Jfrx

It seems to me that the soul slowly relinquishes its identity in the ascent towards God. By identity, I mean the designation which allows a soul to be a unique, discernable entity. This concept is reflected in Buddhism as well.


In the Corpus Hermeticum, Libellus I, 26a Poimandres says,

"And thereafter, each in his turn, they mount upward to the Father; they give themselves up to the Powers, and becoming Powers themselves, they enter into God."


Later, in Libellus IV, 6b, Hermes tells Tat:

"It is not possible, my son, to attach yourself both to things mortal and to things divine."


This indicates, to me, that divinity is synonymous to immortality. It would follow that identity associates with an attachment to the world, rather than the divine, and thus establishes itself in mortality.


So the answer in my opinion, is that you--or me for that matter, are not immortal and will never be. It is by the increments that we cease to be 'you' or 'me' that we gain our immortality. "This is the Good; this is the consummation, for those who have got gnosis."