The recipes
The early alchemists had recipes listing ingredients or techniques by which they made metals. The basis for many of these recipes was to introduce to base metals properties which the metals lacked.
The definition of Alchemy is the magical power or process of transmuting from a base metal and comes from ancient times. The transmutation of base metals into gold. It comes from the arabic al kīmiyā in the middle ages.
The word alchemy comes from the arabic al-kīmiyā and the greek word khumeía or the greek khēmiā.
The idea of the Alchemy definition is to change base metals into gold. Alchemy is a form of chemistry.
Alchemy is a form of chemistry and a major branch of Western occult science. But for many this ancient practice is a most misunderstood and ridiculed subject.
Alchemy is misunderstood by many because when hearing the purpose for transmutation of metals, transforming base metals such as copper and iron into gold. They are inclined to think alchemists were men trying to get rich quick with alchemy.
Not everyone can receive the art, unless there be some person sent by God to instruct him in it. For the matter is so glorious and wonderful that it cannot be fully delivered to any one but by word of mouth. Moreover, if any man would receive it, he must take a sacred oath, that since we his teachers refuse high rank and fame, that he also will not be too eager for these frivolous distinctions, and that he will not be so presumptuous as to make the secret known even to his own son; for propinquity of blood, or affinity, should be held of no account in this our majesty. Nearness of blood, as such, does not exile anyone to be let into the secret, but only virtue, whether in those near to us or in strangers. Therefore, you should carefully test and examine the life, character, and mental aptitude of any person who would be initiated into the art, and then you should bind him, by a sacred oath, not to let our majesty to be commonly or vulgarly known. Only when he begins to grow old and feeble, he may reveal it to one person, but not to more-and that one man must be virtuous and generally approved of by his fellows. For the majesty must always remain a secret science; and the reason that compels us to be so careful is obvious. If any wicked man should learn to practice this art, the event would be impearled with great danger to Christendom.
One of the first alchemist to abandon Hermetism and make alchemy serve practical purposes was Theophrastus Philippus Aureolus Bombastusvon Hohenheim, better known as Paracelsus (1493-1541).
He was one of the most rebellious alchemists who after searching for a medical education throughout northern Europe, and being disappointed, gave himself the Latin name of Paracelsus, meaning «greater than Celsus,»and proclaimed that his medicine would be greater than that of the Greeks and Romans.
In fact, he did by eventually being recognized as the inventor of medical chemistry. All of this came from humble beginnings but stern determination.Paracelsus’ first alchemy training came from his father who was a village doctor without any credential.
He treated the ill of Einsiedeln, and the pilgrims who became ill as the journeyed to and from the shrine of the Black Lady.
He had studied metallurgy, alchemy, and medicine so, as Paracelsus fondly wrote of his father, he taught his son about the healing herbs of the region, as well as alchemy, mining, smelting, and refining ores.
Paracelsus received the rest of his education mostly in German schools and universities. Afterwards he, like his father, practiced medicine without a credential.
He preformed some, what seem to people, miraculous cures and worked up fame as a healer, but about as frequently he irritated local authorities by his arrogance and had to move on.
When finally getting a teaching position at Basel University he used it to blast the Galenic theory of medicine which had predominated Europe for centuries. This definitely did not set well with the faculty who banned him from lecturing.
He won a temporary sanction to lecture in the town of Basel where he espoused a radical theory of medicine which included pathology, prescribing and preparing medicines, examining the pulse and urine, and treating illnesses and injuries.
He did not give these lectures in Latin, as customary for academics of the time, but in German so everyone understood. Those who did not know what their physicians were doing did after hearing Paracelsus.
This was not agreeable to the town fathers either and after Paracelsus became involved with a church man over a fee disagreement they wanted to imprison him. He left in the middle of night as he had often done before.
Despite of his personal character Paracelsus was a true alchemist. He believed in natural healing. He experienced this when with the Hapsburgarmies where he got surgical experience.
He heard from soldier’s lore a wound heals better if the dressing is put on the sword or spear that caused it; trying it, he found it to be true.
The treatment was better than traditional ointments. «If you prevent infection,» he concluded, «Nature will heal the wound by herself.»
At most Paracelsus was a paradox; his lifestyle was that of a fraudulent alchemist while he had the spirit of a real one. Paracelsus uniquely took the medieval world toward the modern world without feeling any clear-cut division.
He retained his old beliefs in a God, angles, devils, and all kinds of natural spirits which he proclaimed could and should be used for healing. Many thought him to be a magician since some of his cures seemed miraculous. Paracelsus would never had considered himself a magician; he just knew the healing power of Nature as he firmly believed that God had placed it there.
And this belief was reaffirmed whenever he saw the natural healing power work. He knew the relationship between God, Nature, and man,the mark of a true alchemist.
This is why he never abandoned the alchemy solution, evaporation, precipitation, and distillation-because he knew that it worked. «Stop making gold,» he taught, «instead find medicines.»
He was the first to name the element zinc in 1526. His medicinal ingredients came from plant extracts, and mineral compounds he used were antinomy, arsenic,and mercury.
He recognized the benefits of mineral waters for health, especially the Pfaffer water; particularly the tincture of gallnut as a reagent for the iron properties of mineral water.
His essences and tinctures extracted from natural plants replaced the complicated compound medicines of the day.Many of his opponents complained his remedies were poisonous, to which he quipped,
«All things are poisons, for there is nothing without poisonous qualities it is only the dose which makes a thing poison.»
Paracelsus brought alchemy into a new age. Instead of experiencing demise it was given new tasks to enable men to live better with their environment.
Paracelsus saw many similarities between the microcosm and the macrocosm and knew man must be in harmony with them to have good physical and spiritual health.
It was the famed psychiatrist Carl G. Jung who finally expressed his view the total goal of the alchemist, both then and now. After years of alchemy research and study Jung wrote the goal in his Mysterium Coniunctionis.
If the goal was ever attained it was achieved by three stages. The first stage, the studying of the problem or the whole situation, for the alchemist, is purely intellectual.
Even very early in alchemy this was known as separating the subtle essence, pneumia or soul, from the matter.
But almost throughout the history of alchemy this separation was recognized as not being enough. The liberated spirit then had to be reunited with the corporal body or matter.
Alchemy represented this reunion by various alchemical symbols, perhaps the best known is the «chemical marriage».
But, the alchemists were not satisfied just to let this chemical marriage represent the marriage of man and woman, no, to them, alchemy was more significant than that.
They tried through repeated distillation to produce an actual sky-blue fluid of the subtlest consistency which they called caelum, their heaven.
Producing this fluid was the second stage, but not the total goal of the alchemist. In other words, the caelum was not the Philosopher’s Stone.
The Philosopher’s Stone has not been significantly mentioned thus far and the following description of the third stage or degree which the alchemist strives for will indicate why.
The third stage of the conjunction is universal. This is not just the desire to change things, matter or the Self, back into prima materia, no, it is the attempting to return to the «first» prima materia, the chaotic state before creation.
This is the premises of the alchemist motto:
«What nature leaves imperfect, the alchemist perfects.»
Further he can say,
«Man, I, in an invisible act of creation put the stamp of perfection on the world by giving it objective existence».
This honor is usually given to the Creator, thus letting man view the world as the life of a machine, counted down to the last detail, which along with the psyche, runs on senselessly, obeying foreknown and predetermined rules.
Then Jung thought of his old Pueblo Indian friend and of envying his certainty that he had to help his father the sun to cross the sky each day.Jung realized Western man long-for myth which he had abandoned: «Human consciousness created objective existence and meaning, and man found his indispensable place in the great process of being.»
Jung’s purpose for studying alchemy was psychological, for to him alchemy was analogous to analytical psychology because both use similar processes.
Whereas in alchemy base metals are melted to make rarer ones, in analytical psychology the conscious is confronted unconscious.
Just as in the alchemist’s furnace the impurities are burned away, so to in psychoanalysis the disharmonious personality traits are worked through.
Here is a list of Suggested Alchemy Books:
For more on Alchemy, see: The Alchemy Virtual Library, Alchemy Symbol.
Alchemy Sources:
Adler, Robert E. «Paracelsus: Renaisannce Rebel» Medical Firsts: From Hippocrates to the Human Genome. Hoboken, NJ. John Wiley & Sons, 2004. pp. 46-52.
Alchemy. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alchemy>.
Aristotle. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aristotle>
Thomas Aquinas. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Aquinas>.
Roger Bacon. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Bacon>.
Doctor of the Church. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_of_the_Church>.
Fabricius, Johannes. Alchemy: The Medieval and Their Royal Art. London. Diamond Books. 1976
Galen. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galen>.
Hannah, Barbara. Jung: His Life and Work, A Biographical Memoir. New York. G. P. Putnam & Sons. 1976 Hayman, Ronald, A Life of Jung. New York. W. W. Norton. 1999.
Albertis Magnus. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albertus_Magnus>.
Natural philosophy (theology). <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_theology>
Isaac Newton. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Newton>.
Isaac Newton’s Occult studies. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Newton%27s_occult_studies>.
Taylor, F. Sherwood. Alchemists, Founders of Modern Chemistry. Kessinger Publishing
Thomism. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomism>.
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