This is a very amazing new translation into English; one of the first in over 350 years. The translation is great, the books are gorgeous, and the translator is to be commended. ( )

I tried to bury the claws of a crab under the sand, but no scorpions came out of it. I want my time back. ( )

FILOSOFÍA OCULTA

Enrique Cornelio Agrippa (1486-1535) fue un alemán de
personalidad descollante. Alquimista, experto en magia y
Cábala, y también médico, actuó en las cortes
de Maximiliano I y de Carlos V, hasta que, por disposición de
Francisco I, sufrió confinamiento en Grenoble, donde
falleció. Sus inquietudes indagativas le produjeron no pocos
trastornos y conflictos. Los misterios del universo le sedujeron de
tal modo que se consagró a investigarlos con esta certidumbre
como lema: La naturaleza es una totalidad
orgánica y con análisis apropiado es posible establecer la causa
de cualquier hecho. Así nacieron sus dos obras capitales:

La Filosofía Oculta (1510) y La Incertidumbre y Vanidad de las
Ciencias (1527). Sin duda, los trabajos de Agrippa
condensaron íntegramente el quehacer de los estudiosos de
todos los siglos hasta su tiempo. Por ello, es oportuno citar aqui
lo que él mismo expresa respecto a su obra:

Todos los escritos que preparé e incluí aquí los obtuve de
autores extranjeros, y no los entrego como verdades sino como
conjeturas próximas a la verdad, como imitación de las
cosas verdaderas. Debemos pues extraer la verdad entre los
errores de los antiguos, lo cual no podemos lograrlo sin
una inteligencia profunda; debe tenerse la sabiduría que sepa
extraer el bien de todo mal, y reducir a líneas rectas todas
las cosas oblicuas, y que conozca el buen uso de
todas las cosas que aquélla gobierna, como lo ejemplifica
Agustin con la persona del carpintero que tiene instrumentos que
le son necesarios y cómodos, y tanto oblicuos y complicados,
como derechos. .."

FILOSOFÍA OCULTA ( HECATE)

Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa (1486-1535) es el escritor más influyente de la esoterica renacentista, y de hecho todo el ocultismo occidental. Sin duda, su libro de occulta philosophia debería estar en la cima de cualquier lista de lectura requerida para aquellos interesados ​​en la magia occidental y las tradiciones esotéricas.

Escrito en tres libros entre los años 1509 y 1510 (tendría 23 años en ese momento), fue un ambicioso intento de rejuvenecer el arte de la magia que había degenerado durante la edad oscura. Lo hizo reuniendo una base intelectual y teórica de su extensa colección de fuentes. Agripa comenzó con una "exposición sistemática de ... la magia espiritual de Ficinian y la magia demoníaca de Trithemia (y) ... tratada en la magia práctica" (IP Couliano in Hidden Truths 1987, p.144). Otras fuentes importantes utilizadas por Agripa incluyen Liber de mirabilibus mundi de pseudo-Albertus Magnus, Oratio de Dignitate Hominis y Apologia de Giovanni Pico, De Verbo Mirifico de Johannes Reuchlin, Historia naturalis de Pliny , así como Picatrix y los textos herméticos y neoplatónicos. El texto resultante circuló ampliamente en forma de manuscrito.

Más de veinte años después, Agripa emprendió una extensa expansión y una cuidadosa revisión de la obra, que se imprimió en 1533. La composición tipográfica apenas había comenzado antes de que el libro fuera denunciado como herético por el inquisidor dominico Conrad Köllin de Ulm. Estas dificultades de último minuto explican la inclusión de la larga retracción adjunta al libro 3 , así como la ausencia del nombre o ubicación de la impresora. (Cf. V. Perrone Compagni, Cornelius Agrippa: De occulta philosophia Libri tres , Leiden: EJ Brill, 1992, p.11)

A reminder of how strange things used to be, from the weird stuff reading list. Henry Cornelius Agrippa of Nettesheim was a sort of Renaissance Man. He claimed to possess degrees in canon law, common law, and medicine; university records of the time (1486-1535) were less than comprehensive, so maybe he did. At various times he was a reasonably accomplished soldier in the armies of Emperor Maximillian, the Marquis of Montferrat and Maximillian Sforza of Milan; he was an ambassador from the Holy Roman Emperor to the court of Henry VIII of England; he served as personal physician to the Duke of Savoy and to Louise of Savoy, Queen Mother of France, and as a private physician in Switzerland and the Netherlands; and he lectured at various European universities. And, like many other intellectuals of the time, he became interested in the occult. (I note that what’s called “occult” now was well within the purview of a doctor in the 16th century).

Wading through this stuff is interesting. Cornelius Agrippa (the name he usually used) had to tread carefully to avoid the attentions of the Inquisition (at one point he was excommunicated). The Church was pretty dubious about magic, always ready to believe it involved dealing with demons; Agrippa worked around this by presenting demon facilitated magic as something to be avoided; by maintaining that some magical operations were assisted by angels or by “spirits” who were not evil; and by describing “natural” magic that worked with inherent properties of stones, herbs, astrology, numerology and so on, rather than by invoking a supernatural entity. He also does a great deal of circumlocution, citing various ancient authorities for magic operations rather than suggesting that he has tried them himself.

The amount of woowoo here is mind numbing. You can cure a fever by strapping live pigeons to your feet. The heart of a screech owl placed on the left breast of a sleeping woman will make her tell all her secrets. The gall of lizards attracts weasels. A needle coated in dung and packed with graveyard earth will protect a woman from unwanted sexual advances (you know, I bet that would actually work). Peony roots covered with beaver oil and menstrual blood will cure epilepsy. If a woman has enchanted you to fall in love with her, urinate in her right sleeve (but only out of doors) and the enchantment will be lifted (I bet that would work, too.). If you boil and eat the heart of the first bird you see on the Calends of November, you will understand the language of birds. And so on for a thousand pages or so.

It’s instructive to remember that everybody believed this stuff. The efficacy of magic was endorsed by the Church, and you could not only be burned alive for practicing it, you could also be burned for denying it. I suppose I shouldn’t be so smug; my Facebook feed is full of people informing me of the magical properties of turmeric or cucumbers or coconut oil or Bernie Sanders economics.

Agrippa was interested in magic squares. If you’ve ever looked at demonological works, they often present “sigils” of demons (and sometimes angels) that are complicated symbols made up of seemingly random connected lines and curves. Some of these are apparently completely invented; some are elaborations of Greek or Hebrew letters, but Agrippa generates some by tracing numerologically significant paths through magic squares. You use Hebrew numerals for your square, which are also Hebrew letters, and trace the name of the angel/demon/spirit in question to get his/her/its sigil. Agrippa generates the sigils of the Intelligences and Spirits of all the planets this way; for example, you can get the sigil of the Spirit of Mercury, Taphthartharath, by setting up an 8x8 magic square with Hebrew letters/numbers and tracing out Th (400) Ph (80) Th (400) R (200) Th (400) R (200) Th (400) without lifting your pencil. (This also reveals that Taphthartharath’s number is 2080; I imagine with a little more effort you could get the URL for his website).

Well, it was an interesting read. Agrippa seems to have been a decent fellow; he got in considerable trouble in France once defending an accused witch (he got her off, too. Or at least she wasn’t burned; she was in pretty bad shape after questioning and we don’t learn her subsequent history). As mentioned, it’s interesting to note that there is plenty of woowoo still with us. ( )