Cosmic Consciousness and the Quest for Hermes Trismegistus

Who was this remarkable individual, why did his mystic teachings lose their standing at the start of the modern age, and is there anything we, at the end of it, can learn from him?

The Ecology, Cosmos and Consciousness lectures series presents:

Cosmic Consciousness and the Quest for Hermes Trismegistus

Gary Lachman

Tuesday, 27th March, 2012

October Gallery, 24 Old Gloucester Street, London, WC1N 3AL

Please RSVP on Facebook (afraid so) so that we can anticipate numbers – Please pay on the door.
Entry £7 /£5 Concessions, Arrive 6pm for a 6:30pm Start - Wine available

In antiquity, through the Renaissance, and up until the beginning of modern times, the name Hermes Trismegistus was one to conjure with, literally. Thought to be the source of all ancient wisdom and knowledge, founder of civilization, master of magic, the arts, and sciences, Hermes Trismegistus was believed to be a contemporary of Moses, the teacher of Plato, and for some his prestige equalled that of Jesus Christ. Yet in the early seventeenth century, this legendary figure lost all credibility, and the hermetic philosophy associated with his name became a laughing stock. Who was this remarkable individual, why did his mystic teachings lose their standing at the start of the modern age, and is there anything we, at the end of it, can learn from him? My talk will look at the remarkable history of this extraordinary character, at the early Hermeticists pursuit of gnosis and its links to "cosmic consciousness," and will explore the possibilities the teaching of Hermes Trismegistus may hold for us today.

Gary Lachman is the author of more than a dozen books on the links between consciousness, culture, and the western "counter tradition," including Jung the Mystic, Politics and the Occult, and A Secret History of Consciousness. He is a regular contributor to Fortean Times, and has written for the Guardian, Independent on Sunday, TLS, and other journals. In a previous life, he was a founding member of the pop group Blondie.

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