Thomas Aquinas vs. Hermes Trismegistus (Anti-Magical Polemic)

[@ARsuffix]

These vigorously critical words from Thomas Aquinas highlight two fascinating take-aways for me: 1) is that the ways of the magi or practitioner of the celestial "pagan" Arts is morally ambiguous and intellectually ill-conceived according to the high virtue of his faith. And 2) by virtue of his critique, for him to write this, there WERE magi and other practitioners of magical Arts causing seemingly REAL effects in his day. 😳

[@heinrich3088]

Most of the magical grimoires, as far as I know came from Renaissance Italy. So, it is fairly possible that these practices predated the mentioned. period.

[@ARsuffix]

@@heinrich3088 Oh for sure!

[@notloki3377]

those intellectually ill conceived people brought you calculus, navigation technology, and architecture that would have no parallel until the space age.

[@heinrich3088]

@@notloki3377 He said according to "his faith"... This has Aquinas as the subject of the phrase.

[@h.w.4482]

and nazis gave us the moon landing, your point?

[@SobekLOTFC]

Keep up the awesome job, Dan! 👍

[@quentandil]

I'm admired of your image archive.

[@Bildgesmythe]

Great video and the artwork you added was perfect!

[@ewadsworth]

Thank you for the best content ever! 🎉

[@pastoralmusic]

Woah this Thomas guy should make a podcast i love his mind

[@zapitlucero7576]

😮 ..he passed away 1274

[@Tinkering4Time]

@@zapitlucero7576and thank goodness. His argumentation was rather shoddy. But basing anything on Aristotle’s authority will do that.

[@tightbhole420]

​@@Tinkering4Timewoah boys look out we got a friggin genius here 😂 gtfo

[@foca7550]

Christian destroys WOKE magician with FACTS and LOGIC. Joking, thank you for the video.

[@notloki3377]

THOU SHALT LOVE ME -idk descartes probably

[@alfredogomez4714]

Lol!

[@naturbursche5540]

Esoteric plot twist: The FACTS and LOGIC are the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil that got us kicked out of paradise

[@notloki3377]

@@naturbursche5540 esoteric plot twist, paradise never existed, and some of those facts and logic have gotten us closer to our better natures.

[@naturbursche5540]

@@notloki3377 Chill, I don't believe in this literally, but in philosophical ways. Think about the first band of desert nomads from whose culture the Bible originates. They were living in paradise as savages as they saw fit until somebody brought up the first moral argument.

[@Writhe_n_Shine]

Ahhh yea more polemics! I love these stuffy gent's and their absolutely next level shade throwing. As always thank you for what you do here. It is absolutely a privilege to have access to this knowledge, and I am immensely grateful to you, and your fellow youtubers (of literally every knowledge set imaginable) who freely give all of this to us with real love and passion. The Great Work continues!

[@nm12349]

Very interesting. I'd love to hear more of Thomas Aquinas's work and theories on this channel.

[@jasonfusaro2170DragonFly]

St. Thomas Aquinas was one of the Doctors of the Church.

[@SavannahShepherd669]

Ive been looking for new knowledge and wow that was powerful and made alot of sense. Tyvm! 😊

[@oumod_]

“Through such sights or sounds that appear through the operations of magicians, people often gain intellectual knowledge of things that exceeds the capacity of their intellect; such as the revelation of hidden treasures, the manifestation of future events and some times even TRUE ANSWERS IN REGARDS TO CERTAIN SCIENTIFIC TEACHINGS.” - ie. Jack Parsons and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory

[@euphoricdesignstx]

Thank you for always sharing the truth. May the Lord keep blessing you with the knowledge and understanding to keep sharing with the mass.

[@1ntrcnnctr608]

They that make them are like unto them: so is every one that trusteth in them.

[@FutureMythology]

An intriguing showdown between Thomas Aquinas and Hermes Trismegistus. 🤔💬📚

[@mandys1505]

Happy up-coming B-Day, Dan 🎉🎉::: it's gonna be a doosie, as far as the astrology; Pluto moving into Aquarius😮... (one of my wonders was Aquinas at the end of his life.. saying that all he had written was "as straw". ☆♡◇) well, maybe pluto moving into aquarius will be a good thing!? who knows...i'm ready for some goodness... Long live the Picatrix! 😂

[@TheModernHermeticist]

Wow Mandy, you are way too generous! Thanks for the birthday gift, I really appreciate it. I hope you're having a happy New Year. I have been fending off sickness (chronic sinusitis) for the last few months, so my uploads have been a bit less frequent. I have a special election related to the channel coming up that happened to fall on the day before my bday, and I didn't even consider the outers. Now regarding Aquinas' mystical experience/potential stroke which caused him to say "all that I have written is like straw/B.S. compared to what has been revealed to me." I think he had the relatively common experience that the absolute eludes language altogether. I don't think it was so much a recanting of his former writings as much as an admission that language has hard limits in its ability to convey anything concrete about the more profound mysteries that sit at the threshold of death. He was awestruck and humbled to the point of never writing anything else for the remainder of his life, but I don't think he thought his works should be burned like so many others have wanted to do at the ends of their lives (I'm thinking of Virgil in particular here). Aquinas had always argued that some things (like the existence of God) could be determined by intellectual proofs, but other things (like the nature of the Trinity) could only be experienced by illumination or revelation, so presumably when he suffered a stroke he witnessed more mysteries to add to his pile of things that reason and logical proofs simply cannot grok.

[@mandys1505]

oh wow did he suffer a stroke... i thought maybe, that he had a vision or something like that~ for sure.... and i wondered if... there had ever been any account of it.... but i had the impression that he remained silent​@@TheModernHermeticist

[@mandys1505]

​@@TheModernHermeticisti hope your sinusistus clears up😮😢...yeah- not good for making videos to say the least! 🙈🙉🙊i've been under the weather, too... i have been rather illish for the last month.... i lie in bed and don't feel up to reading...and i have an old comfort stand-by; which is closing my eyes in the dark and listening to Terence McKenna videos...ha ha...omg. He's like a beautiful irish fairy::: 😂 his voice is like... idk! its worth an essay or poem. So... hang in there! ❤ ⁰🫡😛.. ! rooting for you☆ / ahhhh! 🦋 ( i was always like... what did aquinas encounter! let us know that ) ...

[@mandys1505]

PS.... since i didnt know that Aquinas had a stroke around the same time as this vision or revelation which was beyond words... i tried to find symptoms of stroke , looking online... / so, maybe it was the stroke which cause the vision.... wow. 🏜 i am so interested in philosophy but also very much, religious experience.... so, i think: certain illnesses or conditions in the brain will lead to these perceptions; like in Epilepsy; which was known as the religious disease.... i actually have the lesser form of epilepsy where i get occasional 90 second focal seizures...but the thing is... i have read that, you may have like, only a few of these per year...per month or whatever, but it has an effect on many people with focal seizures, that they are very interested in some field or form of spirituality! And... its hard to know, what is uhm..real...so to say...especially when, a symptom of aura or seizure is, a change in perception which is so subtle, that one often doesnt connect the cause ...and attributes it to something metaphysical... it's the age-old question! But i would like to take the tack, that, well, whether its real or not.... is it meaningful and significant... i mean, it is very popular now in culture to question all of reality as a matrix or something~ so, yeah, that story always stuck with me, and it's quite emotional even, to learn that he had the stroke around the same time...as this vision. Thanks Dan 🩵

[@clementineforever]

@@TheModernHermeticistPossible NDE? I’ve listened to a couple thousand or more of those who verified medically not physically alive and there stories … OH My. I quit listening to them as every human lives a different story and perception on earth… Apparently after as well. But the one thing ‘most’ have in common is ❤ Love engulfed them as never experienced. And All- Change their lives and try to find a way to be comfort to mankind- Some to feed and clothe - Some to work hospice… Me? Im writing- some will be songs- some are poetry ❤

[@FeFefcc]

Woah crazy 😊 exactly what I was thinking. 🌙☀️

[@WhiskerBiscuit369]

Didn't Thomas aquire his base knowledge from the teachings of hermes though?

[@MarkMasters...]

Excellent. Thank you.

[@TodaRai707]

Would you ever make a video talking about the comments of Justin Martyr, who linked pagan mystery cults with fallen angels?

[@MarqueeMark5]

Yeah, until Carl Jung and physics proved that something influences our thought before the conscious mind conceives it. If sunlight can make plants grow to its direction, then planets and stars can vibrate and send a frequency that humans move to its vibe.

[@Sorg22]

Yeah, in the beginning, he didn't sound slanderous, rather academic and neutral, impressively, so, but then, at the end there he certainly turned up the shade extensively, and did away with sound logic with his strawman and gaslighting.

[@Protogonas]

Now this would be an Epic Rap Battle of History.

[@bigdude6538]

You should’ve titled your video Thomas Aquinas vs. Silicon Valley & A.I. lol

[@mojomanrosie]

When he refers to celestial bodies..is he referring to planets or spirits/angels etc.?

[@TheModernHermeticist]

Specifically planets and stars here (angels are thought to be supercelestial)

[@banjogyro]

Hermes Gang

[@Bhakti-Tereza]

Confusious says, signs, and symbols rule over the physical world.

[@david-jr5fn]

I wonder if he seen any of these things he is talking about because I have not been lucky enough to see statues moving, talking or answering questions. Maybe the magicians today just don't have what it takes, perhaps necessary knowledge has been lost that would make it possible or perhaps it never happened

[@Bildgesmythe]

Or early puppetry and speaking tubes

[@theeccentrictripper3863]

@@Bildgesmythe Some manner of ecstatic vision resulting in hallucination doesn't seem implausible, but I'd wager much of it relies on accumulated context, i.e if everything and everyone in society and your books tell you statues will talk, they're probably gonna talk when that vision hits. We still seemingly have fairly frequent mystical experiences, more than ever it seems at times, but the expectations have changed and thus so does its character. That's my theory anyways, food for thought.

[@fosterbennington6405]

I assumed it was like how the buddhists who are not properly Initiated must meditate on and converse with an outward Bodhisattva or Buddha, preferably a statue (whereas the practice given after proper Initiation is to meditate on yourself as the relevant Bodhisattva or Buddha)

[@Cholatemilk1]

Heck ya dan

[@patrickirwin3662]

Thank you, Magister Dan. But, I mean, who was right?

[@eugeneanderson7984]

Excellent video we have a City that rules over US that employs these dark Arts Tom Horn has a great video on how the highest office in the land uses stones ECT. To bring them in.

[@julius-sumner-miller]

Neat!

[@melann4522]

This talks about men as if they solely occupy the space of being human.

[@Bhakti-Tereza]

When you see, or only hear unexplainable things, you can call them hallucinations. But, when you see and hear, then it is called a phenomenon. I learned that in psychology 101😂.

[@gudmunduragustsson5872]

instant sub

[@Atthalassia]

These rappers got beef

[@bradlybaldwin9564]

Maybe you should to see where CHRISTIAN actually started from

[@bigdude6538]

You should’ve titled your video “Thomas Aquinas vs. Silicon Valley & A.I. lol

[@Bhakti-Tereza]

Lovely ❤

[@alem8100]

Is not the main contention here cosmological than metaphysical? I believe the hermeticists and practitioners of magic saw the celestial bodies as "intellectual bodies" to begin with.

[@mktp1]

As a practionioner of the “science of images” - so basically astral magic - I can say that against actual empirical results the theoretical criticism of Aquino just can’t measure up

[@FraterDeweyDecimilus]

Boss man Dan! I have a question for you that's unrelated to this subject in particular but, is directly related to the big Triple Fantastical rascal himself. Being that Hermes is essentially some kind of representation or avatar/archetype or whatever you'd refer to it as for Ahura Mazda (Hermuz), wouldn't the Caduceus kind of be a counterintuitive symbol due to the Zoroastrians disdain for the Serpent? Now, I'm fully aware that the Caduceus is representative of the Kundalini and Pineal Gland but, it does seem kinda strange (to me at least) that our guy is a representative of A.M. and even has the association with Fire but, also carries the Caduceus which I would think would be an almost disrespectful gesture in regards to the origins of the figure in regards to the Persians and Zoroastrianism. Sorry for being so off topic but I wasn't sure where I could or should ask this otherwise.

[@internautapopo2766]

The snake in Zoroastrian mystery doesn't represent kundalini as you said. This is more a syncretic way of analysing the question. In Alchemy and old religions animals are characters of actions in relation to the human psyche. When you go outside in the wild and you find a snake you're lucky because usually they find you before you see them.😂 A wooden staff would save your life because the snake would bite the staff before your legs. The double crossed snake is representative of the counter action of poison, and so the poison itself if isolated can be the cure of the poisoned body. Now we know that this is true but if you analyse the Caduceus symbol old Magi and Alchemists knew this too. the double snake are the action "the poison" and the reaction "the cure" but both are derived from the same entity as Angra Manyu derived from Aura Mazda and vice versa. The wooden staff was used to extract the venom and create the medicine from it. This is a speculation because there are really few Zoroastrian medical text preserved. But it make sense it's plausible and It's not disrespectful of the Persian and Zoroastrian tradition.

[@srinuvasu6558]

🙏🙏🙏🔥🔥🔥

[@TheModernHermeticist]

🙏

[@HolyWisdom93]

Mercury or Hermes might be the actual creator

[@Tinkering4Time]

Huh. Aquinas’ argumentation is rather rough. I am hearing a lot of straw men, hearsay, and appeals to authority. He does make good use of the metaphysics he is familiar with, however it sounds like he applies it here with a strong confirmation bias fundamentally based on dogma rather than reason. This is rather inconsistent with his appeals to reason within his postulates.

[@heinrich3088]

He never considered reason apart from Christian revelation anyway... In the beginning of the ST he already gives reasons why theology should be proper called a science.

[@AllegraPersephone]

People believe all kinds of absurd things. It's not really complicated, but our monkey brains regress to superstition and magical thinking. It's a planet, or a number, or a symbol, or a whatever anyone can imagine, good or bad, but why? Always looking outward. Always trying to control. God is love. Love. It's that simple.

[@AnDyity]

We need an epic rap battle of history video for these two.

[@naturbursche5540]

came here for this comment

[@markdelgado6984]

​@@naturbursche5540 never come back.

[@lepke_3114]

hmmm ok justin

[@jacquiecotillard9699]

Annnnd FIGHT!

[@NevisYsbryd]

Hermes > Aquinas

[@davonbenson4361]

Facts!

[@AJWRAJWR]

Team St. Thomas ✝️>🔮

[@connorcreegan]

absolutely ineffably based

[@bignoob1790]

Ironically Mercury (Hermes)is my dominant planet and Thomas Aquinas is my patron saint

[@SethEvans-r2j]

Sounds like Schopenhauer.

[@RicoMoneybags]

First

[@Thedisciplemike]

Aquinas for the win

[@MoonGoblin]

"It is not possible to attend to likenesses as though they were real things unless the natural judgement of the senses is impaired" Ermm okay buddy, then how is it that I can walk to the store to buy a 40oz of malt liquor and walk back all while talking in my head to anime catgirl tulpas? Checkmate, nerd 😌 Edit: Nvm he says they have souls or something

[@gordonfreeman7737]

It is not scholarly, nor christian to judge that which you have no proper knowledge of. Hermes was not a magician, he was an alchemist. Magic is real, and so is alchemy and both are different. I myself have gained access to a comprehensive list of all spells possible, but I fear hell. However I do not think that the art and science of alchemy is demonic nor is it magic.

[@notloki3377]

thomas aquinas be like "if X, then not Y, given that X is a dead jew on a stick, and Y is the hermetic law of correspondence." someone needs to ressurect diogenes with some jew-magic to slap him with a plucked chicken yelling "BEHOLD, A MAGUS."

[@Bobbyhiddn]

X is the son of God, so. That makes it a vital X.

[@notloki3377]

And man is a featherless biped, so that makes man a plucked chicken. Amazing what you can do with a lazy use of first principles, isn't it?@@Bobbyhiddn

[@notloki3377]

@@Bobbyhiddn that's just like, your opinion, man.

[@alem8100]

Cringe

[@notloki3377]

@@alem8100 useless and illiterate comment

[@babbarr77]

The Hermeticists were more akin to scientists than they were magicians…see the work of Robert Anton Wilson.

[@Rudiarius88]

...This isn't really "vs Hermes Trismegistus"; not sure how you could title this as such unless blatantly for clickbait

[@TheModernHermeticist]

He literally addresses Hermes and claims to refute him.

[@TheModernHermeticist]

(At 9:03)

[@Rudiarius88]

Surely you can see that that's one isolated fragment of this dialogue, and it's pertaining to one particular statement "in Asclepius" (misquoted and without any context) As far as I can tell, the quote in reference here is; "‘And since I have spoken of the kinship and fellowship of men with the gods, Asclepius, acknowledge the power and strength of Man. Just as the Lord and Father, or God (his greatest name) is the creator of the heavenly gods, so Man is the maker of the gods in temples, who are content to be close to human beings. Man not only receives light, but he gives it. Not only does Man progress towards God, but he forms gods. ...Everyone agrees that the race of gods clearly sprang from the purest part of Nature, and their symbols are simply heads which represent the whole being. But the forms of gods which men create are taken from two natures: from the divine, which is purer and far more god-like; and from that which is within men, that is, from matter. Having been formed from such matter, they are not represented by heads alone, but by the whole body with all its members. Thus humanity is always reminded of its own nature and origin as it continues to represent divinity in this way. So just as the Father and Lord has made the eternal gods to be similar to Himself, so humanity has made its gods in the likeness of its own features. ...These statues are made alive by consciousness, and they are filled with breath. They do mighty deeds. They have knowledge of the future which they predict through oracles, prophets, dreams and in many other ways. They bring illnesses to men and cure them. They give sadness and happiness according to merit." The consciousness is bringing these statues to "life" and causing such effects; the book itself is clearly saying these "gods" are representations, not animate statues, so it's not really refuting anything, but REGARDLESS of that fact: Nothing else in this refutes Hermes Trismegistus; Its literally a single refutation of a very particular phrase that is generally up for interpretation, alongside a long set of arguments against the various fantastical practices of magicians.

[@SoothSayer1369]

What a load of garbage

[@mouwersor]

Could you change up the way you speak? The audio is quite monotonous