Alchemy, Sister of Prophecy and the Ancient Tradition of Perfumes
Light seeks to know itself within matter. Alchemy is this knowledge. Perfume is its trace.
Alchemy, Science of the Sun
One possible etymology is that the word alchemy comes from al shemen, the vital principle, the source of life, oils, and the science of the sun.
El is the totalizing principle, the zodiac.
Shemen translates as oil, essence, or vital principle coming from the sun.
Shemesh is the sun.
Divine science is the level of the olive which, once pressed, anoints through knowledge.
The Alchemy of Life
Ancient civilizations were not sun‑worshippers as is often claimed. They had acquired an ontological understanding of the role of the star of our solar system and its action on the creation of life.
Their way of thinking differed completely from ours, which now seeks to be purely intellectual. Their supposed way of approaching life relied on two paths: the intellectual and the sensory. These are the two ways of acquiring knowledge.
The Sensory World
In ancient times, the epoptes were taught that our solar system depended on another solar system. This whole could be understood as two states of thought merging into one.
The result is ternary understanding, which is a form of engendering. The epoptes understood being in all its dimensions. They did not dissociate life from its source.
Ancient Egyptian Thought
It favored knowledge of the soul as the primary principle, the understanding of the star, and the engendering of life.
They considered different states of solar light: the illuminating principle, heat, visible and invisible light across the horizons from twilight to dawn. The red.
The color red is that of the spirit, revealing the true light to come — gold. The energizing action of life through this principle on Earth is the organization of the axioms of life, guided by the directing principle of the four directions for the manifestation of a body.
The Ancient Tradition
It explained that four forces operate at the level of the human soul. These four forces could be symbolized by the four rivers of the sacred garden.
They are four electrical and electromagnetic forces which, in different states, create matter and bodies under the impulse of true light, the vital breath or creative Word.
A cycle of in‑depth study of these forces and their combinations was taught. The distribution of these forces allows the soul to take a body. The soul was seen in its most noble aspect: the planet Earth.
Nature as the Exhalation of the Word
Studying it leads us into the secret arcana of creation and its quintessence: perfume. One of the ancient perfumers’ skills was to transcribe their understanding of cosmogony through fragrances or balms serving as operative means at the level of the soul.
Transmission of Knowledge: The Colleges of Wisdom
The epoptes were trained in divine science in colleges of wisdom called amath. These places granted access to highly advanced spiritual and scientific levels of consciousness: astronomy, mathematics, geometry, and music were taught there. Astronomy was expressed through natura naturans, and the epoptes drew parallels between natura naturans and natura naturata, that is, between the cycles of cosmogony and the cycles of nature.
The colleges or temples had three levels (like the ark). Each level corresponded to specific teachings. Here, we will briefly address the third level, which corresponds to cosmogony. Cosmogony was explained through sacred texts.
One aspect of its operative science is alchemy, including the medicine of the soul and perfumes.
THE ALCHEMICAL ART OF ANCIENT PREPARATIONS
The supposed view of the ancient colleges is that the life of the soul is eternal, and as long as the soul is worthy, it takes on a body again. The work of the soul at the highest level revealed its divine reality: the fully cosmic reality and the process of creation.
The work of humans here below is to foster the links and continuity of creation through the world of action, giving thanks to the first principle, respecting the cycles, and making the body, the land, and the soul a mirror of the sky.
The Operative Mode of Perfumed Preparations
Elixirs supported the ontological work of the soul on human memory. Thus, the dimension of perfumes is unveiled.
Oil and Water, the Four Elements, the Four Directions, the Quintessence
Oil symbolizes the impregnation of divine knowledge and the prophetic level: the anointed through knowledge. The matrix is the support of divine science, symbolizing the beginning, the acting soul, and the construction of the body around the soul.
Oil intrinsically contains within itself the quintessence of the four elements and the three Egyptian seasons of 360 days. A fourth season corresponded to the five epagomenal days, which were sacred and whose understanding was considered dangerous: the hidden dimension of bitumen is the body of resurrection.
Egyptian water has surprising properties. It is rich in calcium, magnesium, sodium, and sulfur. Because of its composition, this water can support chemical modifications.
Incense, the Zodiac, and the Planets — The Unveiling of the Lunar Unconscious
Incense links the body, governed by the zodiac, to fumigation; perfumes link the head to the domain of the planets. The keys to the gate of heaven lie in the knowledge of incense in relation to the planets and zodiac signs.
Aquatic Plants, the Heart, Emotion, Cycles, the Star Sirius
The rebirth of the spirit, cycles, and the level of water (flood) correspond to Sirius. Plants such as water lilies or cyperus were dedicated to the rebirth of the spirit. Using such plants in ancient perfumers’ macerations helped the soul cross the sea of its emotions, the human sea, so that the being would no longer be imprisoned by its mind and senses.
Small Aside
The star Canopus is linked to the navigation of the soul toward the garden; it symbolizes a boat and is the sun accompanying Sirius.
Purifying Fibers, the Enlightened Spirit, the Organization of Our Galaxy, the Star Vega
Vega the Weaver: the image of this star is the weaver (creator) of worlds. It is the burning sun of our soul, the fire of the spirit.
Certain fibers were used to purify and bring the solar dimension into the maceration or used as wicks in sacred oils.
The wick is the support of new life, illuminated by knowledge, symbolizing the celestial spirit. Mummies would have been under this symbolism to reach the garden.
Bitumen and the Quest for the Five Epagomenal Days, or the Quintessence of the Soul’s Region
The symbol of bitumen is the soul transcending its human dimension to embrace the divine dimension, conscious of unity. This is the true dimension of Saturn, which secretly governs our solar system and presides over the Golden Age. Bitumen teaches the eternal rebirth of the soul through the understanding of cycles.
It was used in certain perfumed elixirs and especially intended for the bread of life (knowledge). It was used in preparing royal mummies for their departure to the celestial garden. Once the body was eviscerated, the organs were placed in canopic jars (Canopus), following the four directions, and the mummy kept its heart (Sirius).
The mummy was wrapped after a long preparation (70 days), then came the ceremony of the breath (under the aegis of Vega). The sacred written bandaging was interspersed with layers of natural bitumen and preparations based on incense. Bitumen served as a link between the hidden celestial part where the soul reveals itself to itself. During this journey, the soul became aware of itself through the works of creation and its first principle.
The key to this journey and its understanding lies in the five epagomenal days.
The journey led the soul to a place in the sky where all was dark. Only the light of the spirit guides the soul to find its path: the path of eternal life, the return to the garden.
This part of the sky was later called the darkness. A lack of light reigns there because this place contains very few stars. This region of the sky reveals another system, a galaxy, symbol of continuity and the present time of all things. It is also called the Horizon of Man.
The symbol of bitumen is the soul transcending the human dimension to embrace the divine dimension, the awareness of unity.
Lime and Natron as Fixatives
They were used to fix certain molecules during the separation of the plant body and its summits (calcination and distillation).
Fire as the Source of Life
Heat was maintained and intensified through clever mixtures of wood essences and other natural preparations. Spiritual preparations associated this fire with the image of the first solar star; flames and heat are the source that gives life. The consciousness of the epopte at that moment was to symbolically merge with this source so that his work and himself would be illuminated like the new sun in becoming (Jupiter).
Night and the Serpent
Access to night, symbol of the unconscious (the moon and ignorance), passes through copper (Venus) and its hidden dimension (Mars).
What makes the quest for silver more complex than that for gold is the fact that the soul must retrace the journey from its point of origin back to the Earth, integrating its unconscious and the entire physical dimension (the understanding of the two luminaries).
Copper is the serpent, the electrical conductor, and plays the role of teacher (Mercury). The jars used were often made of copper‑rich clay. The copper in the clay served to conduct heat but especially electricity to trigger reactions in the gases produced.
Because of the volatility of water and added materials during distillation, gases form above the matter, releasing the particles that compose it. Electrical tensions then formed in the gases. This combination produces a different state of matter through a micro‑atmospheric explosion on the scale of the jar. The matter is fertilized, transformed. This process is repeated until gold, silver, or other metals and minerals are obtained.
Properties and Spiritual Applications
These synthetic metal or mineral powders possess physical characteristics different from their naturally occurring counterparts. They react with the senses and the soul.
For the synthetic mineral used in painting to obtain blue, grinding it finely or coarsely produces lighter or darker shades. Depending on the intended use and effect, the grain served as a support for expressing the divinity on this plane. The whole created tensions in the brain. These tensions allowed for dynamic thinking linked to the cosmogonic plane and the sensory world.
Metals resulting from alchemical preparation were used for spiritual and/or medicinal applications. They acted on the two planes of human consciousness. Some powders of these metals were used in ancient perfumes and sometimes as fixatives for specific fragrances to localize on Earth the benefits of the divinity (blue lotus of the Nile).
The Subtle Trace of Light in Matter
In this logic, the gold of Ophir is a form of untraceable gold; it possesses all the characteristics of alchemical gold except one: it is completely transparent, like crystal. The resulting matter is quite astonishing: iridescent, almost incandescent to the touch, with bursts of bright light.
These metals and minerals have the particularity of being informed by the different kingdoms (mineral, vegetal, and part of the human operator) reproduced successively through the action of the serpent in the jar. These levels of preparation require knowledge of the intimate functioning of matter and its organization. Here, perfume becomes the synthesis of ancient science: it opens the way, accompanies, and prepares the soul for the journey and the encounter with its reality. Each stage of the alchemical process depends on the sky and the celestial hemisphere fully operative at a given moment.
The element thus becomes quintessenced and leaves the usual field of consciousness (the intellectual) to enter the untraceable (the sensory world). It serves as a support or stumbling stone for constructing a new thought resonating in matter.
Alchemy Is the Small Gate
Through its realization, it marks the starting point for the ancient epopte to work on the great wholes (the visible solar systems of our galaxy).
The epoptes of the time experienced events of the soul concomitant with the act of creation.
Alchemy, Sister of Prophecy
This process described above was the heart of the sacred texts; everything was recorded there in archetypal form. The use of parables and allusive terms allowed the epopte to move from the conscious to the unconscious, from the intellectual to the sensory.
These back‑and‑forth movements open the path of the senses and knowledge, the path of origin, revealing memory and the dimension of perfumes.
A transposition of ancient texts can also be made on a purely botanical level; this tradition lasted until the High Middle Ages. According to ancient traditions (Egyptian, Persian, Indian, Chinese), the first transmutations were from plant to metal, to transform nature into the flesh of the gods. Later, this complex path was abandoned in favor of the metallic path by the Greeks.
In the Sacred Texts
Thus, we find in allegorical form the story of a child left on the river and adopted by another family, which is the image of our sun adopted by another solar system and its main star.
A whole hierarchy of characters is inscribed in the sky. We can still trace them back to immemorial times. The images used to encourage the journey of knowledge are those of the boat, allegory of the soul, the Earth, the zodiac, and illustrious characters symbolizing the understanding of nature (the twins, the horse, the donkey, and birds among others).
We find characters depicted with a boat, others symbolizing nature or a strong link with it through birds or being fed by them, etc. Their teachings are rooted in a hermetic tradition that reveals itself little by little along the long path of life. Here, alchemy takes flight and becomes the science of light.
Alchemy Is the Beginning of the Path, the Commencement
Although the Greeks were the worthy heirs of Doric science, they were far removed, in thought, from the understanding of the world of the ancient Egyptians or other colleges of wisdom.
Their successors, the Romans, adopted the Greek model, favoring the intellectual and the political even more. They mentally distanced themselves from ancient sources and the civilizing links of these colleges.
Intellectual Principles and the Degradation of Thought
The disappearance of the sensory world created a collapse of thought. Mental conceptions and false beliefs greatly misled the understanding of ancient sciences and their inner dimension.
This new state of thought reduced alchemy to mere operative magic. In Europe’s cultural evolution, the medieval period restored the sensory world and the principle of distillates.
The rise of the so‑called hard sciences gave way to the Renaissance. This period took ancient Rome as its model. From this intellectual lineage naturally arose the survival of a more materialistic state of mind. Thus, many authors of this period took the alchemical work as an end in itself, seeing only the work again for its own sake.
The 18th Century and the Popularization of the Ars Magna
The alchemical art born in the collective mind of this era was hindered by the disappearance of the sensory world, bringing with it distorting ideas and erroneous concepts. These blinders hindered the understanding of ancient knowledge and its purpose.
Alchemy was emptied of its quintessence. The mages and intellectuals of the time divided into two camps: the speculative camp with its inner dimension, and the operative camp with its entirely external dimension. Each considered the other a fool.