The Arabic Hermes

 History of the Arabic Hermes of science made the integration of Hermes into the ranks of the philosophers, physicians, and other scholars, begun in the gnomological compendia, irreversible. They blended al-Mubaššir’s Hermes with Abu- Ma<šar’s account of the three Hermeses so that it would be difficult to distinguish the original parts. For example, Ibn al-Qift ̣ī’s History of the Sages puts this under the entry for Ammon: “Ammon, King and Sage: This is an epithet of his; his real name was Basīlu-xus. He is one of the four kings who took wisdom from the first Hermes. Hermes had made him governor over one quarter of the earth. This Ammon was counted among the philosophers, although nothing of his words have been translated into Arabic. When King Hermes made him governor, he bequeathed counsels to him, some of which have been excerpted and translated, including that he said . . .”265 The Testament of Hermes to King Ammon immediately follows (as abbreviated by az-Zawzanī, who is responsible for shortening Ibn al-Qift ̣ī’s work into the form extant today).

The treatment of Hermes here is a reworded version of the account by al-Mubaššir with a few slight but important modifications. First, we are told that the Hermes who counseled Ammon was specifically the first Hermes. Indeed, Ibn al-Qift ̣ī gives the stories of all three Hermeses, derived from Abu- Ma<šar, elsewhere in his book.

Second, Hermes here relates his counsel to Ammon at a particular time: when he made him governor. Ibn al-Qift ̣ī could have inferred this last piece of information from the contents of Hermes’ counsel. Third, Hermes is himself a king, perhaps following the tradition of Ibn Nawbaxt, according to whom the ancient Babylonian Hermes became king of Egypt. In this short text we can see the integration of numerous strands, each of separate origin, out of which the medieval Arabic Hermes was fashioned by well-meaning scholars who collected all the data at their disposal about the ancient Hermes and uncritically accepted them in synthesis.

Other offshoots of the gnomological tradition easily made their way into more popular literature, for one does not require technical training to understand the moral teachings of the Ṣiwān al-ḥikma or al-Mubaššir’s Muxtār al-ḥikam. This was the case with the European translations of al-Mubaššir, a work known in many languages and excerpted in later works. If a large portion of the Counsel of Hermes to King Ammon, along with other Hermetic sayings derived from al-Mubaššir, could survive in such florilegia as Palfreyman’s Treatise of Morall Philosophie, printed in London in the early seventeenth century,266 it should not be surprising to find Hermes passing from the Arabic wisdom literature and histories of science also into Persian song. This corresponds chronologically with the increasing efflorescence of Persian as a vehicle of literature.

265. Ibn al-Qift ̣ī 7.5–10. Ammu-nu l-maliku l-ḥakīmu. hāDā laqabun lahu- wa-smuhu- l-ḥaqīqīyu bsylwxs wa-huwa aḥadu l-mulu-ki l-arba<ati llaDīna axaDu- l-ḥikmata <an Hirmisa l-awwali wa-kāna Hirmisu qad wallāhu rub<a l-arḍi wa-kāna Ammu- nu hāDā ma<du-dan fī l-ḥukamā>i illā annahu- lam yuxragˇ min kalāmihī šay>un ilā l-<arabīyati wa-lammā wallāhu Hirmisu l-maliku awṣāhu bi-waṣāyā xurrigˇa ba<ḍuhā wa-turgˇima minhu annahu- qāla . . .

266. Palfreyman ca 1635: 60a–b.