Die Alchemie. Das ist die Lehre von den grossen Geheim-Mitteln der Alchemisten und den Speculationen, welche man an sie knüpfte

representation of Egypt and the Nile, but rather we have the contrast between the water transformation experiment on a small scale, and the water transformation experiment on a large scale.

If we thus encounter the ancient view that the world arose from water, one must not think of research in the sense of A. G. Werner and his followers, the Neptunists a 18th-century geological school holding that rocks formed from crystallization in early Earth's oceans. Oh no, among the Indians it is merely a vague idea that might lean on the Sündfluth The Great Flood; among the Jews, however, and those who leaned on them, it concerns nothing other than the problem of the water transformation experiment, which has its roots in the emergence of Egypt from the Nile.

As for the water transformation experiment itself, it is not an exact chemical-physical dogma in the modern sense. It is nothing more than a small scale which was applied to the Nile and Egypt. This was often misunderstood. Even in the previous century, people believed that the experiment in question, the transformation of water, had an exact basis in the modern sense. They believed that "earth" was a fundamental principle of water. They believed that if one took water and treated it in some way, such as rubbing or boiling, it must yield earth. It must be possible, at least in part, to transform it into earth. This is obviously without merit. Water consists of hydrogen and oxygen, but not of water and earth. If someone thought they had obtained earth from water based on an experiment, or had transformed water into earth, the earth (to keep this vague expression) had somehow gotten into the water, but it did not owe its origin to the water as such. Today, a beginner sees through such things. Even a beginner in chemistry knows that there is no simple substance called "earth" at all, so how much less can this substance be a basic component of water?

The Egyptians did not subscribe to the view of the world's origin from water. They did not concern themselves with the world "out there" at all. They had enough to do with their own world, with Egypt. It is precisely the characteristic of Egyptian alchemy to take no account of the world "out there." As soon as we step from Egypt into the world in general, we have left the Egyptian alchemical standpoint. The fact that the Egyptians took such a restricted standpoint is the reason why they arrived at the cosmogenetic relation between water and earth. Had they focused on the world inhabited by us instead of Egypt, they would never have arrived at that relation. But once the Egyptians had the relation in question, could they not, casting their gaze further, move on to cosmogenesis in the broader sense? Answer: No. In their narrow-minded standpoint, it seemed to them a conflict with themselves and with the alchemy appropriate to them to step out of the circle of Egypt and the Nile.

The Egyptians were also not yet familiar with the water transformation experiment itself. The Jews were directed to embrace it so that they could escape the circle of their extended Egyptian cosmogenesis: "Egypt is the world." Why? Because "the world is Egypt." They had a specific motive to ascend from the Egyptian teaching to an extended cosmogenesis. Once they were at the top, they let the ladder fall behind them and looked for a problem that kept them at that height. This problem was precisely the water transformation experiment. The Egyptians, by contrast, had the Nile and Egypt, and Egypt and the Nile, as a self-contained, rounded whole. What need was there for further speculation? Indeed, if someone had offered the Egyptians the water transformation experiment, they would have turned their back on him as a heretic. They held Egypt and the Nile to be sacred. It would have been a profanation to say: you do not specifically need the Nile and Egypt; take any water you like, it produces a sediment, and by doing this, you have the phenomenon that Egypt emerging from the Nile offers you, but on a small scale.

The water transformation experiment is highly important for alchemy. Once it emerged, it ran like a red thread through the entire history of alchemy. To try to give it an exact basis in the sense we explained above is quite wrong. The Jews who introduced the experiment into alchemy did not dream of doing so. They understood the water transformation experiment in such a way that they said: we have water, we let it stand, and we now obtain earth, which is sediment. With pure (distilled) water, they said, this sediment cannot be achieved. The earth that sinks to the bottom must already be present in the water, otherwise it cannot sink. But it is characteristic of this earth that it must be intimately mixed with the water. There is nothing striking if we take a vessel of water and throw in a handful of earth, and this earth then sinks to the bottom. But it is indeed striking that the earth sinks to the bottom when it is intimately mixed with the water. Why does it sink? Why does it not stay in its state of mixture? Why does it not even move from a state of suspension to a state of complete blending? This, they said, is a striking phenomenon, and because it is, water transformation as such has a justification. In water transformation in the Jewish sense, it is not the transformation of water into earth that is considered, but the yielding of earth from such water that is intimately mixed with earth, whereby the water goes up and the earth goes down. Or, to grasp the matter from the standpoint of the experiment, the Jews did not experiment with pure (distilled) water, but with such water that is intimately mixed with earth. From such water they achieved their sediment.

Now, if one has such water, which is indeed intimately mixed with earth, but where the water predominates over the mixed earth, it cannot happen that one overlooks the earth and believes one is dealing with pure water. Furthermore, if one has a solution of a salt where there is no motive for a sediment to form, and the salt undergoes decomposition through the admission of air, or part of the water evaporates, whereby salt particles that were previously dissolved must go to the bottom, it looks as if water, which in and of itself does not stand at the point of water mixed with earth, voluntarily yielded a sediment. This then seduced later alchemists into the false dogma that pure water, which in the Jewish sense is not disposed to sediment, would yield a sediment. This is the origin of the fable of actual water transformation. In the alchemical sense, one can have nothing against such water transformation, for alchemy moves on the basis of speculation, not on the basis of exact research. In our modern sense, however, it is an absurdity to want to perform the water transformation experiment with distilled water, which is to say, to want to fabricate earth from distilled, pure water. As mentioned several times, the Jewish alchemists did not believe in such a water transformation, meaning water transformation in the literal sense. Basically, strictly speaking, there can be no talk of water transformation for them. They understand by water transformation nothing other than the transition of water mixed with earth into the state of separation of water and earth, where the water goes up and the earth goes down. To them, the water transformation experiment does not prove the law of water transformation, but the law of gravitation under difficult circumstances. As said, for the Jewish alchemists, there can actually be no talk of water transformation in the water transformation experiment, and if we nevertheless use the expression "water transformation experiment" in relation to Jewish alchemy, it happens merely so as not to bring an artificial separation into what the alchemists called water transformation or the water transformation experiment from a general standpoint. Such an artificial separation would be out of place. And precisely because

it would be out of place, it is justified when we say: after the Egyptians indirectly gave the first impulse to the water transformation experiment, the Jews introduced it directly into alchemy. Once they introduced it, it remained the property of alchemy. It remains a matter for itself, and in the sense of alchemy, it is an irrelevant matter whether individual alchemists subsequently associated this or that view regarding pure water or water disposed to sediment with it.

We will return to Egyptian alchemy once more with the Alexandrians and learn in more detail that the Nile is not only understood as that to which Egypt owes its origin, but also as that which draws the heavens over to itself. The Nile overflows and covers all the land as far as one can see. In the popular view, it stands up to the sky (the horizon) and merges with the sky. When it recedes again, it is assumed that it does not let go of the sky again, but takes it back with it into its bed. In this way, by having the Nile, one has not only Egypt but also the heavens. This leads the Jewish alchemists, guided by the water transformation experiment, to seek not only the earth but also the heavens. Thus, we obtain the water transformation experiment on a small scale, which leads us to the water transformation experiment on a large scale. Basically, the latter leads us to nothing other than the world we inhabit, but we have the task of linking the heavens to it as well. And they do this by establishing the problem of the "heaven-is" original: "Himmel sei", which we will encounter in Jewish alchemy. This "heaven-is" is, analogous to the Egyptian view of the Nile absorbing the sky, more of an indirect relation in which the water transformation experiment is brought to the heavens. This relation becomes quite direct with the Alexandrians. These say, in relation to the water transformation experiment: we have water and let it stand, then we obtain earth. But we are not finished yet. We place fire beneath it; the water begins to boil and now develops air (vapors). Thus, in the water transformation experiment, we obtain not only earth but also air from the water. This water transformation experiment is the three-part one, in that it yields water, earth, and air; whereas the original water transformation experiment, which yields only water and earth, is the two-part one. Guided by the three-part experiment, cosmogeny (the water transformation experiment on a large scale) arranges itself such that the heavens link to the air, and the world we inhabit links to the remainder.

Since the Indians subscribe to a numerical philosophy, it is likely that the Egyptians, their pupils in alchemy, likewise subscribed to one. This becomes even more likely as we again encounter a numerical philosophy among the Jews, who for their part got their alchemy from the Egyptians. However, in the sources available to us, we found no starting point for a well-rounded Egyptian numerical philosophy, so we will let this matter rest.

Alchemy among the Jews.

The Creation Account in the First Chapter of the First Book of Moses.

This concerns a creation of the world in six days. We will examine verses 1 to 19 more closely later and refer to that section here. Here is just an overview of what they bring. Verses 1 and 2 bring the preparatory period. Then verses 3, 4, and 5 cover the first day of creation, which brings light. Verses 6, 7, and 8 cover the second day of creation, which brings the heavens. Verses 9, 10, 11, 12, and 13 cover the third day of creation, which brings the orbis terrarum fluidus et fixus the fluid and fixed sphere of the earth, but at the same time the plant world. Verses 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, and 19 cover the fourth day of creation, which brings the sun, moon, and stars.

And now it continues:

20. Hebrew: "Wayyomer Elohim yishretsu hammayim sherets nephesh hayyah we-oph ye-opheph al-ha-arets al-pene reqia hashshamayim."
And God said: Let the water bring forth moving and living creatures, and birds that fly above the earth under the firmament of heaven. (Luther.)

21. Hebrew: "Wayyibra Elohim eth-hattanninim haggedolim we-eth kol-nephesh hayyah haromeseth asher sharetsu hammayim leminehem we-eth kol-oph kanaph leminehu wayyar Elohim ki-tob."
    And God created great whales, and every kind of creature that lives and moves and was brought forth by the water, each after its kind, and every kind of feathered bird, each after its kind. And God saw that it was good. (Luther.)

22. Hebrew: "Wayyibarek otham Elohim lemor peru u-rebu u-milu eth-hammayim bayyammim we-ha-oph yereb ba-arets."
    And God blessed them and said: Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the water in the seas; and let the birds multiply on earth. (Luther.)

23. Hebrew: "Wayyehi-ereb wayyehi-boqer yom hamishi."
    Then from evening and morning the fifth day was made. (Luther.)

24. Hebrew: "Wayyomer Elohim totse ha-arets nephesh hayyah leminah behemah wa-remes we-haytho-erets leminah wayyehi-ken."
    And God said: Let the earth bring forth living creatures, each after its kind; cattle, creeping things, and beasts of the earth, each after its kind. And it happened so. (Luther.)

25. Hebrew: "Wayya-as Elohim eth-hayyath ha-arets leminah we-eth-habbehemah leminah we-eth kol-remes ha-adamah leminehu wayyar Elohim ki-tob."
    And God made the beasts of the earth, each after its kind, and the cattle after their kind, and all kinds of creeping things on the earth after their kind. And God saw that it was good. (Luther.)

26. Hebrew: "Wayyomer Elohim na-aseh adam betsalmenu kidmuthenu we-yirdu bideghath hayyam u-be-oph hashshamayim u-babbehemah u-bekol-ha-arets u-bekol-haremes haromes al-ha-arets."
    And God said: Let us make man (we want to make) the human in our image, in our essence, and they shall rule over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the sky, and over the cattle, and over the whole earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.

Luther translates: And God said: Let us make humans, an image that is like us, who shall rule over the fish in the sea, and over the birds under the heavens, and over the cattle, and over the whole earth, and over all creeping things that creep on the earth.

Some interpreters let Tzelem Image refer to the external resemblance and Demut Likeness refer to the internal, spiritual resemblance. For our part, we avoid the issue and say on the one hand: Image, and on the other hand: Essence, Essentia. Now the reader may relate the expressions to inner or outer qualities as he wishes. Luther does exactly the same by translating: an image that is like us. Luther only translates somewhat freely; for it says in the text "in our image," and the expression on which Luther bases his "that is like us" is again brought with an "our." That is why we translate as we have above, and not like Luther. However, the difference would not have moved us to refrain from using Luther's translation in verse 26 as we did in the preceding verses. We bring our own translation for another reason, and since we are bringing it, we also stick more closely to the wording of the text regarding the Tzelem and Demut. The reason for our own translation is the expression Adam Man/Human. This Adam is generic, "human." It is the Genus homo the human genus. Thus, the text does not say, as Luther translates, "let us make humans," but rather: "let us make the human," "let us make the human genus." Now follow the plural verb we-yirdu and let them rule,