Artificial Generation

Translated from: Paul Kraus, Jâbir ibn Hayyān: Contribution à l'histoire des idées scientifiques dans l'Islam, Vol. II (Cairo: Institut Français d'Archéologie Orientale, 1942), pp. 98-134.

Translation note: This is a new English translation from the original French scholarly text. Footnotes marked with [condensed] have been abbreviated from the original; readers seeking full bibliographic apparatus should consult Kraus's original publication.

I. Divine Creation and Human Creation#

In the list of seven "Arts" contained in the Kitāb Iḫrāj mā fi'l-quwwa ila'l-fiʿl, Jābir mentions in last place the "science of forms" (ʿilm al-ṣuwar) or the "science of generation" (ʿilm al-takwīn), which represents the conclusion of all the disciplines that precede it: the science of the Balance (ʿilm al-mīzān), theurgy (ʿilm al-ṭilasmāt), the science of subjugating spiritual beings, the science of properties (ʿilm al-ḫawāṣṣ), medicine, and alchemy. It is the supreme goal toward which all his efforts tend.

Takwīn, the causative form of kawn (genesis), means generation, and more precisely artificial generation. According to Jābir, the science of generation has as its object the artificial production of beings belonging to the three kingdoms and, above all, the production of living beings. Alchemy not only serves to transform certain bodies into others; it also provides the means to form new bodies from their constituent elements. Thus, ʿilm al-takwīn is divided into three parts: production of minerals (alchemy), production of plants, and production of animals. When speaking of the production of animals, Jābir often uses the term tawlīd (literal translation of γέννησις) instead of takwīn.For the terminology and various uses of tawlīd versus takwīn in Jābirian texts, see Kraus's detailed philological discussion in the original (pages 98-99). [condensed]

Is artificial generation possible? Jābir, basing himself on the principles of his physics, answers affirmatively. The living being, even man himself, is the result of natural forces acting in concert. Now, nature in its production obeys a law of quantity and number whose secret is revealed by the theory of the Balance. To reproduce nature's process, even to improve it if necessary, is at least theoretically possible.

Here is what one reads in the Seventy Books: "Certain people, by denying the possibility of the Art, accuse the partisans of the Natures of lying. Or else, they say, first teach us what the principles of things are! This having been explained to them, they object: But where is the proof? Then the partisans of the Natures respond: The proof is that we ourselves have the capacity to produce the minerals that are made in mines and to reproduce the action of the Natures in minerals, plants and animals. The proof is that we do it in effect and that you yourselves have seen us do it many times. The adversaries say: How could you produce something similar to man? The partisans of the Natures respond: First admit that we are capable of producing minerals, plants and all animals except man. Otherwise, we want to demonstrate this first! The adversaries: We admit it. The partisans of the Natures: Given that, by its principle, the genus in its totality is one and differs only by its species and that it is the principle that produces the entire genus, it follows that by admitting something of a certain species of this genus, you are obliged to admit it equally for all the other species. Otherwise, you contradict yourselves."Seventy Books 18. For the designation "partisans of the Natures" (aṣḥāb al-ṭabāʾiʿ), cf. below in the text.

The idea addressed in these lines is quite widespread. The Middle Ages and Renaissance dreamed of the automaton man, of the homunculus. But rarely has this problem received such a "scientific" and detailed expression as with Jābir. Convinced of having established science on solid foundations of rigorous exactitude, Jābir has enough boldness to think he has wrested from nature its last secret. It is characteristic of his science to recognize no limit for human thought.

The starting point of all this development is the ancient idea that art (τέχνη) imitates nature (φύσις). But Jābir gives it a bolder formula, at least for the Muslim reader. According to the ancient definition inspired by Plato, philosophy consists in assimilating oneself to God, in imitating God as much as this imitation is possible for man.This definition, going back to Plato's Theaetetus (176b), was widespread in late antiquity. It appears frequently in Arabic philosophical literature, in authors such as Fārābī, the Ikhwān al-Ṣafāʾ, and Maimonides. [condensed from extensive footnote 2 on page 99] This definition, Jābir applies to natural science: the human artisan (ṣāniʿ = δημιουργός) imitates the Demiurge (bāriʾ), creator of the universe, by exercising creative power himself.

According to the Kitāb al-taṣrīf, the objects of this world have been produced by the concourse of the Soul of the World and Substance. Now, in the Kitāb maydān al-ʿaql, Jābir, speaking of the elixir, writes: "If you succeed in composing these isolated things, you will assume the very place of the Soul and Substance, the isolated things occupying, in relation to you, the place of the Natures; thus you will be able to transform them into whatever you desire."Texts, p. 221, 15. It is perhaps not too audacious to relate Jābir's conception to the remarkable passage from Plato's Republic, according to which plastic art imitates the work of the divine Artisan. Also, one could compare the cosmology of the Timaeus, where the gods of second rank fashion the world by imitating the supreme God.This comparison suggests multiple points of contact: the human artisan manipulates elements reduced to their pure state, just as the gods of the Timaeus create "borrowing parts of fire and earth and water and air from the cosmos"; both Jābir and Plato envision intermediate creators with angelic/divine nature. [condensed]

Other texts are even more explicit. According to the first Kitāb al-aḥjār, Balīnās (Apollonius of Tyana) distinguished two kinds of generation: the first created by God, and the second possible for man. And the Kitāb al-mīzān al-ṣaġīr goes so far as to designate these two modes of generation by the term creation (ḫalq): "There are two kinds of creation, a first and a second; and the second represented by art, resembles the first."Kitāb al-mīzān al-ṣaġīr (Texts, p. 449, 4). The reading might possibly be "imitates the first" (yušbihu al-awwal) instead of "resembles the first."

In the same treatise, Jābir gives a detailed exposition on the categories that intervene in each generation. These categories are five in number: Substance, Quantity, Quality, Time and Place.Texts, p. 434, 1ff. These five categories appear in Hermetic Corpus XI, ii (Scott, I, 220, 31) in a mystical context. Through the concourse, convergence or divergence of these categories, he explains the multiple possible forms of generation. The difference between divine creation and human action consists in that in the first case the Natures apply themselves to Substance all at once (dafʿatan wāḥidatan), while in the second they unite with Substance only successively.

"The Demiurge Most High orders the Natures to confine the Substance in the Time and Place in which He wished to realize them. Then, the Natures seize the Substance and each of them takes possession of the diameter that is proper to it... When one of the active Natures takes possession of the top of the Substance, the other occupies the bottom. And when one of the passive Natures takes possession of the length of the Substance, the other occupies its width. The thing itself that results from it will therefore be due to the action alone of our Lord Most High. What a grandiose and admirable action that is. God, while depriving humans of producing such things, has taught them the manner in which he produced them. They succeed, by using the Natures, Substance, Time and Place, Quality and Quantity, in producing everything they want, but, apart from this power, they are incapable of doing as He does..."According to Texts, p. 444, 6ff., man is capable of measuring the quantity of Natures in God's work, but cannot produce them spontaneously; in human production, we both determine the measure and can execute it precisely.

"As for the second production which is that of Art, he who has acquired the necessary knowledge and practice will first choose the Time in which he wants to compose such a thing, and then the Place; or else, he will first choose the Place and then the Time... After which he will choose, to apply the Natures to Substance, a suitable Quantity and Quality... Then, he will compose with Substance one of the strongest Natures (that is to say active), which must occupy the interior of the body. Beware if you begin by composing the Nature that is outside, for that would be a serious error. To this one he will join the corresponding one among the passive Natures. Then the outside will be composed in accordance with the composition of the inside; and thus the thing will be really produced from non-being to being."Another passage (ibid. p. 454, 9ff.) attributes to Pythagoras, Homer, Archigenes and Socrates the opinion that one must first apply Humidity to Substance, for Humidity binds things together (talzīq) and refines (taldīn) them.

Despite this difference the two productions are so close to each other that Jābir can say: "Both fall under the same genus and the same species, and at the same time do not fall under the same genus and the same species. They are at the same time concordant and discordant."

Among the writings that deal with artificial generation, it is the Kitāb al-tajmīʿ, belonging to the collection of Kutub al-Mawāzīn, which offers the most detailed exposition. Unfortunately, the text of this book is in very poor condition, so that many passages remain inexplicable.According to the first Kitāb al-aḥjār (Texts, p. 138, 10), several treatises are devoted to ʿilm al-takwīn: the Kitāb al-tajmīʿ (the only one preserved), Kitāb al-afāḍil, Kitāb al-šams, Kitāb al-qamar, Kitāb al-muntahā, and several commentaries. One must add the last chapter of the Kitāb iḥrāj mā fi'l-quwwa ila'l-fiʿl, part of the Kitāb al-taṣrīf, and the Kitāb al-mīzān al-ṣaġīr.

II. The Artificial Generation of Man#

The exposition of the Kitāb al-tajmīʿ is divided into three parts: the artificial production of animals (takwīn al-ḥayawān), the artificial production of plants (takwīn al-nabāt), and the artificial production of minerals (takwīn al-ḥajar). The first chapter is the most extensive, and it is from it alone that we borrow the information that follows.

Just as in alchemy Jābir had always distinguished three modes of operation, likewise he distinguishes in the artificial production of animals three different forms: a first which is not further determined; a second which is the production of a "stupid" (ablah or balīd) animal and a third which is the production of an "intelligent" (ḏakī) animal.This division (p. 343, 9ff.) corresponds to: al-takwīn al-awwal (p. 343,14-353,13); al-tawlīd al-ṯānī (p. 353,14-368,16); al-tawlīd al-ṯāliṯ (p. 369,1-380,3). A similar threefold division is found in the chapter on plant generation (Texts, p. 381, 4ff.).

The first mode of production requires the longest time and would be superior to the second and third. The goal of this first production is the artificial generation of man and any other organized animal, as they exist in nature and are imitated by Art.

The second category has as its object the generation of "stupid animals that understand nothing, but which, by habit, approach the normal state." In the paragraph in question, Jābir deals exclusively with the artificial production of certain inferior animals, such as wasps, bees, snakes and poorly organized insects that nature often produces by spontaneous generation.

To the second category is opposed the third, that of "intelligent" animals. The "stupid" animal is slow (baṭīʾ) and earthy (cold-dry), while the intelligent animal is fast (sarīʿ) and aerial (hot-humid). The superior elements, fire and air, are the cause of intelligence, while the inferior elements, earth and water, are the cause of stupidity. The stupid animal only acquires knowledge through long repeated teaching, while the intelligent animal possesses knowledge from the beginning of its production and by immediate intuition.

But what is even more curious, Jābir characterizes the third category as the production "of an intelligent animal, endowed with life, penetration, imagination and a legislative nature (nāmūsī al-ṭibāʿ)". At the head of the paragraph devoted to the description of this third category, one reads: "Discourse on the production of intelligent persons belonging to all species; production that we want to call that of legislators (aṣḥāb al-nawāmīs)."Texts, p. 369, 1. For nāmūs and its dual meaning of both "law/prophet" and "stratagem/magical operation," see Plessner in Encyclopédie de l'Islam.

In the terminology of Arab philosophers, ṣāḥib al-nāmūs designates the prophet legislator, holder of divine Law, the νόμος of Greek philosophical tradition being identified with Muslim šarīʿa. But is it possible that Jābir speaks of the artificial production of prophets? Does he not expressly say that the third category embraces the production not only of human beings, but also of any other animal?Cf. p. 371, 8. Without doubt, the meaning "trick, stratagem, magical operation" which, in Arabic, also belongs to the word nāmūs, will have its part in the appellation chosen by Jābir, and the pseudo-Laws (Kitāb al-nawāmīs), a magical writing attributed by medieval tradition to Plato, certainly had an influence on the Jābirian conception of artificial generation.Ps.-Majrīṭī (Ġāyat al-ḥakīm, p. 147) signals two Books of Laws (nawāmīs), larger and smaller, attributed to Plato. These apocryphal works of magical content appear to have dealt with artificial generation. [condensed from lengthy footnote discussing the Kitāb al-nawāmīs tradition]

If we must therefore take the term aṣḥāb al-nawāmīs in its proper sense, it remains for us to establish the meaning that Jābir assigns to these "legislators" in the whole of his doctrine. To this question we can only answer at the end of our analysis of the Kitāb al-tajmīʿ.

From the point of view of Greek sources, the second of the groups mentioned above presents the least difficulties for interpretation. Indeed, the best authors of antiquity believed in the spontaneous generation (generatio aequivoca) of certain poorly organized animals. Plutarch tells us that the scholars of Alexandria claimed to have established how wasps, beetles and bees were born from the corpses of oxen, horses and asses, and it is notably in Egypt that such doctrines seem to have taken shape.Plutarch, Life of Cleomedes, 39. See also Diodorus Siculus, Bibliotheca historica, I, 10, 7. On spontaneous generation beliefs in antiquity, see Rödemer's dissertation (1928) and E. O. von Lippmann, Urzeugung und Lebenskraft (Berlin, 1933). [condensed]

Like a large number of other Arab authors, Jābir reproduces at length what he found in his sources. He speaks of snakes which, being of earthy constitution, derive from hair which is also of earthy constitution: "For snakes, and particularly black snakes, are born from hair deposited in glass, the glass being considered as mother and the hair as father... As for scorpions, they are born in purslane (ḥawk), that is to say ocimum, which is buried in glass. Black beetles are born in mint also buried. As for scorpions again, we note that they are born particularly in dust and honey lees put in a basin... as well as in humid reeds used to make date baskets, when they are affected by the ardor of fire. Wasps are born from strongly decomposed flesh, I mean dead flesh. Worms are born from the flesh of slaughtered animals... Mosquitoes (baqq) often arise from the thick lees of vinegar, and flies from all sweet things. Let us add that baqq is a plant... whose stem rises to a cubit above the ground and whose fruits are the size of a nut or even larger; when these fruits open, mosquitoes come out of them. All this is therefore of earthy origin."P. 358, 17ff. and p. 359, 3ff. For scorpions born in ocimum, cf. Greek Geoponics XI, 28, 3; Pliny, Natural History XX, 12 (119); and Dioscorides 2, 171. Galen denies this (De alimentorum facultatibus II, 55).

The theme of "bougonie" (ox-born bees), particularly dear to ancient authors, is also mentioned: "One takes a bull—if it is red in color, it's better—makes it enter a cell and throws it ḥašāšiyā leaves. Then, one blocks the entrance through which the bull was introduced, opens four skylights from above and leaves the bull until it dies and putrefies. Then, wasps will be born from it which will begin, after a short time, to build hives in this cell."P. 368, 3ff. This passage corresponds closely to descriptions of bougonie in Geoponics XV, 2, 21ff. The theme of bees born from ox corpses was particularly beloved by ancient authors: Varro, Pliny, Virgil (Georgics IV, 295ff.), Porphyry, and Augustine all mention it. [condensed]

To prove the existence of spontaneous generation, Jābir also evokes ancient legends about animals that were found half-formed: "Several truthful people have told me about certain places located in the islands of the sea, that one finds there hares, foxes, mice and snakes of which half, a third or only a part has formed in clay while the rest has remained unfinished... I myself have seen in many regions marvelous specimens of unfinished animals such as crayfish, turtles and snakes. In the mountains of Mukrān and in the Jabal, I have seen many scorpions, snakes, hares and foxes of this kind." And he adds: "Praise be to God who, thanks to His power, has created us from this same clay and has given us intelligence, so that we may know these things... He who does thus, is He not capable of resurrecting the dead? Indeed, by the glory of my Lord and Creator, there is nothing easier for Him!"P. 367, 4ff. Cf. similar legends in Pliny, Natural History IX, 58 (179); Aelian, De natura animalium II, 56; Horapollo, Hieroglyphica I, 24; Diodorus Siculus I, 10, 7.

From these alleged observations, it is only a step to wanting to reproduce the generation of these animals by a rational method. After studying the different modes of putrefaction, Jābir prepares to explain the artificial generation of snakes and other animals. Let us only note that in these speculations, the number, color and arrangement of hairs apt to reproduce snakes play a major role. The different possible combinations are twenty-two in number and correspond to the letters of the Abjad alphabet. Certain geometric figures are also involved.P. 364, 6-10; 366, 12. The 22 combinations correspond to the Abjad alphabet letters. For additional snake generation recipes, see Kitāb al-ḫawāṣṣ al-kabīr chapter 54 and Ps.-Majrīṭī, Ġāyat al-ḥakīm, p. 412. [condensed]

The exposition becomes even bolder when Jābir extends artificial generation to the entire animal kingdom, including man, and gives the detailed description of the apparatus that serves for it. These apparatuses are constructed in the image of the celestial spheres, thus strikingly illustrating the master idea of the science of generation, which consists in imitating nature's processes. The author does not even hesitate to want to produce kinds of animals that do not exist in nature. Here is the translation of a quite characteristic passage:

"The famous philosophers pronounce thus: If we take the white of any egg and apply to it the process described above, by putting inside the 'spheres' especially humid materials or aerial and humid materials, a bird of the species to which this egg belongs will be produced. If one causes alterations in its organs, the result will conform to these alterations. And if one dyes certain of its organs in different colors, the bird will come out having the color that one has applied. For the principle of dyes is, according to these people, ammonia (nūšādir) combined with the color one desires. For example, one produces yellow with the help of yellow arsenic and ammonia; as for green, one produces it based on water from green leaves and ammonia dissolved in it. White dye is produced by water of white color and whitened ammonia. It is the same if one dyes it with other dyes apt to produce the color in question. Thus one introduces arsenic into the mixture to produce yellow color, or one uses saffron and other similar drugs. Likewise, for all other colors.

"On the subject of this chapter, the great Porphyry says: If a color predominates over the others, the skin of this animal will be dyed in this color. — He means by this that one sometimes prefers to use in the operation several dyes, such as red, blue, green and yellow dye. In this case, if red predominates over the three others, the color of the skin will be red. It is thus with the other colors. And he says again: If the colors are mixed, the animal will have the color of the chameleon. This affirmation is clear and requires no explanation. Understand therefore, my brother, these principles and realize them, so that you may find your way."P. 361, 7ff. For abū Qalamūn (chameleon), the term appears in Arabic designating: a brilliant Egyptian fabric that changes colors; a precious stone with chatoyant nuances; and in alchemy, the philosopher's stone with its changing colors. The etymology likely derives from Greek χαμαιλέων rather than Fleischer's proposed πυκνόχαλμον. [condensed from extensive note on page 109-110]

"Likewise, if one putrefies the said materials in earth or in manure or in humidity or in vinegar, the artificial generation will take place. The following process is also correct: One first constructs the form (ṣūra) which has detachable parts and puts in it 'Element' (ʿunṣur) — it concerns what philosophers call either 'Element', or 'Matter' (mādda), or 'Essence' (ḏāt), or 'Body', or 'Sperm', for everything that produces something is called by philosophers Sperm. — One then takes a perforated vessel as we have described and places the form, that is to say the mold (miṯāl) on its axis inside the perforated vessel which must be round. Note that the great Porphyry says that this apparatus can be conical. One then puts the vessel in a vast pot filled with water so that it covers the vessel, and one boils it with a gentle fire, which dispenses with all other modes of putrefaction.

"Once Porphyry affirms: this generation is earthy; and another time he says: it is aerial. When he says that this generation is earthy, it is because of the water and its kinship with the frigidity of earth. And when he says it is aerial, it is because one boils the contents of the apparatus and that, on this occasion, air is produced from water..."

The greater part of the exposition on the first mode of artificial generation is devoted to the minute description of an apparatus constructed to produce particularly human beings. The Greek inspiration and the relationships of this description with ancient technique are evident in almost all details, and the curious reference (unfortunately too corrupted) to an Egyptian perpetuum mobile allows us to place the piece in the history of oriental hermeticism. Given that the passage in question contains the oldest mention of the automaton-man, we reproduce it below in its entirety:

"It is known that in artificial generation the mold (miṯāl) is indispensable, and this is also our opinion. This mold can be either that of a man or that of any animal. Let us first establish the transmutation of its states whose knowledge results from the study of a book where is exposed... degree by degree. Then, one constructs an apparatus of glass, crystal, stone or any kind — glass lends itself best to it — having the thickness of a finger. If one prefers to give it greater or smaller length and width, one can do so. Likewise, if one wants to combine the body of a young girl with the face of a man, or the intelligence of a man with the body of an adolescent, or if one prefers variations in form, it is possible to do so: one can give the apparatus the form one desires.

"After which, one sets about constructing a sphere (kura) whose dimensions are one and a half times larger than that of the mold and which surrounds the mold on all sides, so that the latter is in the middle, like a circle within another circle. Then, one adds on the side of the head and feet of the mold an additional part made of glass. Note that the sphere must be solid. Then, one applies smooth clay to it, namely a clay that is prepared without hair or straw and which is consequently smooth. Cover the sphere with a thick layer of this clay and let it dry and harden. When it is dry, polish its surface until it becomes like a mirror. Then cut the sphere in two with a fine, subtle, sharp saw that is not serrated; take one half, polish it inside as you polished it outside and do the same with the other half.

"As for the mold, it must be entirely hollow and each of its joints separated from the other: one piece for the head and everything attached to it; another piece for the shoulders, chest, belly and back; likewise the extremities, arms and hands must be separable so that they can be easily detached and recomposed. Then, take sperm that has not been exposed to cold, or earth from the mountains of the Mukrān and Kirmān regions that we have made known to you, or a piece of flesh from the animal of which one desires to produce a specimen; it is the same with sperm. Take therefore parts of the animal's body, of its flesh, then medicines, drugs and other similar things using the method of the Balance. Then put each thing in its place and begin by putting the bones; then, move on to the flesh, nerves, veins, arteries, cartilages and everything that possesses callosity. Then join the parts of the mold in the way you prefer. Finally, set it aside with everything it holds together.

"Inside the sphere cut in two, you install an axis (miḥwar) provided with a pivot (mirwad) around which the effigy (ṣanam) turns on the pivot and axis. Apply the two halves of the sphere against each other and caulk the crack. The sphere also has an axis and a crank that turns above a ditch similar to a canal. Then place the sphere on its axis. It must also have a mechanism that makes it turn constantly. Below the sphere, one lights a fire that is of the first degree of intensity. In this way the movement of the effigy will be perpetual and spontaneous like the movement of a water wheel or the movement of a millstone or other similar things to which movement is proper.

"An example of this is provided by the two statues of Egypt that move perpetually. These statues are placed on an iron column under which is a polished mirror. It is not in the nature of the column nor of the mirror to ever stop. The column is rounded at its base and the mirror is concave. The upper part of the column is fixed while the rounded and smooth form is not fixed. In this way its movement has been made perpetual in the flow of time. The constructor of these statues established this movement in accordance with the movement of the sphere — I have dealt with it in the Book of Natural Figures — having no other intention than to imitate the Sphere and its movement. This apparatus will function until the end of days."The "two statues of Egypt" likely refers to a confused tradition combining: (1) legends about the Colossi of Memnon and their supposed sounds; (2) accounts in Rāzī and Qazwīnī of a perpetually moving marble column in Egypt/Alexandria; (3) possibly a misunderstood description of an ancient gnomon; (4) the fabulous mirror of the Alexandria lighthouse. [condensed from lengthy note on page 113-114]

"Beware! If you know only imperfectly the number of days necessary for the accomplishment of the Work and if you do not reach it or exceed it, the thing whose generation you desire will be destroyed. For by my Master, a being more beautiful and more perfect than anything in the world could have come from it. Strive that it reaches perfection and that, thereby, the accuracy of our affirmation is confirmed. As soon as one of its organs has reached perfection, the whole will be produced in the same way, given that in simple things there is a correspondence between parts and totalities. Understand it.

"This is what must be retained from this species of generation according to Porphyry's exposition. For in this book, we only comment on the book of Porphyry of Tyre and Zosimus's book on the Balance. If someone examines and studies these works, he will recognize how great are the favors we dispense to him. For these two authors have greatly obscured the exposition of these things."P. 350, 1ff. The detailed exposition on the number of days necessary varies according to degrees of intensity: for animal production, 150 days (1st degree), 450 (2nd degree), 750 (3rd degree), and 1200 (4th degree). Similar calculations exist for plants and minerals in Kitāb al-taṣrīf (Texts, p. 399, 8ff.). [condensed]

"As for the school that declares itself partisan of putrefaction, it affirms: this generation cannot be completed, because it is made without putrefaction; and generation only takes place with the help of putrefaction. However, they say: the process is good and correct provided that humidity is used in it. Here is how one proceeds: one puts the mold inside a copper sphere that is arranged in the same way as the one we spoke of first. Let this sphere be filled with water and let the mold be placed inside the water. Let the copper sphere be in the clay sphere and let the fire be several times stronger than in the first case. Know that as long as there is a single sphere inside which the mold is found, the fire will have a power of the first degree — that is why we said that the power of fire is expressible in numbers. — On the other hand, if the sphere is in another sphere, the fire will have a power of the second degree, that is to say will be three times stronger than in the first case.

"As for those who say: the vital spirit is only engendered with the help of air, they use an apparatus of different structure. For they place the mold in a sphere of yellow copper, perforated with fine and numerous holes and which is empty. This sphere, they put it in a copper sphere filled with water in accordance with what we said at the beginning. This latter sphere is placed in the large clay sphere. The fire will be five times stronger than in the first case and it is the power of the third degree. It is the strongest fire that is admitted in all works of artificial generation, for it represents the extreme degree, as we told you previously...

"And you must know that in relation to the first sphere, the mold must possess exactly half of its dimension without excess or defect. We spoke about it in the exposition on the reduction of circles to half or two thirds, exposition that belongs to the Geometric Instructions. Thus the circumference of a circle equals the diameter multiplied by 3, and half of the circumference equals half of the diameter multiplied by 3. The circumference of the first circle in relation to its diameter would then equal 22 in relation to 7. The circumference of the second circle in relation to its diameter would equal 4 in relation to 14. As for the largest circle, its circumference in relation to its diameter, the latter beginning at the point of perforation, would equal 66 in relation to 21. It is therefore demonstrated that the mold must be half of the first circle (that is to say of the first sphere). If one introduces the mold into the calculation, one will have for example 88 for the first circle, 66 for the second, 44 for the third, while the mold will equal 22. One could also adopt the multiples of these numbers, or numbers larger or smaller. Thus for example the first circle will equal 40, the second 20, the third 10 and the mold 5. Understand it and realize it. By my Master, I have explained here numerous mathematical data insofar as they relate to Porphyry's exposition."This is the computation, generally admitted since the Hellenistic era, of π = 22/7. Archimedes gave more precision: between 3 10/71 and 3 1/7. Most Arab geometers adopted the value π = 22/7. [condensed]

"Another school says: There must be sperm inside the effigy, for sperm is the principle without which there is no generation. However, this affirmation is only valid for beings endowed with Speech (al-nāṭiq), while the other forms do not need sperm. Understand it.

"A school says: If one brings changes to the original form and desires for example to produce a man provided with wings, one must use the sperm of the bird or animal in question...

"Another school says: No, but one must take the mentioned drugs, pulverize them completely and, after having kneaded them with sperm, one must put them in the vessel that is the mold.

"A third school says: Generation needs neither drugs nor medicines, nor even the use of the method of the Balance (mīzān). Rather, it must be prepared with blood belonging to the genus of animal in question. In this way the genus that one desires will be produced. On the other hand, when blood is mixed with the blood of another genus, the genus that will be produced from it will necessarily have a certain resemblance to the genus whose blood was added to the mixture. Understand it!..."

The exposition on the third species of artificial generation, that of "intelligent individuals" and "legislators" (aṣḥāb al-nawāmīs) is even much more abstruse. After a general overview of the apparatus to be used, on the time to choose for the accomplishment of the Work, as well as on the duration of the operation, Jābir poses the question of knowing how, in these beings, the intelligence proper to them is produced, which manifests itself in knowledge (ʿilm) and in speech (nuṭq).

Certain authors — who claim the highest rank among the partisans of this artificial generation — are of the opinion that intelligence is due to the use of the brain of the animal one desires to produce. And they discuss seriously which part of the brain is most apt for this purpose: that which is the seat of imagination (ḫayāl), that which is the seat of memory (ḏikr), or that which is the seat of thought (fikr).

On this occasion Jābir refers again to Porphyry who would have said textually: "Let us suppose that the superior movements are in equilibrium and that the epoch chosen for generation agrees with them: if then the artificial generation is made based on all the parts of the Triple-Sage, the being produced will be called to play a great role from the time of its emergence. It must also be known that such an occasion presents itself very rarely and that, consequently, these beings appear only very rarely in the world." — In his commentary, Jābir teaches us that the Triple-Sage of which Porphyry speaks is nothing other than the brain consisting of three parts. He also invokes the authority of Homer and of Galen who rather use as a symbolic name for the brain the term "quintuple" (mutaḫammis), meaning by this the five senses.The reference to Homer (Texts, p. 374, 9-11) appears to allude to Iliad M, 87: "grouping themselves in five corps, they followed their chiefs" (πένταχα κοσμηθέντες ἅμ᾽ ἡγεμόνεσσιν ἕποντο). This suggests an allegorical interpretation seeing military formations of five as the five senses, and the commanders as intelligence. Such allegorical readings of Homer were common in Pythagorean and Stoic exegesis. The physician Philon of Tarsus is cited via Galen's De compositione medicamentorum secundum locos (IX 4; vol. XIII, p. 267-76 Kühn). [condensed from extensive philological note on pages 117-119]

Three opinions dispute the explanation of the origin of knowledge in this "intelligent being": According to the first, he learns all the sciences from his exit from the apparatus, thanks to the teaching provided by the operator. According to the second, knowledge is rather innate to him or comes to him spontaneously (badīha), like Socrates and other great philosophers who possess knowledge by nature. According to the third opinion finally, it is neither teaching nor spontaneity that makes him learned; unless one takes the term "spontaneity" in the sense of an innate desire (šahwa) directed toward the sciences. For, by definition, the soul is powerful, active and ignorant. The partisans of this last opinion claim further that it is by a kind of metempsychosis that the soul enters the body prepared for it; and that its fundamental ignorance manifests itself in the fact that it no longer remembers its previous state.P. 375, 8ff.; 377, 13ff.; 378, 4. The definition of soul as "powerful, active and ignorant" also appears in the Kitāb al-taṣrīf (Texts, p. 407, 4) regarding the Soul of the World.

III. The Homunculus and the Statues of the Gods#

If the idea of the artificial generation of man is unknown to Greek authors, one finds however in ancient literature some beginnings, which could have contributed to its formation. The thesis of the automaton man, of the animal-machine, so in vogue at the dawn of modern thought, ultimately goes back to ancient sources. The Attic comedy that attributes to Daedalus the idea of communicating movement to a wooden Venus by placing mercury in it only announces the subtle experiments of a Hero of Alexandria and a Philon of Byzantium.On ancient automata, see H. Diels, Antike Technik (Berlin, 1914). For Aristotle's mention of Daedalus placing mercury in a wooden Venus, see De anima I, 3 (406 b 12).

Greco-Oriental magic, always ready to mix in a disconcerting way the results of natural science with the most chimerical imaginations, claims to possess the secret formula that allows creating a man from scratch. The pseudo-prophets heckled by Lucian and notably Simon the Magician are supposed to be capable of producing this miracle. Also, the idea of the homunculus, so close to Jābir's conception, is not modern.For Simon Magus and homunculus legends, see Clement of Rome, Homilies II, 26 (Migne, Patrologia Latina I, 904-5); A. Dieterich, Abraxas (Leipzig, 1891), p. 161; R. Reitzenstein, Hellenistische Wundererzählungen (Leipzig, 1906), p. 5. For the Jewish Golem legend, see G. Scholem in Encyclopaedia Judaica VII, 501ff. [condensed]

If Zosimus uses the term homunculus (ἀνθρωπάριον) in his alchemical allegories, this presupposes that such an idea was widespread in hermetic circles. Finally, the theory of the spontaneous generation of man by the simple concourse of natural forces, a theory that occupies, as opposed to the dogma of divine creation, a preponderant place in Arab philosophy, has certainly not failed to contribute to the formation of the idea of the artificial generation of man. A conception analogous to that of Jābir is several times attested to us in the magical literature of the Muslim era.Ibn Waḥšiyya spoke of artificial generation in his Kitāb al-taʿfīn (Book of Putrefaction), attributing the doctrine to Babylonian scholars. The hermetic writing Kitāb sirr al-ḫalīqa attributed to Balīnās teaches that first men were born by spontaneous generation. Similar theories appear in Rasāʾil Iḫwān al-Ṣafāʾ (II, 376), attributed to Indian thinkers in Ibn abī'l-Ḥadīd, and in Ismaili texts. Ibn Ṭufayl's philosophical novel Ḥayy b. Yaqẓān features a hero born from fermenting clay on a desert island under the equator. [condensed]

All these data, parallels and beginnings of ideas, are however not sufficient to explain the particularities of the Jābirian doctrine. On one hand, they cannot even make plausible the hypothesis that Jābir's exposition derives directly from an ancient source. On the other hand, the Greek reminiscences in our text are far too apparent for one to be satisfied with considering it as independent. One must also take into account the fact that Jābir himself refers to ancient or allegedly ancient sources of which his exposition claims to be only a commentary.

Following the description of the apparatus for the generation of living beings, he says indeed: "This is what must be retained from this species of generation according to Porphyry's exposition. For in this treatise here, we only comment on the book of Porphyry of Tyre and Zosimus's book on the Balance. If someone examines and studies these works, he will recognize how great are the favors we dispense to him. For these two authors have greatly obscured the exposition of these things." Likewise, speaking of the dimensions of the spheres of which the apparatus in question consists, the author says: "I have explained here numerous mathematical data insofar as they relate to Porphyry's exposition."

Often, during the Kitāb al-tajmīʿ, Porphyry's name is invoked, and once, the very book of Porphyry from which all these citations would be drawn, is named: speaking of the artificial generation of snakes, Jābir writes: "Porphyry said in the book from which we have borrowed these things and which is entitled Book of Artificial Generation (Kitāb al-tawlīd), the following..."Texts, p. 364, 4. Other references to Porphyry: p. 347, 4; 349, 9; 361, 17; 362, 12; 363, 3; 368, 11. The Kitāb al-baḥṯ attributes to Porphyry the view that stars are angels (f. 27b), mentions his journey to Sicily and visit to Etna (f. 76a), cites his Isagoge (f. 57), and attributes alchemical doctrines to him. [condensed]

Let us first note that such a title (in Greek περὶ γεννήσεως) is not found in the list of Porphyry's works known from ancient sources. Also, Arab authors never mention it. The authenticity of the treatise is therefore highly doubtful. It should be added that such a theme does not fit with Porphyry's literary activity as it is known to us. It is true that, in his youth, before meeting Plotinus, Porphyry was keenly interested in astrology and magic but in the preserved works and fragments one finds no indication that he wrote a purely technical treatise on artificial generation. One will therefore be tempted to consider the Kitāb al-tawlīd as an apocryphal writing and perhaps even as a forgery from the Arab period.

Despite this, the Neoplatonic and even Porphyrian affinities of our text are very striking. We have already mentioned the allegorical interpretation that Jābir gives of a verse from Homer and which is apparently drawn from the writing attributed to Porphyry. Now, this kind of allegory is particularly characteristic of Porphyry whose Homeric Questions are still partially preserved. Likewise, the passage on metempsychosis and the soul's forgetting of its previous state is of Neoplatonic inspiration. This is moreover quite understandable: if the writing cited by Jābir is apocryphal, there must be a reason why it was attributed to Porphyry. One is therefore entitled to look in Porphyry's work for the beginnings of ideas which, although strongly modified, would be at the base of the treatise.

A passage from the Kitāb al-tajmīʿ whose Neoplatonic provenance is beyond doubt allows us to further clarify the question. Having reviewed the different schools that deal with artificial generation, Jābir continues:

"Now, the people of this craft are those who have given themselves the name of image makers (muṣawwirūn). By this name they want to indicate that they imitate the Cause that produced these things. For these people claim that the power that did this was an individual similar to themselves. This individual first produced an imperfect thing and did not cease to improve it until he died. And they call death destruction and they also call it separation; for destruction is a necessary consequence of the separation of body from soul. Some time later, came another individual who set about studying this product of art and said to himself: it is bad! Then, he reflected assiduously and when he understood the cause of this evil he corrected it and improved it. In this way one comes after another until the destruction of the Sphere. Perpetual progress in this art takes place because the successive discoveries of men manifest themselves in it and men construct images in accordance with these discoveries. For each soul tends toward a more beautiful form. By this operation they throw down a challenge to the first individual who occupied himself with this art, in order to have priority over him, although they are posterior. For when someone happens to be the first in a science and his successor, although less learned than him, catches up with him and even, in a second attempt, surpasses him, the first is recognized to have lost priority in favor of the second."Texts, p. 350, 12ff. The text is defective in places; probable reconstruction: "For, according to them, this cause <is the inaugurator of this art?> and they occupy (in relation to it) the rank of <successors, or imitators>."

Although Porphyry is not mentioned at the head of this paragraph, everything leads us to believe that Jābir wanted to attribute it to him. When the "image makers" claim to imitate "the Cause that produced these things", this does not mean that they imitate the Creator God. This idea, which is moreover quite ancient, is excluded by what follows where it is a question of the human character and death of the first artist. This "individual", inaugurator of plastic art, is the hero, man-god, who like Prometheus or Asclepius sojourned on earth to teach men civilization. The Platonic origin of the phrase "each soul tends toward a more beautiful form" is apparent.

But what best confirms our hypothesis is the notice on death: to die, according to our text, means that the body is separated from the soul. One would rather expect to see death defined as separation of the soul from the body. But Porphyry, in his Aids to the Intelligibles (Ἀφορμαὶ πρὸς τὰ νοητά), teaches us that there is a double death: one known to all men (natural death), releases the body from the soul; the other, that which philosophers seek, releases the soul from the body.Porphyry, Aids to the Intelligibles (Ἀφορμαὶ πρὸς τὰ νοητά), ed. B. Mommert (Leipzig, 1907), IX: "Death is double. One is commonly acknowledged, when the body is released from the soul; the other is that of philosophers, when the soul is released from the body. And one does not necessarily follow the other." This distinction relates to Plotinus (Enneads I, 9) and appears in Macrobius (In Somnium Scipionis I, 13, 11). [condensed]

Finally, the idea of progress that forms the central theme of our text is not foreign to ancient literature. A famous passage from Seneca's Natural Questions which through Roger Bacon played a considerable role in the renewal of Western thought, offers undeniable resemblances to the Jābirian text. The idea of the progress of alchemical art is already found in Zosimus, where however there is no question of its continuation in the future. Following Epicurus and Lucretius, the Neoplatonist Macrobius speaks of the progress of human civilization, while admitting, like Jābir, that this progress is limited, if not by the "destruction of the Sphere", at least by the great cataclysms that mark the history of our earth.On the idea of progress: Seneca, Natural Questions VII, 25, 4 and VI, 5, 2-3 (which influenced Roger Bacon); Zosimus (Collection des anciens alchimistes grecs, II, 138); Epicurus and Lucretius on human civilization; Macrobius (In Somnium Scipionis II, 10). For the history of the progress idea, see J. Delvaille (1910) and J.-B. Bury (1928). [condensed]

The philosophical tradition of Islam, contrary to orthodoxy which sees the ideal state in the past, has always cherished the idea of progress. To such an extent that Rāzī who, in matters of philosophy, claims to have surpassed his masters Plato and Aristotle, can say that after him will come others who will destroy in part the results of his research, and replace them with new research: for we never possess the truth; yet we must march toward it.Rāzī's conversation with Abū Ḥātim al-Rāzī (reproduced from Kitāb aʿlām al-nubuwwa in Opera Philosophica, Cairo, 1940, p. 301-2). Even more explicitly, Rāzī exposes the idea of progress in the introduction to his Kitāb al-šukūk ʿalā Jālīnūs (Doubts about Galen).

What is the relationship of the passage on "image makers" with the theories exposed in the Kitāb al-tajmīʿ? He who practices artificial generation (ṣāḥib al-tawlīd, al-takwīn) first constructs a mold (miṯāl = εἴδωλον), a form (ṣūra = εἶδος) or an effigy (ṣanam = ἄγαλμα) of the being he wants to produce, and tries, subsequently, to breathe life into this effigy. Likewise, the sculptor (muṣawwir = εἰδωλοποιός, ἀγαλματοποιός, ἀνδριαντοποιός): to the matter he works, he gives, at least externally, the form of the living being, and perhaps he even succeeds, thanks to a superior and magical power, in making his statues alive, moving, acting.

Thus, the sculptor and the author of artificial generation meet in their effort to imitate nature. Daedalus, prodigious artist, creator of animated statues and who retouches the shapeless images of his predecessors is assimilated to Prometheus who is said to have modeled men in clay.On Daedalus and animated statues, see W. Deonna in Revue des Études Grecques 48 (1935), p. 219ff. On the assimilation of Daedalus to Prometheus as creator, see Lactantius, Divine Institutes II, 10, 12ff., and Augustine, City of God XVIII, 8. [condensed] It is an old belief, common to Greeks and other peoples, to attribute life to images and statues. In the Neoplatonic era, it was elaborated into a philosophical theory, of which the most prominent representative is none other than Porphyry.

In its concern to make an apology for paganism, the Neoplatonic school felt particularly attracted to the question of the relationship between statues and the gods they represented. How could one make the gods present in the simulacra erected for them in sanctuaries, how did the life of the gods manifest itself in statues? Plotinus devoted a beautiful passage to this theme, which was taken up by almost all later Neoplatonists. If certain authors see in statues only symbols that speak to the imagination of believers, most of them invoke the prodigies and healings accomplished by statues to attribute life to them. Thus the art of the sculptor finds itself allied to theurgical art.On Neoplatonic theories of divine images: Plotinus, Enneads IV, 3, 11; E. von Dobschütz, Christusbilder (Leipzig, 1899), p. 22; Joseph Kroll, Die Lehren des Hermes Trismegistos (Münster, 1914), p. 90-94, 409; Ch. Clerc, Les théories relatives au culte des images (Paris, 1916). [condensed]

Porphyry dealt with images of the gods on several occasions. In the Philosophy of Oracles (περὶ τῆς ἐκ λογίων φιλοσοφίας), a work of youth, before he rallied to Plotinus's philosophy, he exposes with the conviction of a faithful believer the most backward superstitions and the most extraordinary rites of Eastern cults. By undertaking a magical explanation of all the practices of paganism, he gives among other things prescriptions on the fabrication and ornamentation of idols considered as the dwelling places of gods and demons.Eusebius, Praeparatio Evangelica V, 11 (vol. I, 232, 11ff.): "what shape must be given to images, in what forms the gods themselves appear, and in what places they dwell... the gods themselves prescribed how to make their images and from what matter..." [condensed]

The idea expressed in Porphyry's On Images (περὶ ἀγαλμάτων) — a writing which dates from the years that immediately preceded Porphyry's entry into Plotinus's school — is quite different. Against the attacks of the adversaries of paganism (Jews and Christians) Porphyry affirms that "the faithful do not take for gods the statues and other symbols venerated in temples". The statues are only symbols and the rites performed before them must be understood allegorically. Here, Porphyry, probably under the influence of his master Longinus, has almost entirely freed himself from the magical practices of the cults of his time, without however his philosophical doubts leading him to reject popular beliefs wholesale.

This last step, he accomplishes in a curious epistle that is preserved for us by citations in St. Augustine, in Eusebius and in Theodoret as well as by a refutation that the author of De mysteriis devoted to it. The Letter to Anebo is already entirely inspired by Plotinus's doctrine. Porphyry asks an Egyptian priest to free him from certain philosophical doubts that have occurred to him about pagan cults and mysteries. In reality, his questions are very embarrassing for the representative of cults. It is known that the contradictions noted by Porphyry provided the arsenal of Christians in their struggle against paganism.Porphyry's Letter to Anebo is preserved through citations in Augustine (City of God X, 11), Eusebius (Praeparatio Evangelica XIV, 10), and Theodoret (Graecarum affectionum curatio, p. 28 Gaisford), as well as the refutation in De mysteriis (ed. G. Parthey, Berlin, 1857). Masʿūdī (Kitāb al-tanbīh, p. 162, 6) refers to the correspondence between Porphyry and Anebo. Arab bibliographers attribute two treatises to Anebo to Porphyry. Rāzī composed a refutation of the book Porphyry addressed to Anebo. [condensed]

During his interrogation, Porphyry comes to speak of images. It is quite natural that the ideas he exposes there come closer to the magical interpretation given in the Philosophy of Oracles than to the allegorical explanation given in the On Images. At the same time, we encounter there at least some of the ideas that Jābir, in the Kitāb al-tajmīʿ, puts in Porphyry's mouth. With the irony that marks the entire treatise, Porphyry claims that one must not fail to recognize the existence of people capable of fabricating images endowed with activity. This phrase corresponds closely to the data of the Kitāb al-tajmīʿ; also the term ἀναγεννητικούς, by which the image makers are designated, recalls the title of the treatise (Kitāb al-tawlīd = περὶ γεννήσεως) attributed to Porphyry.De mysteriis III, 28 (p. 167, 10): "as by no means rejecting that there are those capable of regenerating (ἀναγεννητικούς) active images." Augustine (City of God VIII, 23) summarizes this as discussing how to couple invisible spirits to visible corporeal matter through certain arts, "so that there are bodies as if animated, dedicated and subjected to those spirits as images—this, he says, is making gods."

The author of the reply (De mysteriis) underlines the same conception: "For no particular sensible body generates demons. But much rather these are generated and guarded by demons." To Porphyry's alleged theory, he responds that man is incapable of constructing as if by artifice the forms of demons. By mixing a multitude of material elements one can never create demons, which are immaterial beings. He admits however that the art of image-making (εἰδωλοποιία), like all other arts (medicine and gymnastics), participates to a certain extent, thanks to an emanation from the divine world, in creative power.De mysteriis III, 30 (p. 174, 6-9, 10ff.). The author states: "For no particular sensible body generates demons... But neither can any man fashion as if from a machine the forms of demons... nor from a heaped-up multitude of sensible elements is the demonic generated." However, image-making (εἰδωλοποιία) like medicine and gymnastics "draws a very faint generative portion from" divine emanations (III, 28, p. 170, 1).

Just as with Jābir, Porphyry claims in the Letter to Anebo that the constructor of images of gods (or rather of demons) must observe celestial movements so that the images become the dwelling places of gods. And when the author of De mysteriis compares the creation of the demiurge with the art of the "image maker", one believes one hears Jābir defining the distance that separates divine creation from the creation of man.Just as Jābir (above, pp. 100-102), Porphyry claims the constructor must observe celestial movements (De mysteriis III, 30, p. 173, 8ff.). The comparison of demiurgic creation with the image-maker's art (III, 28, p. 168, 3ff.) parallels Jābir's distinction between divine and human creation. Nature "at once and simultaneously makes its proper works, and accomplishes all things by simple and uncompounded energies" while artificial construction operates "technically" (τεχνικῶς) but "not theurgically" (οὐ θεουργικῶς) (p. 170, 9). [condensed]

The author of De mysteriis seems to have denied the theurgical character of statues produced by the sculptor only to elaborate another philosophy of images, which is no less superstitious nor less miraculous. At least Iamblichus, in his On Images (περὶ ἀγαλμάτων), defended the thesis that images which are the true dwelling places of gods fell from heaven and were not touched by the impure hands of humans.

When Porphyry, addressing an Egyptian priest, speaks of the construction of images of gods, he certainly has in view a theory about images current in his time in Egypt. Such a theory is indeed attested to us in the Hermetic Corpus, where one encounters several times the bizarre doctrine that terrestrial gods, that is to say demons, contrary to celestial gods, are due to human production.

In the third dialogue of Hermes Trismegistus with Asclepius which is preserved only in Latin translation and of which Augustine gives some extracts, one reads indeed: "And since discussion of the kinship and fellowship of men and gods is indicated to us, O Asclepius, know the power and strength of man. Just as the Lord and Father, or, what is supreme, God is the maker of the celestial gods, so man is the fashioner of the gods who dwell in temples, content with human proximity... And humanity not only advances toward God, but even fashions gods... The species of gods which humanity fashions are formed from both natures, from the divine which is purer and much more divine, and from that which is within (or below) men, that is from the matter from which they have been fabricated; and they are fashioned not only with heads alone, but with all members and the whole body. Thus humanity, always mindful of its nature and origin, perseveres in this imitation of divinity, so that, just as the Father and Lord, in order that they might be like him, made the eternal gods, so humanity fashioned its gods in the likeness of its own countenance."

And to Asclepius's question "Do you mean statues, O Trismegistus?" Hermes responds: "Statues, O Asclepius. Do you see to what extent you yourself doubt? Statues animated, full of sense and spirit, accomplishing such and so great things, statues presaging the future, and predicting it by lot, by prophet, by dreams, and by many other things, causing weaknesses in men and curing them, dispensing sadness and joy according to merit."Asclepius III, 23 (Scott, I, 338); cited by Augustine, City of God VIII, 23. Augustine explains this as spirits invisibly coupled to visible material bodies through art, "so that there are bodies as if animated, dedicated and subjected to those spirits as images—this, he says, is making gods."

The same theme is found evoked again in a later passage: "For this surpasses all wonderful things in wonder, that man could discover the divine nature and make it. Since therefore our ancestors greatly erred concerning the nature of the gods... they invented the art by which they made gods... since they could not make souls, evoking the souls of demons or angels, they introduced them into holy images..." Asclepius: "And of these gods, O Trismegistus, who are called terrestrial, of what kind is their quality?" Trismegistus: "It consists, O Asclepius, of herbs, of stones, and of aromatics having in themselves the nature of divinity... Thus man is the fashioner of gods."Asclepius III, 37 (Scott, I, 358); Augustine, City of God VIII, 24. William of Auvergne extensively commented on this passage in De legibus 23ff. (Opera Omnia, Paris, 1674, I, 66ff.), noting that "relics of this error still remain among many old women, even Christians," who say images gain power in their sixtieth year after fabrication. [condensed]

The cited passages from the Asclepius dialogue contain the rare reminiscences of truly Egyptian doctrines found in hermetic writings. Indeed, the primitive belief that the god or demon, thanks to the magical ritual of consecration, comes to inhabit its statue, has been elevated in the religion of ancient Egypt into a true theological principle. Even the Egyptian language expressed it, by designating the sculptor by the root śʿnḫ which means "to give life". And in the Roman era, one still encountered, among the personnel of Egyptian temples, a particular caste of sculptors, called by Firmicus Maternus, like the hermetic texts, fabricatores deorum vel cultores divinorum simulacrorum.On Egyptian beliefs about divine statues: M. Weynants-Ronday, Les statues vivantes (Brussels, 1926), p. 111; A. Erman-H. Grapow, Wörterbuch der ägyptischen Sprache IV (Leipzig, 1930), p. 47 on śʿnḫ ("to give life"); F. Cumont, L'Égypte des astrologues (Brussels, 1937), p. 142ff. on Roman-era temple sculptors called fabricatores deorum vel cultores divinorum simulacrorum by Firmicus Maternus.

The herbs, stones and aromatics with which the hermetic author has the divine statue constructed closely recall the drugs and medicines which according to Jābir are placed in the mold of the artificial man. It is also appropriate to relate this conception to the Egyptian ritual of the feasts of Osiris, whose significance has been brought to light by I. Lévy. This ritual contains the detailed recipe for the fabrication of divine simulacra and indicates the exact mixture of the effigy that makes the god of the year appear, at the rites of the month of Khoiak. "In the mold that represents a figure with a human head with the divine lock and the uraeus, holding in its hands the pedum and flagellum", one introduces a certain quantity of earth, sacred water, "aromatic plants ground and passed through a sieve,... metals and precious stones numbering twenty-four", etc., later one unmolds the effigy and paints its eyes, hair, beard and cheeks in different colors. — Jābir describes with a profusion of details, where fantasy certainly has its part, the construction of the mold and the manner of its functioning, but speaks barely of the composition itself of the mixture. The Egyptian text, no less "esoteric", gives only the list of components of the effigy, while remaining silent on the process of its fabrication.On the Egyptian Osiris ritual: V. Loret, Recueil de travaux... Les fêtes d'Osiris, vols. III-V; I. Lévy, Revue de l'Histoire des Religions 63 (1911), p. 129ff. The ritual specifies the exact mixture for divine effigies used in the month of Khoiak feasts.

I. Lévy has shown how in the Greek era Alexandrian authors assimilated these data from the Egyptian ritual to the legend of the colossal statue of Sarapis that King Sesostris or Sesonchosis would have had constructed in the sanctuary founded on the site of the future Alexandria and that Ptolemy (Soter?) would have renewed, with the aim "to present to the Alexandrians a direct manifestation of divinity". According to Athenodorus the sculptor Bryaxis who constructed this statue "used a mixed material of copper, lead, tin, fragments of all the precious stones known to the Egyptians", adding to it the funerary drugs that remained from the embalming of Osiris and Apis. Origen, according to Numenius, reports that the mixture of the effigy comprised all products from the animal and plant kingdoms. Jābir, for his part, evokes in his exposition of the "science of artificial generation" the "two statues of Egypt that move perpetually". Everything leads us to believe that the Jābirian conception ultimately goes back to the Greek version of an Egyptian rite.I. Lévy (RHR 63, p. 125ff.) on the legend of the Sarapis statue: Athenodorus (cited by Clement of Alexandria, Protrepticus IV, 48) describes Bryaxis using mixed materials including copper, lead, tin, precious stones, and funerary drugs from Osiris and Apis embalming. Origen (Contra Celsum V, 30), following Numenius, reports the effigy comprised all products from animal and plant kingdoms. Lévy summarizes (p. 136): "The legend of Sarapis... is essentially the novel of the statue... animated by invisible presence of the numen, talisman statue... Greek statue of Egyptian god." [condensed]

One easily understands that Jābir considers intelligence and speech as the most characteristic traits of the artificial man. But when he declares that the "intelligent" being is formed of fire and air while the "stupid" being has its cause in the inferior elements, he is apparently inspired by Neoplatonic demonology: the distinction between igneous and aerial demons, and demons formed of earth is directly attested for Porphyry. Likewise, the appellation aṣḥāb al-nawāmīs (legislators, prophets) by which Jābir designates the most developed product of artificial generation, now receives an at least convincing explanation: indeed, the author of the Asclepius dialogue, speaking of the animated statues of gods, considers them as "presaging the future, and predicting it by lot, by prophet, by dreams"; and likewise, Proclus, in his commentary on the Timaeus, underlines the "prophetic" faculty of images of gods. If one takes into account the fact that even in the Muslim era the idea of the demonic character of prophecy is not entirely unknown, one will readily believe that such a transposition of hermetic and Neoplatonic data is not impossible.On demonology and intelligence: Porphyry's distinction between igneous/aerial demons and earth-formed demons (Proclus, In Timaeum II, 11, 10; Augustine, City of God X, 9, 2); Asclepius on statues "presaging the future, predicting by lot, prophet, dreams"; Proclus (In Timaeum III, 155, 22) on images' power to "foretell the future" (προλέγειν τὸ μέλλον). For demonic prophecy in Islam, see Rāzī's critique in Kitāb al-ʿilm al-ilāhī cited by Nāṣir-i Ḫusraw. [condensed]

Thus, an ancient ritual and magical idea appears to have passed, through the intermediary of hermetic writings, into Neoplatonic teaching, to finally assimilate itself to the "alchemical" conception of the artificial man. We do not claim that the Kitāb al-tawlīd, commented on by Jābir, is authentic. It contains however elements that recall certain doctrines of Porphyry and sufficiently explain the attribution of the pseudepigraph. The Kitāb al-tawlīd relates to Porphyry's teaching as the alchemical Timaeus commented on by Jābir relates to Plato's Timaeus.

If our hypothesis is correct — and there are many chances that it is — we grasp here in the act one of the most characteristic traits of natural magic. Under the influence no doubt of the dogma of a unique God, Neoplatonic and hermetic demonology, so closely linked to ancient polytheism, transforms itself into natural science. The idea of the statue of the god, made alive by magical processes, is replaced by this other, even bolder if not less incompatible with religious data, of the artificial generation of man.The ḥadīṯ (Bukhārī, Būlāq 1312 H., VII, p. 167) warns: "On resurrection day, those who fabricated images will suffer the gravest punishments, and they will be told: give life to what you have created." See also E. Doutté, Magie et religion dans l'Afrique du Nord (Algiers, 1909), p. 16.

Source: Paul Kraus, Jâbir ibn Hayyân: Contribution à l'histoire des idées scientifiques dans l'Islam, Vol. II: Jâbir et la science grecque (Cairo: Institut Français d'Archéologie Orientale, 1942), pp. 98-134.

About this translation: This is an independent English translation from Kraus's French text. Footnotes marked [condensed] have been abbreviated from the original scholarly apparatus while preserving essential citations and arguments. Readers seeking the complete academic apparatus should consult Kraus's original publication in the Mémoires de l'Institut d'Égypte, vol. XLV.