Magical Alkemic Path: Basic Alchemy

 Dear readers and friends,

Today I present to you another article from my Magical Alkemic Path: Basic Alchemy. An introduction to this beautiful and very controversial discipline. 

 Pentacle Alchemical Symbol 

The pentagram is a symbol of power, harmony, health and mysticism. The Pythagoreans adopted the pentagram as a symbol of health and union between heaven and earth. As a sign of heaven and earth, as well as of the human body and mind, the pentacle holds great power, so much so, that it was used as a protective symbol by alchemists and magicians, as it was used in all rituals especially the evocation of spirits and positive or negative entities. In particular, alchemists used this symbol on hermetic books to emphasize that the knowledge within was protected and sacred.

 THE PENTACLE AND ALCHEMY 

With the advent of Alchemy, the Pentacle becomes a symbol used to take into account the alchemical elements of which everything is composed, including man. The Pentalpha in Alchemy has more degrees of interpretation depending on the path one follows: thus it represents the Philosophical Fire, which is called the vital spark initiated by the Creator into matter. In alchemy the number 5 is traced back to the number of elements, but it is also interpreted in relation to the spiritual quintessence. In the Alchemical tradition, in which the burning of slag to reveal the inner gold is one of the main themes, the man-pentagram is called STELLA MICROCOSMI.

The man who can be inscribed in the pentagram and the circle that surrounds it is also an alchemical symbol. Agrippa of Netteshein in his "De Occulta Philosophia" says: "Starting from this center now describe a circle that passes just above the head, spread the arms until the tips of the fingers touch the circumference, while the distance separating the feet must be equal to that between the top of the head and the tips of the fingers, so that the circle is divided into five equal parts and gives rise to a pentagon just as the line joining the two feet will be the base of a equilateral triangle whose vertex is located at the navel “ So once again we find the symbology of the Pentacle closely linked to the Original Creator, to God and to his most perfect creature, man.