THE GOLDEN VERSES: A Guide to Living in an Ensouled Cosmos

Announcing a 35 Part Course by Caitlín Matthews

PLEASE JOIN ME ON A NEW COURSE

I am very happy to be announcing my new course on The Golden Verses, which has been in preparation for over a year now. Many of you may be surprised to find me writing from the wider Western Esoteric Tradition, but the wisdom of the ancient world derives from not just one source. I have spent my whole life learning from the wisdom of our common heritage, and wanted to go to one of its major roots, to bring to your attention this twenty-five centuries old tradition, which is so apt for our own time.

The Golden Verses as taught by the 5th century CE philoosopher, Hierocles, present us with a guide for living in an ensouled cosmos. They stem from oral instructions given by Pythagoras to his followers and to their students from the 5^th century BCE onwards, that were passed on down by word of mouth, and which are referenced throughout the Classical world. Pythagoras is known mostly today for his mathematical and musical wisdom, but he is also the source of these short, simple – even sometimes challenging - instructions, which lay down a proven mode of progress for anyone who wants to reshape or refocus their life in an ethical and dedicated way. These were the teachings around which Pythagoras and his disciples framed their daily lives.  

The central aim of studying and embodying these teachings is to receive back and foster your essential self, and to come to know again the entire sacred cosmos  - both seen and unseen - with respect. The verses also enable us to live with kindness, consideration, healthy introspection, and honesty: it is also suitable for people of any background.

I am inviting you to join me on this path by offering what Hierocles called ‘the best method for growing wings.’ This is a reference to the Platonic myth, found in the Phaedrus, which tells how the winged soul became full of forgetfulness and lost its wings, becoming mired in illusion, but how it still yearns towards the divine original condition, and seeks to regrow its wings – in other words, to align the soul with an ensouled cosmos.

WHY GREECE, SUDDENLY?

Well, I’ve been interested in the wisdom of the ancient world all my life, but over the last ten years, as part of my own on-going Neo-Platonic studies, I have been learning these verses and trying to live by them. This has been both very challenging and very supportive. I have found them accompanying and becoming part of me, making me question things and, I hope, creating an inner equanimity. This series on the Golden Verses are my musings on how we might live in an ensouled universe.  I am approaching these teachings as an inheritor of a great cloak of interwoven traditions, as an initiate of the ancestral mysteries, and as your companion upon the road for all who join me here. While I am nothing like as learned as the many great students of this art, I do count myself as one who is upon the road to Wisdom, one who is ‘a lover of Wisdom’, or a philo-sophia, which is what that word essentially means.

In their current form, these popular verses were transmitted and actively taught by the 5^th century CE Neo-Platonic philosopher, Hierocles, in Alexandria, Egypt; he wrote a commentary upon the Golden Verses for his students, which is one of the ways that they have survived for us to read them today. In an era that had become Christian by decree, Hierocles had been flogged for teaching philosophy in Constantinople which had recently outlawed such things.  He continued to teach in the no-less dangerous city of Alexandria, in Egypt where his philosophic contemporary, Hypatia, was actively done to death by a fanatic mob for continuing to espouse philosophy. Like Hypatia, Hierocles walked his talk in an era where everything that had been formerly considered sacred was being reframed as an unholy anachronism.

I have always been drawn to this pivotal 5^th century period, because so many of the roots of my own work stem from it, and because I am also interested in how people ‘mind the gap’ at times of spiritual and cultural transition. On the pages of history, these moments of spiritual collision may seem to have a tidy, dated, edge but in practice they did not: people’s beliefs and practices didn’t suddenly lie down under the new injunction or become forgotten.  These ancient teachings continued to inspire then, just as they continue to inspire me now.

Now, also in our own uncertain times, when the way-markers of life are upended and where confusing sign-posts have been erected to replace them; when all that we thought of as holy or even normal is changed utterly by mockery, disrespect, and warped by commercial interests, we need a steady and simple path beneath our feet.

While you may have a sense of philosophy as some kind of theoretic thing, with all the savour of a dry crisp-bread, may I please replace that impression with a sense of joyful anticipation and freedom, with all the friendliness of a journey undertaken in company, as we seek to live our lives in practical and wholesome ways. Hierocles himself tells us:

 ‘Philosophy is the purification and perfection of human nature… recovering our original joy by restoring it to its divine likeness.’

Philosophy has to be ‘united with the art of sacred acts in order to have power,’ which means that our individual service to the divine (however you view that) needs to be yoked with clear thinking and good guidance, because divine inspiration by itself can blind us, unless we are also practising it practically in our lives. We need the eye of our reasoning intellect or nous (our intuitive understanding), as well as the foot of the body’s actions, with the hand of our soul’s capacity (psyche) to be filled with gratitude and love, so that our whole being is fused with a coordinated understanding.

BUT WHY PHILOSOPHY?

Many images depict the meetings of philosophers as a set of serious-looking men, but I need to remind you that this wasn’t the case. These teachings were followed by women as well as men with complete equality, for Pythagoras realised that men couldn’t be philosophers unless their womenfolk were also dedicated to these teachings: children were raised to follow these teachings.  Men were forbidden from keeping mistresses or sleeping with hetairai  - the cultured high-class courtesans of the time – or with slaves, because Pythagoras understood the anger and hurt which arose within a marriage that was not harmonious and mutually considerate. Within the sexually-uneven society of ancient times, Pythagorean women enjoyed an equality and consideration that was not extended so generously to their sisters.

The Golden Verses were also followed by people of many different kinds of background – not just Greeks, but Jews, Romans, Syrians. Later on in time, followers of Orpheus, Plato, and Christ were all considered as fellow friends and students. Students of this tradition were not divided from each other by their spiritual affiliation in the way that they became so in successive centuries, becoming polarized into different groups as state religion prescribed one official way: philosophic students were each considered to be inheritors of an ancient wisdom whose differences were united by the truth found at the heart of all traditions.  There is nothing in these teachings that contravenes the cosmic order of life so, whether you are at home in a spiritual tradition or seeking one, or without any current spiritual abode, you are welcome here equally.

The Golden Verses have gone from Greek into many languages and traditions, and have been welcomed in different places by individuals and groups, as we can see from this medieval Islamic manuscript:  when Christian authorities banned the teaching of philosophy, many philosophers went east, into Muslim territory where they were not subject to persecution.

Opening words of Iamblichus' Golden Verses commentary in Arabic, from Princeton, Garrett no. 308Y, fol 305v.

The Stoic philosophers of Rome used to recite the Golden Verses every morning and evening as valued teachings.  After the loss of much of the Classical traditions, these verses were welcomed into the 15th century world of the Renaissance, which began to rediscover the treasures of Classical philosophy. The teachings were regarded and valued as reliable way-markers during the intervening centuries, to be taken up right down to our own times. The Golden Verses have been translated, recited, and carried around by those who have sought to live by their wisdom over many centuries. You are just the latest to read and work with them.

Despite the elapse of 25 centuries when they were first being actively taught, they still speak to us, acting as way-marks to guide us along our soul’s way.

WHERE WILL THIS LEAD US?

I see each verse or group of verses as steps and unfoldings of a much longer path that pilgrim souls are upon. These teachings have been helpful in maintaining integrity amongst the challenges of altered priorities and shifting values that assault me daily. I hope you will also find them so. The verses are both simple and understandable, since they were taught as the preliminary step towards a deeper study of philosophy.

I give you the end of a golden string by Franny Swann.

In his notebooks, the great mythologizing poet, William Blake wrote,

‘I give you the end of a golden string
Only wind it into a ball.
It will lead you in at Heaven’s gate
Built in Jerusalem’s wall.

Blake’s instruction to follow the golden string speaks of the soul’s pilgrimage to the spiritual heart of our vision, a path that leads us surely to the core of what has opened that pilgrimage to us.  If we are faithful to our path, we come into a place of gnosis and understanding.  However, this is not a physical location, nor to a particular religious destination, although we can study the Golden Verses whatever our background without clashing with any spiritual tradition that we already follow. It becomes a axis of balance that our practice will slowly unfold. But we will never arrive at the core of wisdom unless we follow what Pythagoras instructs us:

         ‘Practice these teachings with all your might,

          Meditate on them attentively,

         Love them ardently with all your heart,

         And they will set your steps upon the path of divine virtue.’

It is only when we actively live our spiritual life, noticing and referring to what keeps us upon the path, with a deep love of it - that helps us remain connected to it in difficult times, - that we can track where the path leads, following the footsteps of those who have travelled before us; only so do we come to join the way of the sacred living.

This 35-part course is going to be available only to my paying subscribers on Caitlín Matthews – A Hallowquest Sanctuary – which is open to anyone who is seeking a way or who is already actively upon their spiritual path. I have translated the Golden Verses from the original Greek. Each step upon this path leads the reader to embody the teachings given by Pythagoras, through the focused teaching of Hierocles, in such a way that you can find your own level of engagement in the 21^st century.

·      Where will the Golden Verses lead you?

·      What keeps your soul upon its path?

·      What makes you wobble off of it?

·      Where do you find the balance you need to live well?

This Hallowquest Sanctuary is hospitable to all people of good will, without persuasion or judgement. Your soul-guides are already leading you. We are all companions upon our path.

Steps leading to Pythagoras’ Cave on Samos..

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The course will start unrolling from the end of the month. Unlike the last course, Blessings of the Celtic Year, which is still on my Substack for you to study, The Golden Verses will come in much smaller portions. The first part of the course has the preparatory material, including my complete new translation of the verses themself, so that you can so that you can start work on them. The first part will come with supporting material, a bibliography and a glossary.