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Balinas (Pseudo-Apollonius)

Arabic tradition attributed to "Balinas," often identified with Apollonius of Tyana | Early Islamic period (commonly dated 8th--9th century CE)
How to use this page: the full text is on the left; the right side and sections below explain provenance, constraints on what can be verified, and what this wording does compared to later versions.
Version: Earliest Arabic Recension (Literal Text)
◦ (a) truth; no doubt [it] is true
◦ indeed, the uppermost is from the lowermost and
  the lowermost is from the uppermost,
◦ [it] worked the wonders from one, (just) as all
  things come from one by means of one plan ,
◦ [its] father is the sun, [its] mother is the moon,
◦ the wind carried [it] in her womb, the earth fed [it],
◦ father of talismans, keeper of wonders, perfect
  in power,
◦ fire became earth, separate the earth from the fire,
◦ the subtle is more noble than the gross ,
◦ with gentle-being and wisdom [it] ascends from the
  earth to the heaven and descends to the earth
  from the heaven,
◦ and in [it] is the power of the uppermost and
  the lowermost,
◦ since with [it] is the light of lights therefore the
  darkness escapes (away) from [it],
◦ power of powers
◦ it prevails over everything subtle , enters into everything gross ,
◦ against the creation of the macrocosm the work
  was created,
◦ this is my renown and therefore I am named
  Hermes the threefold with the wisdom.
Note: This is a literal rendering style. Bracketed pronouns are grammatical placeholders; Arabic grammatical gender does not map cleanly to the English pronoun "it".5
Normalized reading (non-literal, later tradition)
This is included for reader recognition only. It is not a literal rendering of the Arabic recension shown above, and it reflects later Latin traditions and their Englishing. Treat it as downstream reception, not as the baseline witness.2
True, without falsehood, certain and most true.
That which is above is like that which is below, and that which is below is like that which is above, to accomplish the miracles of the One thing.
And as all things were from One, by the mediation of One, so all things arose from this One thing by adaptation.
Its father is the Sun, its mother the Moon. The Wind carried it in its belly. The Earth is its nurse.
The father of all perfection in the whole world is here.
Its force or power is entire if it be converted into earth.
Separate the earth from the fire, the subtle from the gross, gently and with great ingenuity.
It ascends from earth to heaven and again descends to earth, and receives the force of things superior and inferior.
Thus you will have the glory of the whole world, and all obscurity will fly from you.
This is the strong force of all forces, overcoming every subtle thing and penetrating every solid thing.
So was the world created.
From this are and do come admirable adaptations, whereof the means is here in this.
Therefore I am called Hermes Trismegistus, having the three parts of the philosophy of the whole world.
That which I have said of the operation of the Sun is accomplished and ended.
Provenance note: this type of English wording is commonly derived from Latin recensions and later editorial translations; it is not the direct English "of Balinas." For Latin plurality and the way later alchemists handled competing versions, see Davis 1926.2

Overview

The Balinas version stands at the beginning of the chronological sequence represented in this collection. It is the earliest surviving textual witness of the Tablet, preserved in Arabic treatise contexts rather than as a standalone authored essay.5

This wording compresses cosmology, causality, and transformation into short, declarative claims. Later translations often expand, moralize, or technicalize the material, but many of the later tradition's core moves are already visible here in compact form.2

Reader note In this project, "earliest" means earliest surviving textual witness of the Tablet itself (the recoverable chain), not earliest possible conceptual ancestry. Claims about exact pre-Arabic wording must stay hypothetical.5

Translator identity and provenance

This version is attributed to "Balinas" (Balinus), a name linked in Arabic tradition to Apollonius of Tyana. Modern scholarship treats this as a tradition-marker rather than as a verifiable autograph authorship claim.3

The Tablet appears as an appendix within the pseudo-Apollonian "Book of the Secret of Creation and the Craft of Nature" tradition, which belongs to the early Arabic Hermetic corpus and the broader translation and re-contextualization culture of the Islamicate intellectual world.35

Working rule Treat "Balinas" as a tradition label unless a specific manuscript shelfmark and context forces a stronger claim. The label is still useful evidence for how authority is staged inside the tradition.

On origins, absence, and first witness

No Greek manuscript of the Emerald Tablet survives as a usable baseline for verifying exact wording. What we can responsibly anchor is the earliest Arabic witness tradition and its later Latin plurality downstream.52

Think of it like a base starch that absorbs flavor from its preparation. Universal structures become readable inside specific cosmological grammars. That is not automatically "distortion." It is how transmission works when living cultures handle texts.

Evidence trail (what we can point to)

Purpose and audience

This witness reads like it was meant for readers already fluent in metaphysical and technical-occult categories. It does not argue. It states.

The presence of explicit talismanic language ("father of talismans") is a tell: this is at home in a world where hidden properties, marvels, and operative knowledge are normal categories, not fringe decoration.5

Sociological context and power dynamics

Early Islamicate intellectual culture placed high value on the recovery, translation, and domestication of ancient knowledge. Translation was not only linguistic transfer; it was also a mechanism for importing prestige and stabilizing disciplines inside an intelligible worldview.3

The opening line ("truth; no doubt [it] is true") functions as a social signal. It marks the Tablet as legitimate knowledge, not folklore or poetic allegory. It also establishes the epistemic posture immediately: authority precedes demonstration.

Comparative structural features

As the earliest node in this collection's sequence, this Arabic witness functions as baseline rather than as revision. Several features introduced here become points of later modification:

Connotative anchors

"truth; no doubt [it] is true"
The text opens with epistemic posture, not argument. It arrives as something to be recognized as correct, not negotiated.

"the uppermost is from the lowermost and the lowermost is from the uppermost"
Vertical cosmology is reciprocal generation, not a one-way chain of command. "Above" and "below" are mutually deriving conditions.

"all things come from one by means of one plan/with one considered act"
Unity is not only metaphysical source; it is also a single mode of intention. Cosmogenesis reads as purposeful craft.

"the wind carried [it] in her womb, the earth fed [it]"
Causality is gestated and nursed. Nature is not inert matter; it is a living carrier of invisible power.

"father of talismans, keeper of wonders"
This is a Balinas-specific signal: the text is comfortable inside a talismanic-technical world, not only abstract metaphysics.

"fire became earth, separate the earth from the fire"
Transformation and method sit together. Separation is an operational act, not just a poetic image.

"the subtle is more noble than the gross"
A value hierarchy is installed explicitly. Subtlety is superiority, which steers later moral and spiritual readings.

"light of lights ... darkness escapes"
Knowledge is framed as illumination with darkness as a fleeing condition. Ignorance is eviction, not neutral uncertainty.

"prevails ... enters into"
Power is pervasiveness. Victory is penetration and access, not brute force. The winning principle passes through boundaries.

"against the creation of the macrocosm the work was created"
Even if opaque, it functions as a scope claim: this is world-scale craft, not merely private self-improvement.

"therefore I am named Hermes the threefold with the wisdom"
Authority is asserted through renown and naming. The voice installs a credential inside the text itself.

Axiom-level observations

Axiom 1: The opening is recognition language, not proof language. Intended readers are expected to accept the register of certainty.

Axiom 2: The reciprocity matters. This reads like a cosmological engine, not a decorative metaphor.

Axiom 3: The "plan / considered act" gloss is a big tell. Unity has intentional structure, encouraging later readings of ordered craft.

Axiom 4-5: Parentage plus womb-nursing frames cosmic causality in generative biology. Nature participates as an active medium.

Axiom 6: "Father of talismans" anchors the text in a technical Hermetic environment where marvels and hidden properties are legitimate knowledge categories.

Axiom 7: Metamorphosis ("fire became earth") is paired with method ("separate"). That supports reading this witness as operational rather than merely contemplative.

Axiom 8: The subtle/gross gloss range is where connotation lives: physical refinement, moral refinement, intellectual refinement, or stacked layers.

Axiom 11-12: "Light of lights" plus fleeing darkness frames knowledge as purification. Ignorance is expelled by contact with the principle.

Axiom 13-14: Prevailing and entering describes permeability as power. The principle wins by passing through and occupying every layer of matter.

Axiom 15: The macrocosm line functions rhetorically as scope. Whatever the exact technical reading, it asserts world-scale operation.

Axiom 16: The final credential is social as well as metaphysical: renown and naming establish the speaker's authority to deliver the claims.

Sources and notes

Citations below are given in Chicago-style bibliography form; use them as footnote anchors for specific claims above.

  1. Davis, Tenney L. "The Emerald Tablet of Hermes Trismegistus: Three Latin Versions Which Were Current among Later Alchemists." Journal of Chemical Education 3, no. 8 (1926): 863--875. https://doi.org/10.1021/ed003p863. ↩
  2. van Bladel, Kevin. The Arabic Hermes: From Pagan Sage to Prophet of Science. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009. ↩
  3. Ruska, Julius. Tabula Smaragdina: Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der hermetischen Literatur. Heidelberg: Carl Winter's Universitätsbuchhandlung, 1926. ↩
  4. Weisser, Ursula. Buch über das Geheimnis der Schöpfung und die Darstellung der Natur (Buch der Ursachen) von Pseudo-Apollonios von Tyana. Aleppo: Institute for the History of Arabic Science, 1979. (See especially the Tablet text as printed in the edition; your displayed literal-rendering style matches the type of philological presentation associated with this edition.) ↩

Note on scope: these references support (a) anchoring the earliest Arabic witness tradition and its editorial presentation, (b) the wider Arabic Hermetic reception context, and (c) Latin plurality downstream. If you later want to cite the specific manuscript shelfmark shown in your manuscript scan, add a manuscript catalog reference tied to that shelfmark.