In this way, the "divine word" in Hellenism really became the bearer of the most religious concepts that it could have worked out. At the same time, the "divine word" itself regains its sacred character, which it gradually lost in the development of rationalistic Greek thought.

But on closer examination, this impression is weakened to a great extent. First of all, what is the content of Hermetic revelation? Apart from the old dualistic ideas, borrowed from the Orphic tradition and now artificially revived, we find only a web of cosmogonic fantasies, the extreme complexity of which does not hide its inner emptiness. The desert of this thought is filled with difficulty by the heap of 'aeons' with their genealogies. This underdeveloped antiquity does not so much satisfy the new needs of the religious soul as it unwittingly testifies to their existence.

If we turn to the form in which these supposed revelations are clothed, it turns out to be mere literary fiction. In the confusion and capitulation of rationalistic thinking, the "divine word" serves only as a universally applicable pretext that can be mastered by any author or popularizer of new fantastic inventions. But those who use this formula believe in it themselves, without a doubt, the least of all. The conditional theme is exploited automatically: it is felt everywhere. Meanwhile, the halo of "noumena" surrounding it rests entirely, or almost entirely, on the tenacious prestige that the Far East enjoys in the eyes of Western snobs, compared with what is closer and more familiar to them.

Nevertheless, it remains indisputable that these last, undoubtedly decadent, forms of Hellenism, of which Apuleius of Madaura is a typical representative, are at any rate permeated with a sacred breath. The origins of this new phenomenon, which is also undeniable in other respects, are unanimously sought by historians of the mystery religions and of their intellectual offspring, Hermeticism, in Semitic influences. There they see the primary source of this revival of the idea of divine revelation and its attractive power. From there, in their opinion, comes the desire to know the dromenon, the sacred history of the suffering, struggling, and finally triumphant god, and at the same time to receive initiation, not only the intellectual, but also the vital inclusion of man in this superterrestrial epic. It seems that on this path the Hellenistic man, tired of the deceptive perfection of his 'cosmos', if not quite came, then came close to the hope of obtaining immortality through the immersion of the immortals themselves in the vicissitudes of our own fate.

To put it more precisely, the prestige which the concept of the "divine word" again enjoyed at the beginning of our era is connected with the revival, in the Hellenic world, of that type of people whom the Greeks themselves called "prophets." Both sincere dreamers and clever charlatans tried to decorate themselves with their halo. By "prophet" here we should understand not the one who "predicts" (such an interpretation is incorrect etymologically), but the one who "speaks for" a certain deity. {} It is not even quite accurate to talk about the revival of this concept in the Hellenic world. Previously, the Greeks had never ascribed such a meaning to prophecy. Only the Semites were able to develop this concept along with the general development of their culture. On the contrary, Greek culture, with its frank rationalism, seems to have paid for it by the disappearance of the prophets who existed in Greece at its origin, as well as among all emerging peoples.

In the atmosphere of classical Greece, the Delphic Pythia and the like seem to be only remnants. As for the other phenomena of "rapture" (in the etymological sense of divine ecstasy), which accompanied, for example, the cult of Dionysus, they must be regarded rather as disturbing outbursts of repressed instincts. In fact, all this was also in contradiction with the development of the Hellenic "city" and Hellenic wisdom. In the Semitic East, on the other hand, the "prophet," the man whom God possessed, remained, on the other hand, a wise man par excellence and the guide of his fellow citizens.

How did he preserve this prestige, among a society that, after all, had already left the state of childhood?

It must be admitted that there he retained a sense of that which is beyond our reason (there are more things in heaven and on earth than in our philosophy), a sensation which in Hellenism was dangerously obscured by its very successes. Was it not for this reason that Hellenism turned its eyes with envy to the East, feeling itself prematurely exhausted? The great Babylonian cosmogony, the savage mysticism of the Syrian cults, the ancient Egyptian religion of the dead, and then the grandiose cosmic epic of light and darkness that inspired Mazdaism—all these were worldviews full of inhuman horrors, the very ones that had been safely banished by Hellenism, but they also allowed man to regain a superhuman sense of mystery, which, alas, Hellenism had lost. The mystery of the world and of life, the mystery of man and that which surpasses him — is this not what fascinated a Greek-educated man in the Eastern initiations? {}

But there is no doubt that in all this the irrational principle has unfortunately not been able to free itself either from the slavery of magical rituals or from the childish fantasies of primitive cosmogonies. Is it to be regarded as a mere admission of failure, merely the fruit of despair, of the attraction of Greek thought, disillusioned with its overly intellectualized logic, to the myths of pre-logical times?

Not only, but whatever Plotinus thinks and says, for example, in his treatise Against the Gnostics. And his very contempt—does it not only prove how little he is aware of the anxiety which possesses him and creates his own greatness, so profoundly different from that of Aristotle or even of Plato? This general phenomenon of inspiration, of prophecy in the sense we have just defined, that is, in the sense of direct contact with the divinity who possesses man and speaks through him, and which is common to the whole group of Semitic peoples, may seem rather misleading when we observe and consider all its many results. But it can be said that all of them constitute only a kind of nebula enveloping one definite spiritual achievement, in which the simple irrational principle has reached a truly super-rational level

In Israel, as well as among the Canaanites, there have always been "nebiim". This was the name given to people who were suddenly overwhelmed by an inexplicable ecstatic ecstasy, ascribed to supernatural influence, and expressed in the irrepressible utterance of seemingly incoherent words. This is more or less exactly what Plato, for his part, describes under the name of enthusiasm. Among these people who went into ecstasy were, in Israel as elsewhere, mystics who claimed to be able to discern realities invisible to ordinary mortals, and, conversely, to penetrate into the depths of the visible world with a super-normal sighted eye. But now, the image of the Deity taking possession of them begins to emerge from their revelations with amazing clarity, and moreover with features of incomparable grandeur and with a purity that is not found anywhere else. At the same time, the general direction which they discern in events gradually acquires such distinctness and scope that are also unparalleled. In all this is reflected a mysterious design, and they call upon their countrymen to become its conscious and obedient executors, otherwise they will be crushed like an insignificant obstacle by that personal omnipotence which creates history.

With such prophets, we have something quite different from those isolated divine utterances, from which something coherent and instructive can be extracted only if all their religious content is removed, together with the mythological form. But here we are just as far from the plant forces, from the elements, and from the heavenly bodies, as the Canaanite or Assyro-Babylonian Baals were. The God of the Israelite prophets, Yahweh, is not a cosmic force or a mere glimpse of the inner world of men. He is the Lord of all things, free from His creation. It is revealed in the heavenly fire, but even more in a light and indefinable rustle, in which the man of God recognizes His personal presence, prostrating himself before Him who is Holy and Who is completely Different.

It is still less any spirit-lord of a given place, such as those who can be contacted and used by almost only magical agreement with them. Here is God, who does not dwell in any house built by human hands, since the heavens themselves, and the heavens of heavens, cannot contain Him. And yet, for all this royal majesty, this is the God closest to man that has ever been known. By His free will, He is immeasurably closer to Israel than to the other nations of their "ruler"—He is so close to Israel that Israel can no longer call Him "his Baal" but "his Spouse," giving the words—indeed, a meaning that is purer than tribal." In this intimacy, the voluntariness of which must be emphasized, Yahweh, unswervingly supporting it with Israel through the whole series of His inspired messengers, will lead the people of Israel along paths that also have no parallel to themselves. In the course of this history, and for the sake of its progressive development, which defies all human foresight, the consciousness of both the people and the individual will be forged to depths of which Greek humanism had no idea. By revealing Himself to man as the Almighty, as Lord in the most absolute sense of the word, God, however, reveals man to himself better than any investigation of his own consciousness would do. For He reveals Himself as the Creator of man and, in the end, as his Father, the One Whose Word created man in the image of God, and it is this Word that awakens in man the superconsciousness. Now that man has lost his way far from Paradise, from the primordial creation, when God has appeared to him without fear, as a friend can appear to his friends, the Word of the Invisible One has only one purpose: to restore this image in man and bring it to perfection, opening the heavens for this purpose and descending to man.

The Israelite prophets themselves were the first to be struck by the absolute originality of the experiential knowledge that they received about the God who spoke to them. Of these, the oldest who left us his own testimony recorded in writing was Amos. {} It appeared in the VIII century, in the Northern Kingdom (in the kingdom of the ten tribes). He was not, however, a native of the country, but a native of Judea. At first, he was a simple shepherd in the small village of Fekoya. In no way did he belong to the circle of professional prophets, so to speak, those who methodically came into ecstasy, entering into communion with a rather vague deity by various vague methods, like the Pythia, who sat on a tripod and chewed the laurel of Delphi. He himself tells us, or rather says to Amaziah the priest, who was in charge of the royal sanctuary at Bethel and may have lost the peace of mind with which God spoke to Amos, which was personally advantageous to him: