Some Basic Alchemical Principles

As mentioned, alchemy essentially begins with the idea of the Prime Matter (materia prima). This Prime Matter was believed to have a basic fourfold structure, known as the four basic classical elements—usually recognized as fire, water, air, earth. A fifth ‘element’ has been commonly recognized as well, variously called ether, space, quintessence, or spirit. The idea of these basic elements goes back to ancient Babylonia (the Enuma Elish, the chief Babylonian Creation myth, written circa 1700 BCE, made mention of them). It fell to the Greek pre-Socratics, in particular Empedocles (circa 490-430 BCE), to elaborate on the idea, although it was Plato (424-348 BCE) who first used the term ‘elements’ (from the Greek stoicheion), and Aristotle who fleshed out the scheme. Empedocles had been influenced by Pythagoras and certain esoteric schools such as the Orphic mysteries, but appears to have developed his independent view of things. His idea of the four basic elements was part of his attempt to explain how things come to undergo change, the understanding of which lies at the very root of alchemy. Empedocles held that all of existence is a process of change via the separation and combination of different elements. Things do not, he maintained, change by passing from existence to non-existence (as Heraclitus had held), but rather via the process of the mixing, dividing, and the re-combining of different combinations of substances and their elemental properties.

An essential idea behind most esoteric tradition, never to be lost sight of, is that this material reality we dwell in is a degraded copy of a finer, more subtle and rarefied, dimension. Much of Plato’s highly influential cosmology was based on this idea, and even Empedocles asserted it in reference to the basic elements, declaring, ‘from them, flow all things that are, or have been, or shall be.’ For him, these elements represented phases of transition, a crystallization of subtle energies into material form. In short, the ‘Supreme Being’ imposed a fourfold structure onto the Prime Matter, in order to condense the subtle into the material, and thereby create the material universe. Such ideas are seen by historians of science as primitive scientific glimmerings (for e.g., complex elements arising from simple elements, as the result of a star going nova), but they are perhaps more valid when understood as esoteric teachings that are central to an understanding of psycho-spiritual alchemy. Elements of the personality are to be restructured, made concrete, if you will, so that they can be recognized and thereby transformed. In so doing, the personality becomes more capable of supporting the growth of higher potentialities, and the emergence of the higher self.

According to the early alchemists, the four elements—fire, water, air, and earth—come into existence via the combination of specific qualities, recognized as hot, cold, wet, and dry, being ‘impressed’ on to the Prime Matter. For example, when hot and dry are impressed on the Prime Matter, we have fire; if cold and dry, then earth; if wet and hot, then air; if cold and wet, then water. When these qualities are changed, the elements themselves are changed. A few examples will suffice:

1. Add water to fire (substituting wet for dry; hot and dry becomes hot and wet: steam, or air).
2. Add fire to water (substituting hot for wet; cold and wet becomes hot and wet: steam, or air). This is known as vaporization, which can occur via boiling or evaporation.
3. Add cold to air, and air will ‘become’ water (substitute cold for hot; wet and hot becomes wet and cold; air becomes water). This is known as condensation.

And so forth. Modern chemistry is obviously vastly more comprehensive in its grasp of such matters as pertains to physical reality—the modern table of elements, or Periodic Table, recognizes (as of this writing in 2012) no less than 118 isolated elements, a far cry from the four or five of Empedocles, Plato, and Aristotle—but when the esoteric basis of alchemy is understood, it is also understood to be addressing a domain utterly distinct from that addressed by modern chemistry.

What follows is a brief synopsis of the esoteric significance of the five elements:

Fire: In esoteric studies all elements carry great significance, but in the realm of alchemy, it may be said that fire rules. It is the key, the mastery of which has long been held to be of prime importance by alchemists and shamans of old (as well as by smiths and potters, craftsmen whose work was related in many ways to alchemy). This is because fire is the element of transmutation par excellence, the key to changing things from one state to another—beginning with the most obvious examples of the power of the Sun and the core of our planet to heat the surface of the Earth, allowing for the possibility for life as we know it to develop. Of the four qualities mentioned above—hot, cold, wet, and dry—only two, hot and cold, are foundational (being found in space beyond our planet), and as cold is but the absence of heat, in the final analysis only fire (hot) is the essential transformational force. As Titus Burckhardt put it.

It is the effect of fire alone that renders the substance in the alchemist’s retort successively liquid, gaseous, fiery, and once again solid. Thus, it imitates in miniature the ‘work’ of Nature herself.

In alchemy, fire is traditionally associated with the color red, with the qualities of hot and dry, and the force that rarefies and refines things, as well as causing total transformation. Psychologically, fire is usually connected to will, energy, and sometimes intuition. (On occasion it is connected to feeling, although this latter is more often associated with the water element). Alchemicaly, fire is symbolized by a triangle with the apex pointing up. In terms of geometry, the Platonic solid that is connected to fire is the tetrahedron, or four-sided pyramid. (The idea of Platonic solids corresponding to the four elements derives from Plato, although it was earlier Greeks who discovered the shapes of the actual Platonic solids. Plato’s scheme is subjective and rather contrived; it is included here more as a historical curiosity. He considered that fire was ‘sharp’, rather like the four-sided pyramid).

Water: Water is traditionally connected to the color blue, and to the qualities of wet and cold. It is a potent symbol in physical reality and for life in particular, as the planet we live on and the bodies we inhabit are primarily water. Water is the great dissolver and the womb for creation. Psychologically it is usually associated with feelings and emotions. In the symbolism of alchemy, it is represented by the triangle with the apex pointing down. The Platonic solid for water is the icosahedron (a solid with twenty sides, closest of the five solids to resembling a ball, and thus most similar to the ‘smoothness’ and ‘slipperiness’ of water).

Air: Air is traditionally connected to the color yellow, and to the qualities of hot and wet. Air is a natural purifier, rendering the coarse more fine, and enabling the subtlety of mind that allows for clearer understanding. Accordingly, air is the element of thinking and reason. Its alchemical symbol is the right side up triangle with a horizontal line running through it. The Platonic solid for air is the octahedron (eight-sided solid).

Earth: Earth is the element traditionally associated with the color green (and sometimes black), and with the qualities of cold and dry. It is the symbol for all matters pertaining to the physical and the practical. Its symbol is the upside down triangle with a horizontal line bisecting it. The Platonic solid is the cube (six-sided solid, its square solidity making it a natural symbol for the solid Earth that supports us).

Quintessence (or Spirit, or Ether): The word ‘quintessence’, which literally means ‘fifth element’, is beyond the four basic elements as such. Aristotle described it as being beyond the ‘sub-lunar sphere’ and as being the basic material of the immortal and incorruptible ‘heaven realms’, free of any of the four qualities and incapable of change. However, later philosophers and alchemists granted this mysterious element certain qualities, such as those of ability to change density, or subtleness beyond that of light itself. There are grounds for speculating a link between this enigmatic ‘fifth classical element’ and the ‘dark matter’ currently studied by modern physicists, but that is highly speculative. Quintessence, or ‘ether’ as it also has been known, is sometimes linked to the concept of empty space. Its symbol is generally a circle with eight spokes, and its Platonic solid is sometimes considered the dodecahedron, the twelve-sided solid, although Aristotle resisted this latter association.