Further readings on Agrippa...
...since my post last night, I've read Nauert's description of the 1510 edition of Three Books of Occult Philosophy, before Agrippa's trip to Italy, and its difference from the later 1534 edition.
One would have seriously expected the book to have been lacking in Neo-Platonic and Hermetic writing and sources before this period, but no apparently Agrippa was already well read in the Hermetic Corpus, and in the writings of Pico and Ficino on the other Prisci Theologia. What did change apparently, from one edition to the other is the advent of some deeper understanding of Cabala, but Nauert claims the main source for this is the 1517 (?) edition of Reuchlin's "De Arte de Kabbah." Through and through Reuchlin seems to be Agrippa's source for his Christian Kabbalah. What was he specifically studying in this period? His correspondences show him constantly seeking new texts and sources, and studying amongst an ever growing network of friends, but of what the actually studies were, we appear to be, a little in the dark. At least for now.
I would agree with the assessment that Reuchlin supplied the framework for Agrippa's kabbalah, based on the readings I've done of Reuchlins and Agrippa, both men seem o focus on the power of the 5-fold name to unlock the power of the scriptures. The deeper question of Agrippa's angel magick in book 3 is a bit of a problem for me. At some point in the near future I should read the Stenographia and other writing of Trithemius, to see if that is a source for him. Three books is not a manual for Magic the same way that much of the writings we have on Occultism today would be, but there is a definitive system, based on a very particular understanding of the Universal Order.
One would have seriously expected the book to have been lacking in Neo-Platonic and Hermetic writing and sources before this period, but no apparently Agrippa was already well read in the Hermetic Corpus, and in the writings of Pico and Ficino on the other Prisci Theologia. What did change apparently, from one edition to the other is the advent of some deeper understanding of Cabala, but Nauert claims the main source for this is the 1517 (?) edition of Reuchlin's "De Arte de Kabbah." Through and through Reuchlin seems to be Agrippa's source for his Christian Kabbalah. What was he specifically studying in this period? His correspondences show him constantly seeking new texts and sources, and studying amongst an ever growing network of friends, but of what the actually studies were, we appear to be, a little in the dark. At least for now.
I would agree with the assessment that Reuchlin supplied the framework for Agrippa's kabbalah, based on the readings I've done of Reuchlins and Agrippa, both men seem o focus on the power of the 5-fold name to unlock the power of the scriptures. The deeper question of Agrippa's angel magick in book 3 is a bit of a problem for me. At some point in the near future I should read the Stenographia and other writing of Trithemius, to see if that is a source for him. Three books is not a manual for Magic the same way that much of the writings we have on Occultism today would be, but there is a definitive system, based on a very particular understanding of the Universal Order.