Spoken and Meditative Prayers
Prayer to Amun, The One and the Many
One is Amun, who keeps Himself concealed from all, who hides Himself from the gods, no one knowing His nature.
He is more remote than the firmament, He is deeper than the netherworld.
None of the gods knows His true form. His image is not unfolded in the papyrus rolls. Nothing certain is testified about Him.
He is too secret for His Majesty to be revealed, He is too great to be enquired after, too powerful to be known.
Awestruck is mankind when His Name is uttered knowingly or unknowingly. There is no god able to invoke Him by it. He is Soul-like, hidden of name, like His Secrecy.
Prayer to Amun-Ra, The Almighty
The One in his works, as with the gods. Beneficent Bull of the company of the gods. Chief of all the gods.
Lord of Truth, father of the gods, maker of men, creator of all animals, Lord of things that are, creator of the staff of life: Maker of the herbage that sustaineth the life of cattle.
Power made by Ptah, beautiful child of love. The gods ascribe praises to Him. Maker of things celestial and of things terrestrial, He illumineth Egypt, Traverser of the celestial heights in peace.
King Ra true speaker, chief of the earth. Most glorious one, Honored Lord, chief creator of the whole earth.
Prayer to Amun, Soul of the Cosmos
Self-made Amun, Creator uncreated.
Sole one, unique one, who traverses eternity.
Remote one, with millions under His care.
Your splendor is like heaven's splendor,
Your color brighter than its hues.
When You cross the sky all faces see You,
When You set out You are hidden from their sight;
Daily You give Yourself at dawn,
safe is Your sailing under Your Majesty.
In a brief day You race a course,
hundred thousands, millions of miles.
A moment is each day to You,
it has passed when You descend.
You also completed the hours of night,
You order it without pause in Your labor.
Through You do all eyes see,
they lack aim when Your Majesty sets.
When You stir to rise at dawn,
Your brightness opens the eyes of the herds;
When You set in the western mountain,
they sleep as in the state of death.
The Opening of the Mouth
My mouth is opened by Ptah,
my mouth's bonds are loosed by my leader-god.
Thoth has come fully equipped with spells,
He loosens the bonds of Set from my mouth.
Atum has given me my hands,
they are placed as guardians.
My mouth is given to me.
My mouth is opened by Ptah,
with that chisel of wood
with which he opened the mouths of the gods.
I am Sekhmet-Wadjet who dwells
in the west of heaven,
I am Sahyt among the souls of On.
Gnosis and Prayer
How to do the “Silent Prayer”
I perform what I call the “Silent Prayer.” The “Silent Prayer” is a silent, meditative prayer derived from the concept of silence in the Hermetica, which aims to emulate or mimic the ineffable nature of the “One,” or divine unity. It involves visualizing aspects of a central deity, repeating the deity’s name or epithets along with an “elevating phrase,” and incorporating a physical movement or tactile engagement to affect an emotional, intuitive, or otherwise experiential result.
This prayer aims to strengthen your connection with God and refocus yourself upon the divine—away from the material. It can also help unlock and progress your powers of spiritual intuition and sensibility.
The only thing required is a clean or empty room in as quiet a setting as possible. I also change into specific clothes I reserve for prayer: a robe, headcovering, and blindfold. Special clothing for worship should be loose-fitting, so you can move more efficiently without interrupting your prayer. The Hermetica prescribes that this is done with no material offering. No incense, music, poems, additional prayers, food offerings, or religious offerings of any kind—just you, alone, in silence. If you are performing this prayer near a religious altar, I recommend facing away from it.
This “Silent Prayer” is something I derived principally from the Corpus Hermeticum Books I, X, XI, and XIII, the Perfect Sermon, the Stobaean Fragments, and the Definitions of Hermes Trismegistus to Asclepius. These Hermetic texts reference a “divine” or “sacred” silence. In addition, I took inspiration from Iamblichus’ On the Mysteries, Books I, VII, and VIII, where he says that “all superior beings rejoice in the efforts of their inferiors to imitate them.” We should aspire to achieve “identity with the primal entities in form and essence” and that the highest principles should be “worshipped by means of silence alone.”
Begin by sitting cross-legged. Other seated or standing positions also work, so try different styles.
Select a divine name and “elevating phrase” to repeat to yourself mentally. The “elevating phrase” is a command directed at yourself to spur your soul to rise upwards towards God. It is essential not to speak this aloud. I use Amun- Ra as the divine name, and to keep things simple, I use the word “elevate” as the elevating phrase. It happens that the deity I have selected and the elevating phrase have the same number of syllables, so in my head, I can almost sing them to myself, interchanging the words in rhythm. Whatever combination you select of deity name and elevating phrase, I’d say it’s generally ideal for them to have a rhythmic quality combined.
Close your eyes, push your eyeballs upward in your head, and repeat the divine name and elevating phrase to yourself silently. If you don’t want to push your eyeballs upward, other physical movements may help. Prayer beads can be used to keep a record of your repetitions, or you can rock your body in a swaying rhythm. Allow yourself to forget everything besides the deity.
Do this either until you naturally feel you wish to stop, or program a gentle alert of ocean waves or shimmering chimes on your phone, set to go off after 10, 15, or 20 minutes.
The summary experience of this prayer for me is what I can only describe as a sense of “heightened-ness” or “excellence.” I feel a sensation similar to floating upwards in water after several minutes of the “Silent Prayer.” Towards the end of the prayer, I often experience a feeling of a pleasant warmth upon my forehead, as if I was sitting in a sunbeam. This is the extent to which I have experienced “gnosis,” or a kind of personal, sacred knowledge or state of knowing. Allow yourself to feel whatever you feel during this experience.