As students of the hermetic tradition we all recognise that the alchemical work takes place on many different levels - the physical work with substances, the experience and manipulation of etheric forces, the interior work on the soul, as well as the spiritual and planetary/cosmic aspects of alchemy. These different facets of the work interpenetrate and overlap each other. Indeed, in a sense, if we are to make any progress in alchemy, we must pursue the different facets concurrently, paralleling interior development with experience of the outer work. One symbol that belongs to all these different realms of this work is that of the alchemical vessel.The tradition of interior development in alchemy, is pursued by mirroring the transformations and processes of alchemy within our soul. As with any esoteric practice, this internalising of alchemical operations can produce disturbing patterns in the powerful psychic energies that we evoke through inner work, unless we find some means of containing these energies. In the tradition of ritual ceremonial magic the operators normally use an opening and closing ritual that acts as a structure to contain and safely dissipate the energies raised through their work. Similarly, in many traditions of meditation, an opening and closing exercise (sometimes based on breathing rhythms) helps to anchor and reconnect the meditators with their normal state of consciousness, so as not to leave them rather dissociated and dangling somewhere in between the outer and interior worlds.
In our inner work with alchemical processes we will find the symbol of the alchemical vessel an invaluable means for containing the interior energies and allowing them to unfold within us in a controlled and positive manner. So in a sense, the alchemical vessel can be a protective interior symbol, just like the circle of the ceremonial magician, or the astral temple of a working esoteric lodge, or the breathing exercises of a meditation tradition.
The energies evoked by working with alchemical processes can be powerful and disruptive forces in the psyche, and a direct inner encounter with these transformative energies is not to be had instantaneously. Only through long and repeated interior work do we come to directly experience these energies in their primal and most fundamental form. The initial encounters are usually ephemeral and overlain with emotional currents. Only if we have the patience of alchemists tirelessly repeating interior experiments, brooding over our inner flask, will we attain even a glimpse of the goal of alchemical transmutation. It is therefore important that we understand the nature of the alchemical vessel so that we have some indication of how to use this in our inner work. We should come to see that symbols are actually patterns of energy.
In an exoteric sense this is so, for obviously any symbol held in our consciousness is manifested as an electro-chemical plexus in the neuron net in our brain. However, esoterically on the deepest level, a symbol is the pattern of etheric energy underlying its various different forms. When we meditate on a symbol we will find it shape-shifting and manifesting its different appearances, and through this can come to grasp that the true nature of the symbol is its energy pattern. There are many different forms of vessel described and depicted in the alchemical literature and emblematic engravings. There are a seeming multiplicity of forms of retort, pelicans, water baths, alembics, cucurbites, stills, etc. However, in the interior work we will find that all these different outer manifestations of the apparatus reduce to three archetypal forms - which we can call the CRUCIBLE, the RETORT and the STILL ... read more ...