The Emerald Tablet kept eminent scholars and hobbyists busy for centuries trying to decipher its meaning. Many were convinced that it contained some deep secret of the universe or the key to unlimited wealth. For example, Sir Isaac Newton took the Emerald Tablet seriously, pondered its meaning, and translated it into English. Many other luminaries solemnly studied it, too, but the many interpretations that have been offered vary widely.
Other scholars characterized Apollonius as an impostor and charlatan and claimed that he made up the whole story. They said that the Emerald Tablet is a hoax, and that it is meaningless nonsense. Until now, however, there has not been a rational method for settling the dispute. Let us look at the text of the Emerald Tablet and see what the theory of nonsense can tell us.
The text is composed of cryptic sentences:
The truth, certainty, truest, without untruth. What is above is like what is below. What is below is like what is above. The miracle of unity is to be attained. Everything is formed from the contemplation of unity, and all things come about from unity, by means of adaptation. Its parents are the Sun and Moon. It was borne by the wind and nurtured by the Earth. Every wonder is from it and its power is complete.…This is the power of all strength—it overcomes that which is delicate and penetrates through solids. This was the means of the creation of the world. And in the future wonderful developments will be made, and this is the way. I am Hermes the Threefold Sage, so named because I hold the three elements of all the wisdom. And thus ends the revelation of the work of Sun.64
An analysis in terms of the typology of nonsense solves the riddle of the Emerald Tablet, for the text plainly consists of several types of nonsense that we already identified and described. Specifically, the text consists of elements of self-contradiction, numerative nonsense, figurative nonsense, nonreferential pronouns, and pseudo-profound nonsense.
In an exercise, my students discovered they could use the Emerald Tablet as an abstract pattern for making other works of nonsense that sound just as mysterious and profound.
For instance, an often-cited portion of the text is “What is above is like what is below. What is below is like what is above. The miracle of unity is to be attained.” My students easily wrote sentences modeled on that pattern that sounded equally enigmatic and deep. For instance, one student wrote, “The within arises from the without and the without arises from the within—the manifestation of the Absolute.” Another student wrote, “The odd embraces the even, and the even embraces the odd—the timeless process of Essence.”
This analysis shows that in some cases a systematic typology of nonsense can be used to resolve disputes concerning unintelligibility. Even so, the method has three significant limitations. First, the method is effective for rational thinkers whose desire and interest are to seek truth. People who are fixated on an ideology are unlikely to be swayed if applying the method contradicts their cherished beliefs. For example, hobbyists who spend their lives trying to unlock a hidden meaning in the Emerald Tablet would probably be unmoved by the above analysis.
Second, the method won’t work for all disputes concerning unintelligibility, for the method works by matching a disputed case to known structural patterns of deliberate nonsense. However, we have not identified and characterized all types of deliberate nonsense. Therefore, we cannot conclude that a disputed case is not nonsense, merely because we are unable to match it to a known structural pattern.
Third, we saw that calling a proposed idea unintelligible nonsense is generally regarded as a particularly powerful, even final, kind of objection. However, its power, efficacy, and finality have been greatly exaggerated, for even a clear, incontrovertible determination that a notion is unintelligible nonsense does not always invalidate the notion. In reality, proving that an idea is nonsense doesn’t necessarily have the dire consequences that proponents of such objections imagine. Sometimes we accept an idea with grace and ease even if we know it is unintelligible.
Judges sometimes impose nonsensical sentences on perpetrators of particularly heinous crimes. A judge may sentence a condemned prisoner to “six consecutive life terms plus fifty-five years,” for example. Sentences like that are plainly unintelligible nonsense.
Theoretically, if a judge handed down a sentence that was meaningless and unintelligible, the sentence should be invalid, for how could a prisoner be required to serve a nonsensical sentence? But what actually happens in cases like that? Defense attorneys don’t protest. The legal system doesn’t fall apart, and the court and penal system continue functioning as usual.
In the real world, nonsense is mostly harmless. Still, there are plenty of exceptions. Accordingly, the next chapter will discuss common misuses of nonsense.
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63. Thurber, Lanterns and Lances, 62.
64. Shah, The Sufis, 240–241.
Chapter 8
Misusing Nonsense
Nonsense draws evil after it.
C. S. Lewis
A few individuals misappropriate the powers of nonsense to manipulate others. The theory developed in this book makes it easier to recognize misuses of nonsense and to blunt their ill effects. This chapter will examine six common patterns or contexts of misusing nonsense. Specifically, nonsense has been used for imposture, bogus prophecies, totalitarian control, mock profundity, pseudoscientific theories, and self-deception.
Imposture
Impostors are colorful, charismatic figures who sometimes come to the attention of forensic psychiatrists and law enforcement officers. Impostors beguile others with fabricated tales of their supposed personal accomplishments and adventures. Impostors pretend to be intelligence agents, military heroes, royalty, or, in one case, a space shuttle pilot. Nonsense is one of impostors’ favorite tools for fooling their gullible admirers.
In 1701 a blond, blue-eyed Frenchman who was only seventeen years old appeared in England. He identified himself as Psalmanazar, although nobody ever learned his real name. Psalmanazar told everyone he was a Christianized cannibal from the recently discovered island of Formosa. He ate raw meat and went around semi nude in public. Psalmanazar’s fabricated descriptions of his supposed homeland held people spellbound, and he soon gathered a large following. In 1704 Psalmanazar published an illustrated book describing the customs, religion, and architecture of Formosa, and the book quickly became a major bestseller.
Psalmanazar told his enthralled audiences that Formosans sacrificed eighteen thousand male infants annually as a religious rite. He said that great herds of elephants and giraffes roamed his homeland. He claimed that Formosans lived to be a hundred years old and were rich in gold and silver.
To support the character he invented, Psalmanazar devised a meaningless mock language, complete with a nonsense alphabet, which he claimed was “Formosan.” He made a prayer book and carried it as a prop. Inside were crude drawings of the sun, moon, and stars, together with passages written in his mock language. He pretended to read from the book as he muttered his nonsensical “Formosan prayers.”