Herm

this phallic herm is as much feminine as it is masculine; nay, even more strongly put, the essence of this image is feminine insofar as what is depicted here is Hermes emerging from the very source of life, from the four-sided base, from the four soul elements forming the world soul

Sardello argues that the herm’s phallic form is ontologically feminine in essence, signifying the emergence of soul from the world-soul’s four elemental ground rather than sexuality per se.

Sardello, Robert, Facing the World with Soul: The Reimagination of Modern Life, 1992thesis

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In the herms the masculine aspect of the life source does not appear as blossoming in the child, nor as unfolding in the classical Hermes image; it appears rather as congealed in its kernel.

Kerényi identifies the herm as the concentrated, archaic form of the masculine life-source, distinct from both the child-image of Eros and the fully developed Olympian Hermes.

Kerényi, Karl, Hermes Guide of Souls, 1944thesis

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From the Greek point of view, the quadratic form as applied to the herm is not odd. Also not strange or shocking for the Greeks was the ithyphallic shape. For the Olympians this was entirely unfitting, except for Hermes, whom we are trying to understand.

Kerényi contextualizes the herm’s quadratic and ithyphallic form within Greek religious sensibility, arguing that its iconographic anomaly is uniquely appropriate to Hermes alone among the Olympians.

Kerényi, Karl, Hermes Guide of Souls, 1944thesis

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The androgynous first being, who since Theophrastus has been known as hermaphrodites and as such has been ascribed to Hermes and Aphrodite as their son, appears in the Cyprian cult of the goddess as her masculine aspect, Aphroditos.

Kerényi links the herm’s ambiguous gender to the androgynous mythological background of Hermes, tracing the hermaphrodite figure to the primordial unity of Hermes and Aphrodite.

Kerényi, Karl, Hermes Guide of Souls, 1944supporting

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‘Epflij�) -ov [m.] Hermes, son of Zeus and Maia; also ‘herm, head of a herm’

Beekes establishes that the Greek word for Hermes etymologically encompasses both the deity and the physical cult object — the herm or head of a herm — confirming their semantic inseparability.

Beekes, Robert, Etymological Dictionary of Greek, 2010supporting

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Hermes, ph, 64, 65, 211, 221; as phallic god, 25 … herms, 25

Von Franz cross-references herms as the cultic expression of Hermes’ phallic aspect, situating them within her broader account of Hermes-Mercurius in Jung’s symbolic world.

von Franz, Marie-Louise, C.G. Jung: His Myth in Our Time, 1975supporting

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Hermes is no god of generation and fertility, though he may appear to be such because his miraculous power leads also to unions in love and the begetting of children. Always it is uncanny guidance that constitutes the essence of his activity

Otto resists reducing Hermes — and by extension the herm — to a fertility deity, insisting that uncanny guidance and mediation constitute the god’s essential character.

Otto, Walter F., The Homeric Gods: The Spiritual Significance of Greek Religion, 1929supporting

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The primordial mediator and messenger moves between the absolute ‘no’ and the absolute ‘yes,’ or, more correctly, between two ‘no’s’ that are lined up against each other… In this he stands on ground that is no ground, and there he creates the way.

Kerényi articulates the mythological background of the herm as threshold-marker by describing Hermes’ primordial function as mediator between opposing poles — the very liminal quality objectified in the herm’s placement at boundaries.

Kerényi, Karl, Hermes Guide of Souls, 1944supporting

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His further inferences rest upon a misunderstanding of the mythological character of the hermaphrodite.

In a scholarly footnote, Kerényi corrects Bolkestein’s interpretation of the hermaphrodite associated with the herm tradition, insisting on the properly mythological — not sociological — reading of the figure.

Kerényi, Karl, Hermes Guide of Souls, 1944aside

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