A Hymn to Hermēs Sōtēr

I know I don’t speak a lot much nowadays about my devotional work with Hermēs, or at least as much as I used to. Admittedly, my focus and practices have shifted over the years, and as an arrangement I entered into willingly on both my terms and the terms of the god, my devotional work with the Son of Zeus and Maia waxes and wanes over time. But, through it all, despite it all, and even because of it all, Hermēs has never left me, and I have never left him. Even with my house more full of more gods than I would ever have anticipated, I still maintain my own practice and service to the god, and lately I’ve been spending more time getting back in touch with him since the last Mercury retrograde period ended. It’s…well, not gonna lie, it’s pretty nice to do this again, and to remind myself why I got his emblem emblazoned on my flesh all those years ago.

Lately, between a renewed sense of his presence and a concern for the world, I was moved to write a simple hymn for the god. It’s nothing special, but it’s something I wanted to share and spread, a hymn to Hermēs Sōtēr (the Savior). Although he’s not usually considered among the usual savior-type gods, I feel like there’s something to be said for the blessings of swiftness, slyness, and quick motion (in the sense of both speed and life) that we could call on from the god in our time of need. So, in this day of Jupiter and in this hour of Mercury, I dedicate these words to the god of my heart who accompanies on my ways. May these words ring out in the air around me and throughout the entire world as a small token of my honor to the god, that all people of all cultures and all habits and all tongues may come to honor, sing, praise, and exalt the god who guides all men, spirits, souls, heroes, and gods!

Hail, Hermēs, o bright and swift savior through the paths of all the worlds!
O you who loves to be a close friend to mankind,
o you who cuts to the heart, knowing all that is within,
o you who stands keen watch at every cross and every fork,
o you who cannot be denied by any god or any man!

Son of Maia and scion of Atlas who knows the secrets of all the stars,
messenger of Zeus and all the gods who delivers words hither and thither!
Giving to all minds the wit to discern the gods and all their many works,
giving to all hands the skill to join in the very work of the very gods,
great are you who established the heavenly rites of offering and worship!

Ram-bearer, wand-bearer, leader of robbers and thieves!
You care for the well-being of all flocks of all kinds, kind Hermēs!
You lead them away amid motley heart-broken cries, sly Hermēs!
You defend them from those who would devour them, fierce Hermēs!
Driver of herds, shepherd of the living, o guide of all the dead!

Be kind to us, lord of the world, for all our travels and travails in it!
Lead us to the right place at the right time in the right way on the right day;
keep our hands as clean as they can, yet no dirtier than we need them to be.
By your guidance, keep us safe on our roads from all the awful nosoi;
by your wiles, o Hermēs, lead them afar by a different road entirely!

Be gracious, lord of the world, who collect the goods of gods and men!
Lead us all to sweet safety, to calm harbors, to a place to call our own,
to a shelter unafflicted by blight or the waste of terrible, hateful decay!
Let your lyre soothe the raging hearts of the bright children of Mother Lētō;
stay their fatal arrows, o lord, but when let fly, take us out from their flight!

Come, lord savior Hermēs, and hear this my heartfelt prayer;
be kind and be propitious to all those who seek your care.

Most people who are familiar with the god will understand most of the references, but I admit the one to the nosoi is probably a weird one. These were a class of daimones in ancient Greek belief, the spirits of plague and sickness; for the Romans, these would be considered the Morbi, like Morbus (Disease), Pestis and Lues (Pestilence), Macies (Wasting), and Tabes (Corruption). In Homeric literature, plague and disease was typically seen as being the arrows sent forth in wrath from the bows of Apollōn and Artemis, the two children of Lētō, but I also felt that the nosoi are a useful thing to ward against on their own right. After all, there are two approaches to health, sanitization and inoculation, and in the absence of one, we must resort to the other; in the absence of vaccines or other defenses against the attacks of heavenly arrows or hellish claws, we must evade them entirely, and who better among the theoi to help lead us on the route to escape than Hermēs himself? Who else but Hermēs to help us, the one among all the gods closest to the cries of all humanity, most familiar of all tongues, who guides us both in our world and in the next? After all, although there aren’t all that many connections between Hermēs and plague, as Kriophoros (“Ram-bearer”), Hermēs is one who has helped before to save people from pestilence and plague, and with later connections of Kriophoros and Christ, lends a definite savior link to the noble son of Zeus and Maia.