At death the mind sheds its garments, takes a body of fire, and roams — the soul left to judgment
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Hermes — τὸ δὲ αὐτὸ συμβαίνει καὶ τοῖς τοῦ σώματος ἐξιοῦσιν. ἀναδραμοῦσα γὰρ ἡ ψυχὴ εἰς ἑαυτήν, συστέλλεται τὸ πνεῦμα εἰς τὸ αἷμα, ἡ δὲ ψυχὴ εἰς τὸ πνεῦμα, ὁ δὲ νοῦς καθαρὸς γενόμενος τῶν ἐνδυμάτων, θεῖος ὢν φύσει, σώματος πυρίνου λαβόμενος περιπολεῖ πάντα τόπον, καταλιπὼν τὴν ψυχὴν κρίσει καὶ τῇ κατ' ἀξίαν δίκῃ.
Tat — Πῶς τοῦτο λέγεις, ὦ πάτερ; ὁ νοῦς τῆς ψυχῆς χωρίζεται καὶ ἡ ψυχὴ τοῦ πνεύματος, σοῦ εἰπόντος ἔνδυμα εἶναι τοῦ μὲν νοῦ τὴν ψυχήν, τῆς δὲ ψυχῆς τὸ πνεῦμα;
And the same happens also to those departing the body. For the soul, having run back into itself, the breath contracts into the blood and the soul into the breath; and the mind, become pure of its garments and divine by nature, taking a body of fire, roams every place, leaving behind the soul to judgment and the penalty according to its desert. — How do you mean this, O father — the mind is separated from the soul, and the soul from the breath — when you have said the soul to be a garment of the mind, and of the soul the breath?
The same happens to those departing the body. The soul, having run back into itself, the breath contracts into the blood and the soul into the breath; but the mind, become pure of its garments and divine by nature, takes a body of fire and roams every place, leaving the soul to judgment and the penalty according to its desert. Tat: how do you mean this, father — the mind is separated from the soul, and the soul from the breath, when you said the soul is a garment of the mind, and the breath a garment of the soul?
Death, seen from the top of the chain. The physiology of §13 now runs in reverse and upward: 'the soul, having run back into itself (ἀναδραμοῦσα… εἰς ἑαυτήν),' the breath 'contracts into the blood (συστέλλεται… εἰς τὸ αἷμα),' the soul into the breath — each vehicle folding into the next. And at the summit the release: 'the mind, become pure of its garments (καθαρὸς γενόμενος τῶν ἐνδυμάτων) and divine by nature, taking a body of fire (σώματος πυρίνου λαβόμενος), roams every place (περιπολεῖ πάντα τόπον).' The image is exhilarating and strange — the mind at death does not merely survive but is freed into a fiery vehicle and ranges the cosmos, a self stripped of its coverings and set loose.
But it 'leaves behind the soul to judgment and the penalty according to its desert (κρίσει καὶ τῇ κατ' ἀξίαν δίκῃ).' The mind ascends; the soul is weighed. This is the Hermetic reckoning — deserved (κατ' ἀξίαν), not arbitrary — and it sits at the fault-line of the treatise's anthropology: what rises is νοῦς, what is judged is ψυχή. Tat immediately catches the tension, and his objection is precise: how can mind be 'separated (χωρίζεται)' from soul, and soul from breath, when Hermes has just called them nested garments (ἐνδύματα)? If they are clothing, how do they come apart? The question is the door to the next section's answer — that the garments are assembled only in the earthy body, and death is precisely the unclothing. Tat, for once, is not slow; he has heard the seam in the doctrine and pulls at it.
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