I just came to this lesson in the course. It has been beautiful so far and even though I have not listened to some of the videos and podcasts, I am quite familiar with what this lesson teaches. Except Agatho Daimon.
My thoughts on this were that Poimandres is Agatho Daimon, I can understand that Poimandres is the Nous, but in his form (in some texts they translate it as a great serpent) i.e. the symbol is Agatho Daimon.
Then there is the question of the succession of knowledge. For historically many years and generations may have passed, only 3 men were recognized.... Here my ideas derive more to the succession of acosmic, cosmic and formal functions, and as we are composed of three "states" of the consciousness, perhaps these three are state of the consciousness of the Artisan.
Let me explain, what I have seen empirically is that (and so says the Kore Kosmou) Hermes is the creator of the Soul of Humanity, not only of the Soul but of all the Gnosis that is contained in its unfolding, and in turn is a being who is Trismegistus, who has mastery in the three worlds, who carries the triple crown.....
So for me hermes in the ibis is the living form of Thoth in the baboon who is the intelligence of the heart to bring here the serpent stream, the knowledge of the Sun, P-eimen-Re.
That is to say, they are 3 aspects of the same function, and that in the end is the very creative function of the human being, his heart and the intelligence of the heart.
These are all things that have emerged from the Lectio Divina of my reading and my own understanding and relationship with the symbols that are drawn in the Corpus.
Concretely, could Poimandres be Agatho Daimon?
Poimandres and Nous can be considered the same "entity", but then why use two different names? Why does Hermes sometimes use the name "Poimandres" and at other times "Nous"?
My theory is that Nous calls itself Poimandres when it engages with a person directly, when it needs to be something that can be interacted with.
Since Poimandres’ teachings relate to the divine discourse/Logos. So, when Nous needs to act as the divine Logos/messenger, he "personifies" itself as Poimandres. Poimandres is thus a sort of a personified Nous that can come to one in a visionary state (through the mind or lesser nous).
When Nous needs to engage with the visionary in CH I, Nous calls himself Poimandres, Hermes in CH XIII calls him Poimandres and not Nous when he taught Hermes, and Zosimos urges Theosebeia to call upon Poimandres and not Nous (or Agathos Daimon)for guidance.
The only parallel I can think of is the mysterious figure of Khidr in Sufism, who might be a deified human that has become the hypostatization of initiation or the Way.
As you can figure out, I think Agathos Daimon is something else, something different, as it is not named like Nous/Poimandres nor associated with these two names. I think Agathos Daimon is the real teacher of Hermes Trismegistus, one he went to on a regular basis to receive instructions, not one that only appeared to him in visions. Maybe Agathos Daimon was the father of Hermes, as he is never mentioned elsewhere. Thoth, the grandfather of Hermes is mentioned in the Asclepius, but not his father.
And I am willing to go even further, namely that it was Agathos Daimon who received the vision from Poimandres in CH I. See:
https://wayofhermes.com/hermeticism/who-is-agathos-daimon-the-teacher-of-hermes/
https://wayofhermes.com/alchemy/the-lost-book-on-alchemy-by-agathodaimon-the-teacher-of-hermes/
Now, I know this is a very controversial take as most experts see Nous/Poimandres/Agathodaimon as the same being because they all taught Hermes, but it is clear that the Hermetic texts use different names and probably did so intentionally.
I had teachers and they were not all the same person. 😀 So, thinking they are the same because they all teach seems to me a weak reason to do this, but it is the current theory.
Thank you for the clarification, I just reread the notes on CH X.23 by Brian, with your response and now I can locate this character in the stories (couldn't do it before, for some reason)
About why I tend to put them all under the same idea and don't separate the characters, I am not a schoolar so the historical facts are not of importance to me. I see every thing that is written in CH as a function and functions are wider than characters, as characters incarnate parts of functions. This might be an irresponsible análisis of texts but as I am not studying this to write an academic work or even to understand them in a ritualistic doctrine (where I would need to differentiate their powers).
When I say they are the same I mean in functional manners Poimandres, Agathos Damion and Hermes, the three of them represents (form me) the ability to learn, integrate and teach (a trismegistus power) although in a different state of counciousnes the one who already knows, the one that listens, the one that teach to so called "others".
Like Ra in the Egyptian mitología that has different appearances with different states of understanding even appearing as Khonsu the son of Ammon.
So I see the characters on Hermética as the following functions:
The teacher (who needs to realize all) as Hermes- agathodaimon - Poimandres. Poimandres being the higher self of Hermes.
The Student - Son Tat, the one who learns and writtes about it.
The scientist - profesional who applies the knowledge to practical applications and technologies Asclepius (always misinterpreting the teachings and being daring about the rites)
And the king, the one that reflects the knowledge given in his environment. That being Ammon that hears, but almost never speaks but has voice on the actions and inventions of Hermes.
Each of this Funtions are part of our integrity of actions-though-emotions and helped me to understand how I do things in daily basis.
This is almost the same as the Homework you asked on this lesson. To see this archetypes on our life.
By no ways diminishing the historical approaches and understanding of the geanologies. I might be scratching the interpretations of a new age spiritual researcher, thank God the Corpus doesn't limit his access to any structure of the human understanding.