If a pre-Jabir alchemist wanted to make some gold, they needed some gold to act as a “seed” to transmute the base metal. It was actually ibn-Hayyan who introduced the idea that you could transmute lead into gold. This was a radical departure from established alchemical logic. Jabir placed no limits on what the alchemist could theoretically achieve. According to Jabir, if you had a big enough flask, a big enough furnace, and a big enough chunk of time, you could make your own tiny planet earth. You just had to get the ratios right.
The key to this new theory of transmutation was what Jabir called “The Science of Balances.” If you’ve ever tried to correctly season a big pot of soup, you understand the Jabirian balance. If the pot is too spicy, you might need to add cream or acid to cut it. If the pot is too salty, you need more food. A properly seasoned broth is not necessarily about the amount of an ingredient, it’s about the ratios. When all your flavors and textures taste “right” you have achieved Jabirian balance.
To Jabir, all non-gold materials are simply improperly seasoned broth. Tin might have too little elemental air, iron might have too much elemental earth, etc etc. Transmutation was a process of adding what your base substance “lacked.”
Islamicate Alchemy and the Jabirian Corpus, today on Patreon
