The handbag is a symbolic correspondence we can find among depictions of Sumerian Gods, Mesoamerican reliefs, symbolic stones at Gobekli Tepe, India, and beyond. The Handbag symbolism is on one level symbolic for development of civilization through agricultural fostering of natural systems. The Sumerian Gods are said to hold a bag of pollen for pollinating the date palm to enhance its production of food.
For a wonderful exoteric lesson of the Sumerian Bag demonstrated in reliefs of Gods and the similarity to other bags and symbolism the world over do read this extensive overview of the symbolism demonstrated in Sumerian stone work/art see this article: Click Here
As with any symbolism of any depth there is going to be the immediate differentiation of the esoteric and exoteric symbolic aspects and there often is multiple sets of symbolism within the primary differentiation. Here we can see through exploring history that the exoteric aspect of the bag as a symbol of the leadership being related to gods of generation and pollination, and the people are as a beekeeper's bees and a date farmer's dates and trees so as to generate from pollination of idea to fruition.
The esoteric symbolism can be a whole lot more fun, especially when pertaining to the ultimate esotericism; the inner work of self-development. What is this hand bag symbolic for? What is inside? With many such esoteric questions we can find the simplest most likely answer internally, in the self, as the self. The hand bag is you. You are your own king or queen of individuation and it is up to you to develop from pollination to fruition.
What is a Hermeticist? Most essentially, among many other diverse potentialities, Hermetics integrates polarities, masculine and feminine energies, correspondences and unifies ideas. Hermetics, as alchemy, integrates, to develop potential. Hermetics is the art of self-development and individuation, the becoming of the individual through integration on many levels.
A Hermeticist, like Taoist Alchemists, realize that we ourselves must become as if a hermetically sealed consciousness body. We become a hermetically sealed encapsulation of consciousness and then we can develop. If we are not sealed off from the distractions and swaying energies of the trite and worldings we will succumb to those waters. If we are not hermetically sealed we will leak and release energy and not develop much, if at all.
In The East, building one's Chi or vital energy is a process of self-development. Chi literally translates to compressed air. The unsaid prerequisite for development of Chi is to have sealed off yourself as a Hermetic container. No air compression will develop without literally enhancing the hermetically sealed aspects of our mind and body, our physiology and psychology.
"I do not have a chair. I have a bowl." ~Taoist Expression
The idea in the above quote is that one is not furniture, one can do all sorts of things instead of just staying sit like a piece of furniture. And moreover the idea of a bowl is related to our dantien, our physical center that is as if a sealed compressed bowl, like the cupping massage technique that creates pressure or like the hermetically sealed Magdeburg Hemispheres. When we can practice compression we can experience the opposite of inflammation in our physiology and the opposite of depression in our psychology.
A Taoist, a Hermeticist, an Alchemist, a Yogi, a meditator all practice compression of body and mind so as to develop our Chi, our psychology and physiology, or to at least not be dragged down by our very own psychology and physiology. Tai Chi, meditation, Yoga, and numerous other systems can assist you to assist yourself, but you have to assist yourself, you must take the first step to seal yourself off from unneccesary distractions toward compression.
~Excerpt From The Tao of Thoth
