Isis Unveiled, Volume 1 — H
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Brill's Companion to Aphrodite / Edited by Amy C
Brill’s Companion to Aphrodite Edited by Amy C. Smith and Sadie Pickup LEIDEN • BOSTON 2010 On the cover:AnAtticblack-!gure amphora, featuring Aphrodite and Poseidon, ca. 520"#. London, British Museum B254. Drawing a$er Lenormant, de Witte, Élite des monuments céramographiques. Matériaux pour l’histoire des religions et des moeurs de l’antiquité (Paris, 1844–1861), 3, pl. 15. %is book is printed on acid-free paper. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Brill's companion to aphrodite / edited by Amy C. Smith & Sadie Pickup. p. cm. Emerged from a conference at the University of Reading, May 8-10, 2008. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-90-04-18003-1 (hardback : alk. paper) 1. Aphrodite (Greek deity)–Congresses. I. Smith, Amy Claire, 1966- II. Title. BL820.V5B74 2010 292.2'114–dc22 2009052569 ISSN 1872-3357 ISBN 978 9004 18003 1 Copyright 2010 by Koninklijke Brill NV,Leiden, %eNetherlands. Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Hotei Publishing, IDC Publishers, Martinus Nijho& Publishers and VSP. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in aretrievalsystem,ortransmittedinanyformorbyanymeans,electronic,mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Brill has made all reasonable e&orts to trace all right holders to any copyrighted material used in this work. In cases where these e&orts have not been successful the publisher welcomes communications from copyright holders, so that the appropriate acknowledgements can be made in future editions, and to settle other permission matters. Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use is granted by Koninklijke Brill NV provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to %eCopyrightClearanceCenter, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910, Danvers, MA 01923, USA. -
Resounding Mysteries: Sound and Silence in the Eleusinian Soundscape
Body bar (print) issn 2057–5823 and bar (online) issn 2057–5831 Religion Article Resounding mysteries: sound and silence in the Eleusinian soundscape Georgia Petridou Abstract The term ‘soundscape’, as coined by the Canadian composer R. Murray Schafer at the end of the 1960s, refers to the part of the acoustic environment that is per- ceivable by humans. This study attempts to reconstruct roughly the Eleusinian ‘soundscape’ (the words and the sounds made and heard, and those others who remained unheard) as participants in the Great Mysteries of the two Goddesses may have perceived it in the Classical and post-Classical periods. Unlike other mystery cults (e.g. the Cult of Cybele and Attis) whose soundscapes have been meticulously investigated, the soundscape of Eleusis has received relatively little attention, since the visual aspect of the Megala Mysteria of Demeter and Kore has for decades monopolised the scholarly attention. This study aims at putting things right on this front, and simultaneously look closely at the relational dynamic of the acoustic segment of Eleusis as it can be surmised from the work of well-known orators and philosophers of the first and second centuries ce. Keywords: Demeter; Eleusis; Kore; mysteries; silence; sound; soundscape Affiliation University of Liverpool, UK. email: [email protected] bar vol 2.1 2018 68–87 doi: https://doi.org/10.1558/bar.36485 ©2018, equinox publishing RESOUNDING MYSTERIES: SOUND AND SILENCE IN THE ELEUSINIAN SOUNDSCAPE 69 Sound, like breath, is experienced as a movement of coming and going, inspiration and expiration. If that is so, then we should say of the body, as it sings, hums, whistles or speaks, that it is ensounded. -
Celtic Egyptians: Isis Priests of the Lineage of Scota
Celtic Egyptians: Isis Priests of the Lineage of Scota Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers – the primary creative genius behind the famous British occult group, the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn – and his wife Moina Mathers established a mystery religion of Isis in fin-de-siècle Paris. Lawrence Durdin-Robertson, his wife Pamela, and his sister Olivia created the Fellowship of Isis in Ireland in the early 1970s. Although separated by over half a century, and not directly associated with each other, both groups have several characteristics in common. Each combined their worship of an ancient Egyptian goddess with an interest in the Celtic Revival; both claimed that their priestly lineages derived directly from the Egyptian queen Scota, mythical foundress of Ireland and Scotland; and both groups used dramatic ritual and theatrical events as avenues for the promulgation of their Isis cults. The Parisian Isis movement and the Fellowship of Isis were (and are) historically-inaccurate syncretic constructions that utilised the tradition of an Egyptian origin of the peoples of Scotland and Ireland to legitimise their founders’ claims of lineal descent from an ancient Egyptian priesthood. To explore this contention, this chapter begins with brief overviews of Isis in antiquity, her later appeal for Enlightenment Freemasons, and her subsequent adoption by the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. It then explores the Parisian cult of Isis, its relationship to the Celtic Revival, the myth of the Egyptian queen Scota, and examines the establishment of the Fellowship of Isis. The Parisian mysteries of Isis and the Fellowship of Isis have largely been overlooked by critical scholarship to date; the use of the medieval myth of Scota by the founders of these groups has hitherto been left unexplored. -
Music and Ritual in Primitive Eleusis
APOSTOLUS Ν. ATHANASSAKIS University of California at Santa Barbara MUSIC AND RITUAL IN PRIMITIVE ELEUSIS To Benjamin Schwartz, my teacher, on his seventieth birthday. The story of Persephone's rape and of Demeter* s arrival in Eleusis is told primarily in the Homeric Hymn to Demeter. Interestingly enough, once Demeter finds herself inside the palace of Keleos, it is not Metaneira, the queen, but wise old Iambê who knows how to entertain her ( 184—211). Demeter turns down the queen's throne for a humbler seat covered with a sheepskin offered by Iambê. It is Iambê's jests (χλεΰαι) which restore smile and laughter to the grief- stricken guest ( 200—204). Demeter also turns down the customary wine offered by the queen and bids her make a κυκεών, a mixed drink consisting of barley groats (άλφι), water (ΰδωρ), and pennyroyal (γλήχων). The version given in the Orphicorum Fragmenta (Kern 46—53) is rather different.The most articulate ac count is the one given by Clement of Alexandria in Protr. II 20,1—21,2 (Kern 52). According to this account when Demeter reached Eleusis the most important local ruler was Dysaules, and his wife's name was Baubô. The lesser kings or barons were Triptolemos, the cowherd, Eumolpos the shepherd, and Euboulos, the swineherd. Baubô offered Demeter the kykeôn, but the goddess demurred because she was in mourning. Then Baubô resorted to an unusual means of persuasion : ώς ειπούσα πέπλους άνεσύρετο δείξε δε πάντα σώματος ουδέ πρέποντα τύπον παις δ' ήεν "Ιακχος χειρί τέ μιν ρίπτασκε γελών Βαυβοΰς ύπο κόλποις· ή δ' έπεί οδν μείδησε θεά, μείδησ' ένΐ θυμω δέξατο δ* αίόλον άγγος, εν φ κυκεών ενέκειτο. -
(Title of the Thesis)*
Dionysian Semiotics: Myco-Dendrolatry and Other Shamanic Motifs in the Myths and Rituals of the Phrygian Mother by Daniel Attrell A thesis presented to the University of Waterloo in fulfillment of the thesis requirement for the degree of Master of Arts in Ancient Mediterranean Cultures Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, 2013 © Daniel Attrell 2013 Author’s Declaration I hereby declare that I am the sole author of this thesis. This is a true copy of the thesis, including any required final revisions, as accepted by my examiners. I understand that my thesis may be made electronically available to the public. ii Abstract The administration of initiation rites by an ecstatic specialist, now known to western scholarship by the general designation of ‗shaman‘, has proven to be one of humanity‘s oldest, most widespread, and continuous magico-religious traditions. At the heart of their initiatory rituals lay an ordeal – a metaphysical journey - almost ubiquitously brought on by the effects of a life-changing hallucinogenic drug experience. To guide their initiates, these shaman worked with a repertoire of locally acquired instruments, costumes, dances, and ecstasy-inducing substances. Among past Mediterranean cultures, Semitic and Indo-European, these sorts of initiation rites were vital to society‘s spiritual well-being. It was, however, the mystery schools of antiquity – organizations founded upon conserving the secrets of plant-lore, astrology, theurgy and mystical philosophy – which satisfied the role of the shaman in Greco-Roman society. The rites they delivered to the common individual were a form of ritualized ecstasy and they provided an orderly context for religiously-oriented intoxication. -
Egypt Was the Image of Heaven on Earth and Temple of the Whole World
Egypt was the image of heaven on earth and temple of the whole world Egypt was the image of heaven on earth and temple of the whole world v. 16.13, www.philaletheians.co.uk, 13 March 2019 Page 1 of 77 EGYPT WAS THE IMAGE OF HEAVEN ON EARTH ABSTRACT AND TRAIN OF THOUGHTS Abstract and train of thoughts 1 Ancient India and Egypt were the oldest group of nations Egypt sent no agents throughout the world to learn what others knew; but to her the wise men of neighbouring nations resorted for knowledge. 6 The Egyptian Pyramids antedate the upheaval of the Sahara and other deserts. 10 Ancient Greece owes everything to Egypt There is no comparison between the Egypt of old, with its perfection of art, science, and religion, its glorious cities and monuments, its swarming population, and the Egypt of today — peopled with strangers. 13 History got its first glimpse of the ancients when the arts were already fast degenerating among them. 16 The further back we go in history, the better and finer become these arts. 16 Ancient knowledge of thunder, lightning, and electricity antedates modern “discoveries.” 18 The Egyptian art of writing was perfect and complete from the very first. It was used as early as the days of Menes, the protomonarch. 21 Before Greece came into existence, the arts, with the Egyptians, were already ripe and old. 23 The Greeks learned all they knew, including the sacred services of the temple, from the Egyptians and, because of that, their principal temples were consecrated to Egyptian divinities. -
Hadot the VEIL of ISIS Excerpts Of.Pdf
PIERRE HADOT THE VEIL OF ISIS An Essay on the History of the Idea of Nature Translated by Michael Chase THE BELKNAP PRESS OF HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS Cambridge, Massachusetts London, England 2006 Contents Preface Vll Prologue at Ephesus: An Enigmatic Saying i Copyright © 2006 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College All rights reserved PART i • The Veil of Death Printed in the United States of America 1. Heraclitus' Aphorism: "What Is Born Tends to Disappear" This book was originally published as Le Voile d'Isis: Essai sur I'histoire de PART II • The Veil of Nature I'idee de Nature, by Editions Gallimard, copyright © 2004 by Editions Gallimard, Paris 2. From Phusis to Nature 17 3. Secrets of the Gods and Secrets of Nature 29 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data PART HI • "Nature Loves to Hide" Hadot, Pierre. [Voile d'Isis. English] 4. Heraclitus' Aphorism and Allegorical Exegesis 39 The Veil of Isis: an essay on the history of the idea of nature / 5. "Nature Loves to Wrap Herself Up": Mythical Forms Pierre Hadot; translated by Michael Chase. and Corporeal Forms 50 p. cm. 6. Calypso, or "Imagination with the Flowing Veil" 58 Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN-IS: 978-0-674-02316-1 7. The Genius of Paganism 67 ISBN-IO: 0-674-02316-1 :t 8. The "Gods of Greece": Pagan Myths in a Christian World 76 i. Philosophy of nature. I. Title. PART iv • Unveiling Nature's Secrets BD581.H2813 2006 113.09-—dc22 2006044554 I, 9. Prometheus and Orpheus 91 PART v · The Promethean Attitude Unveiling Secrets through Technology 10. -
Unveiling the Goddess Artemis of Ephesus As a Symbol of Nature at the Turn of the Nineteenth Century
Unveiling the Goddess Artemis of Ephesus as a symbol of nature at the turn of the nineteenth century Frederika Tevebring In 1807 Alexander von Humboldt published his Ideen zu einer Geographie der Pflanzen nebst ein Naturgemälde der Tropenlander, a translation from French of one of the volumes written as a result of his five-year expedition to Latin America. The German translation includes a frontispiece by Humboldt’s friend, the Danish artist Bertel Thorvaldsen. The image shows a statue of Artemis of Ephesus being unveiled by Apollo.1 At the base of the statue lies a tablet with the inscription Metamorphose der Pflanzen, a reference to Humboldt’s much-esteemed friend Goethe to whom the fron- tispiece is dedicated. In a letter to Goethe Humboldt expresses his enthu- siasm for the image and how he looks forward to presenting the book to his friend. “After so many years of absence I did not want appear before you in any other way but through this small tribute, which is a testimo- nial of my deep reverence and profound gratefulness towards you,” and “my friend Thorvaldsen in Rome has come up with this vignette for me. It refers to the synthesis of Poetry, Philosophy and Natural sciences brought together in your person.”2 Thorvaldsen’s picture was not the first of its kind; the unveiling of the ancient goddess had been a reoccurring pictorial trope in discourses on the pursuit of philosophical and scientific knowledge since the seventeenth century, when it also became increasingly popular on frontispieces to scientific treatises. Goethe himself had made use of similar images on several occasions. -
THE VEIL of ISIS by Jeni Bethell
THE VEIL OF ISIS by Jeni Bethell In the Major Arcana of the Tarot, The High Priestess is said to represent the receptacle of which the Magician, the seed, has need. It is through this union between the feminine, passive, unconscious High Priestess and the Magician’s masculine, activating self-consciousness, that the animating principle of the Magician can be activated by the Empress. One of the roles of mythology is to present to us concepts, sometimes quite complex, which, when personalised in story, can be more readily digested and comprehended. The great Egyptian goddess, Isis, was worshipped far and wide for over 3000 years as Magician, as devoted wife and mother (Empress) and also as High Priestess, guardian of the veil. In presenting a little of the mythology surrounding Isis, I hope to demonstrate, by analogy, the profound role the High Priestess energy plays in linking the energies of Magician and Empress, and also to shed a little light on the great spiritual wisdom She, the High Priestess, offers. The Journeys of Isis Perhaps the most famous myths surrounding Isis concern her journeys in search of her beloved brother and husband, Osiris. Their evil brother, Seth, had tricked Osiris into lying in a sarco phagus that was then nailed down and set afloat on the Nile. It ultimately landed in Byblos, was enwrapped by a tamarisk tree which was cut down by the king to form a pillar for the roof of his palace. Having eventually located Osiris and brought him back to Egypt, Isis, adopting the wings of a kite, breathed life ba ck into Osiris's body. -
The Veil of Isis: an Essay on the History of the Idea of Nature
Essays Philos (2011) 12:363-371 1526-0569 | commons.pacificu.edu/eip Book Review | The Veil of Isis: An Essay on the History of the Idea of Nature Peter H. Denton Published online: 11 July 2011 © Peter H. Denton 2011 The Veil of Isis: An Essay on the History of the Idea of Nature. Pierre Hadot; Trans. Michael Chase; Cambridge, MA.: Belknap/Harvard University Press, 2008; 399 + xii pages. $20.00 paperback; 978-067403049-7 An author’s last publication tempts its reviewer to think more in terms of eulogy than assessment, because it is as much a personal legacy as a contribution to scholarship. In his last book, published in French nearly six years before he died, Pierre Hadot (d. April 24, 2010) succeeds at both. The Veil of Isis: An Essay on the History of the Idea of Nature needs to be read at least twice. The first time, the reader can appreciate the magisterial sweep of his topic from the first record of Heraclitus’s cryptic expression through to more contemporary philosophical incarnations of the idea that “Nature loves to hide.” The second time, the reader can work from the philosophical impetus Hadot found in the work of Nietzsche and Heidegger, in particular, back through the ages to find either the genealogy of the idea or similar expressions of it in other times and places. Hadot’s book is superbly balanced between the twin hazards of caricature and retrojection. Anyone who attempts a magisterial sweep through history risks caricaturing elements to fit them into the pattern, but Hadot instead deftly captures the essential characteristics of what he includes. -
The Local Divisions of Attica
f\1e.7)u-tl ~-tS )~ ,\A l'i~~ The Local DiYieions of Attiea Before the t~e of Solon, Attica was organized by trittyes and phratries. The phratries were groups of famil ies related by blood, ·e.nd were divided, in turn, into ~~v,., , smaller associations united in loyalty to a mythical ancestor. Although from the inscriptions~ioh record the decrees of various Y I. vn , we knOlJ that by the time of Cleisthenes their me.mbers were scattered over various dames, it is probable that in the earlier period the y c v~ were connected with a defi.nite locality.1 The trittyes may have been divisi.ons of the Athenian people on the basis of locality but the evidence does not . 2 make this clear. The Eupatridae, who were pro_bably, as WS.de-Gery suggested, the descendants of these men who. formed the first c ouncil. of the Athenian state at the time of the synoecism of the twelve Attic towns, controlled the government in the pre-Solonean period.3 - 4 They .elected the flvA o a.~- e-. ;~. s from their own number, and chose the 5 nine archons. We can see, therefore, that political power in the pre-Solonean period Tms in the hands of groups of families in specific districts. The evidence that we have on the Attic y~v~ who looked after the cults on the acropolis and at Eleusi.s throws some light on the important place that the y l v~ had in Attic religion at this time. The Eteobou tadae, for instance, cared for the cult of Poseidon Erechtheus on the acropolis. -
Demonic History: from Goethe to the Present
Demonic History Demonic History From Goethe to the Present Kirk Wetters northwestern university press evanston, illinois Northwestern University Press www.nupress.northwestern.edu Copyright © 2014 by Northwestern University Press. Published 2014. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Wetters, Kirk, author. Demonic history : from Goethe to the present / Kirk Wetters. pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-8101-2976-4 (cloth : alk. paper) 1. Demonology in literature. 2. German literature—19th century—History and criticism. 3. German literature—20th century—History and criticism. 4. Devil in literature. I. Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von, 1749–1832. Urworte orphisch. II. Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von, 1749–1832. Urworte orphisch. English. III. Title. [DNLM: 1. Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von, 1749–1832— Criticism and interpretation.] PT134.D456W48 2014 830.937—dc23 2014012468 Except where otherwise noted, this book is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/. In all cases attribution should include the following information: Wetters, Kirk. Demonic History: From Goethe to the Present. Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 2015. For permissions beyond the scope of this license, visit http://www.nupress .northwestern.edu/. An electronic version of this book is freely available, thanks to the support of libraries working with Knowledge Unlatched. KU is a collaborative initiative designed to make high-quality books open access for the public good. More information about the initiative and links to the open-access version can be found at www.knowledgeunlatched.org.