Then Apply the Ancient African IFA Oracle (And Its Subset the I Ching) to Describe History, Including the Future History of Global Finance
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DIVINATION SYSTEMS Written by Nicole Yalsovac Additional Sections Contributed by Sean Michael Smith and Christine Breese, D.D
DIVINATION SYSTEMS Written by Nicole Yalsovac Additional sections contributed by Sean Michael Smith and Christine Breese, D.D. Ph.D. Introduction Nichole Yalsovac Prophetic revelation, or Divination, dates back to the earliest known times of human existence. The oldest of all Chinese texts, the I Ching, is a divination system older than recorded history. James Legge says in his translation of I Ching: Book Of Changes (1996), “The desire to seek answers and to predict the future is as old as civilization itself.” Mankind has always had a desire to know what the future holds. Evidence shows that methods of divination, also known as fortune telling, were used by the ancient Egyptians, Chinese, Babylonians and the Sumerians (who resided in what is now Iraq) as early as six‐thousand years ago. Divination was originally a device of royalty and has often been an essential part of religion and medicine. Significant leaders and royalty often employed priests, doctors, soothsayers and astrologers as advisers and consultants on what the future held. Every civilization has held a belief in at least some type of divination. The point of divination in the ancient world was to ascertain the will of the gods. In fact, divination is so called because it is assumed to be a gift of the divine, a gift from the gods. This gift of obtaining knowledge of the unknown uses a wide range of tools and an enormous variety of techniques, as we will see in this course. No matter which method is used, the most imperative aspect is the interpretation and presentation of what is seen. -
The Adorabyssal Oracle
THE ADORABYSSAL ORACLE The Adorabyssal Oracle is an oracle deck featuring the cutest versions of mythological, supernatural, and cryptozoological creatures from around the world! Thirty-six spooky cuties come with associated elements and themes to help bring some introspection to your day-to-day divinations and meditations. If you’re looking for something a bit more playful, The Adorabyssal Oracle deck doubles as a card game featuring those same cute and spooky creatures. It is meant for 2-4 players and games typically take 5-10 minutes. If you’re interested mainly in the card game rules, you can skip past the next couple of sections. However you choose to use your Adorabyssal Deck, it is my hope that these darkly delightful creatures will bring some fun to your day! WHAT IS AN ORACLE DECK? An Oracle deck is similar to, but different from, a Tarot deck. Where a Tarot deck has specific symbolism, number of cards, and a distinct way of interpreting card meanings, Oracle decks are a bit more free-form and their structures are dependent on their creators. The Adorabyssal Oracle, like many oracle decks, provides general themes accompanying the artwork. The basic and most prominent structure for this deck is the grouping of cards based on elemental associations. My hope is that this deck can provide a simple way to read for new readers and grow in complexity from there. My previous Tarot decks have seen very specific interpretation and symbolism. This Oracle deck opens things up a bit. It can be used for more general or free-form readings, and it makes a delightful addition to your existing decks. -
African Concepts of Energy and Their Manifestations Through Art
AFRICAN CONCEPTS OF ENERGY AND THEIR MANIFESTATIONS THROUGH ART A thesis submitted to the College of the Arts of Kent State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts by Renée B. Waite August, 2016 Thesis written by Renée B. Waite B.A., Ohio University, 2012 M.A., Kent State University, 2016 Approved by ____________________________________________________ Fred Smith, Ph.D., Advisor ____________________________________________________ Michael Loderstedt, M.F.A., Interim Director, School of Art ____________________________________________________ John R. Crawford-Spinelli, D.Ed., Dean, College of the Arts TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF FIGURES………………………………………….. iv ACKNOWLEDGMENTS …………………………………… vi CHAPTERS I. Introduction ………………………………………………… 1 II. Terms and Art ……………………………………………... 4 III. Myths of Origin …………………………………………. 11 IV. Social Structure …………………………………………. 20 V. Divination Arts …………………………………………... 30 VI. Women as Vessels of Energy …………………………… 42 VII. Conclusion ……………………………………….…...... 56 VIII. Images ………………………………………………… 60 IX. Bibliography …………………………………………….. 84 X. Further Reading ………………………………………….. 86 iii LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1: Porogun Quarter, Ijebu-Ode, Nigeria, 1992, Photograph by John Pemberton III http://africa.si.edu/exhibits/cosmos/models.html. ……………………………………… 60 Figure 2: Yoruba Ifa Divination Tapper (Iroke Ifa) Nigeria; Ivory. 12in, Baltimore Museum of Art http://www.artbma.org/. ……………………………………………… 61 Figure 3.; Yoruba Opon Ifa (Divination Tray), Nigerian; carved wood 3/4 x 12 7/8 x 16 in. Smith College Museum of Art, http://www.smith.edu/artmuseum/. ………………….. 62 Figure 4. Ifa Divination Vessel; Female Caryatid (Agere Ifa); Ivory, wood or coconut shell inlay. Nigeria, Guinea Coast The Metropolitan Museum of Art, http://www.metmuseum.org. ……………………… 63 Figure 5. Beaded Crown of a Yoruba King. Nigerian; L.15 (crown), L.15 (fringe) in. -
D I V I N a T I O N Culture a N D the H a N D L I N G of The
Originalveröffentlichung in: G. Leick (Hrsg), The Babylonian World, New York/London, 2007, S. 361-372 CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE DIVINATION CULTURE AND THE HANDLING OF THE FUTURE Stefan M. Maul n omen is a clearly defined perception understood as a sign pointing to future A events whenever it manifests itself under identical circumstances. The classification of a perception as ominous is based on an epistemological development which establishes a normative relationship between the perceived and the future. This classification process is preceded by a period of detailed examination and is thus initially built on empirical knowledge. Omina only cease to be detected empirically when a firm conceptual link has been established between the observed and the future which then allows omina to be construed by the application of regularities. In the Mesopotamian written sources from the first and second millennia BC, omina based on regularities far exceed those based on empirical data. Mesopotamian scholars generally collected data without formally expressing the fundamental principles behind their method. It was the composition of non-empirical omina as such which allowed students to detect the regularities on which they were based without this formulated orally or in writing. Modern attempts at a systematic investigation of such principles however, are still outstanding. It is interesting that there is no Sumerian or Akkadian equivalent for the terms 'oracle' or 'omen'. Assyriologists use the term omen for the sentence construction 'if x then y' which consists of a main clause beginning with summa ('if') describing the ominous occurence, and a second clause which spells out the predicted outcome. -
The Evolution of Variability in Magic, Divination and Religion
THE EVOLUTION OF VARIABILITY IN MAGIC, DIVINATION AND RELIGION: A MULTI-LEVEL SELECTION ANALYSIS A Dissertation by CATHARINA LAPORTE Submitted to the Office of Graduate and Professional Studies of Texas A&M University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Chair of Committee, Michael S. Alvard Committee Members, Jeffrey Winking D. Bruce Dickson Jane Sell Head of Department, Cynthia A. Werner December 2013 Major Subject: Anthropology Copyright 2013 Catharina Laporte ABSTRACT Religious behavior varies greatly both with-in cultures and cross-culturally. Throughout history, scientific scholars of religion have debated the definition, function, or lack of function for religious behavior. The question remains: why doesn’t one set of beliefs suit everybody and every culture? Using mixed methods, the theoretical logic of Multi-Level Selection hypothesis (MLS) which has foundations in neo-evolutionary theory, and data collected during nearly two years of field work in Macaé Brazil, this study asserts that religious variability exists because of the historic and dynamic relationship between the individual, the family, the (religious) group and other groups. By re-representing a nuanced version of Elman Service’s sociopolitical typologies together with theorized categories of religion proposed by J.G. Frazer, Anthony C. Wallace and Max Weber, in a multi-level nested hierarchy, I argue that variability in religious behavior sustains because it provides adaptive advantages and solutions to group living on multiple levels. These adaptive strategies may be more important or less important depending on the time, place, individual or group. MLS potentially serves to unify the various functional theories of religion and can be used to analyze why some religions, at different points in history, may attract and retain more adherents by reacting to the environment and providing a dynamic balance between what the individual needs and what the group needs. -
And Corpse-Divination in the Paris Magical Papyri (Pgm Iv 1928-2144)
necromancy goes underground 255 NECROMANCY GOES UNDERGROUND: THE DISGUISE OF SKULL- AND CORPSE-DIVINATION IN THE PARIS MAGICAL PAPYRI (PGM IV 1928-2144) Christopher A. Faraone The practice of consulting the dead for divinatory purposes is widely practiced cross-culturally and firmly attested in the Greek world.1 Poets, for example, speak of the underworld journeys of heroes, like Odys- seus and Aeneas, to learn crucial information about the past, present or future, and elsewhere we hear about rituals of psychagogia designed to lead souls or ghosts up from the underworld for similar purposes. These are usually performed at the tomb of the dead person, as in the famous scene in Aeschylus’ Persians, or at other places where the Greeks believed there was an entrance to the underworld. Herodotus tells us, for instance, that the Corinthian tyrant Periander visited an “oracle of the dead” (nekromanteion) in Ephyra to consult his dead wife (5.92) and that Croesus, when he performed his famous comparative testing of Greek oracles, sent questions to the tombs of Amphiaraus at Oropus and Trophonius at Lebedeia (1.46.2-3). Since Herodotus is heavily dependent on Delphic informants for most of Croesus’ story, modern readers are apt to forget that there were, in fact, two oracles that correctly answered the Lydian king’s riddle: the oracle of Apollo at Delphi and that of the dead hero Amphiaraus. The popularity of such oracular hero-shrines increased steadily in Hel- lenistic and Roman times, although divination by dreams gradually seems to take center stage.2 It is clear, however, that the more personal and private forms of necromancy—especially consultations at the grave—fell into disfavor, especially with the Romans, whose poets repeatedly depict horrible 1 For a general overview of the Greek practices and discussions of the specific sites mentioned in this paragraph, see A. -
Book of African Divination
B 0 0 K S Destiny Books Rochester, Vermont I NTRO D UCTI ON 1 1. DIVINATION 2. AFRICA AND AFRICAN LIFE 9 3. AFRICAN DIVINATION 23 ~.. VENDA DIVINATION 28 5. ZULU DIVINATION 39 6. YORUBA DIVINATION 54 7. TIKAR SPIDER DIVINATION 8. SAMPLE READINGS 116 BIBLIOGRAPHY 135 INDEX 137 n Africa there is a strong relationship between divination and spirituality. A supernatural cause is attributed to all events in life, whether the life of the individual or of the society. There are many methods of divination by which humankind has tried, over millenia, to see into the future and to discover the will of the gods. Although some few methods have become popular around the world-Tarot cards and astrology, for example-most people are unaware of the wide diversity of systems in existence and certainly have only a vague idea of the types found in Africa. African divinatory practices are .remarkably varied and have traditionally embodied African spirituality in everyday life. We have tried to bring together some of the previously widely scattered information on African divination. With the continuing Western interest in all forms of fortune-telling, this constitutes a rich, virtually untapped vein of material, and one that-even apart from its interest to the occultist-should be preserved. A great deal of the religio-magical practices found throughout the Ameri- cas, among the descendants of the African slaves, remains very similar to the African Yoruba system. In the New World, individual peoples’ beliefs and meth- ods of divining suffered a blending as the Africans were mixed and then di- vided, to the point where the legends and myths found extended life in the Voodoo of Haiti, the Santeria of Cuba, and the Macumba, Candomb~, Umbanda, and CLuimbanda of Brazil and other parts of South America. -
African Traditional Religions in Mainstream Religious Studies
AFRICAN TRADITIONAL RELIGIONS IN MAINSTREAM RELIGIOUS STUDIES DISCOURSE: THE CASE FOR INCLUSION THROUGH THE LENS OF YORUBA DIVINE CONCEPTUALIZATIONS Vanessa Turyatunga Thesis submitted to the University of Ottawa in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Master of Arts in Religious Studies Department of Classics and Religious Studies Faculty of Arts University of Ottawa © Vanessa Turyatunga, Ottawa, Canada, 2019 Abstract The history of African Traditional Religions (ATRs), both inside and outside academia, is one dominated by exclusions. These exclusions were created by the colonial framing of ATRs as primitive, irrational and inferior to other religions. This colonial legacy is in danger of being preserved by the absence of ATRs from the academic study of religion, legal definitions of religion, and global and local conversations about religion. This thesis will explore the ways that a more considered and accurate examination of the understudied religious dimensions within ATRs can potentially dismantle this legacy. It will do so by demonstrating what this considered examination might look like, through an examination of Yoruba divine conceptualizations and the insights they bring to our understanding of three concepts in Religious Studies discourse: Worship, Gender, and Syncretism. This thesis will demonstrate how these concepts have the ability to challenge and contribute to a richer understanding of various concepts and debates in Religious Studies discourse. Finally, it will consider the implications beyond academia, with a focus on the self-understanding of ATR practitioners and African communities. It frames these implications under the lens of the colonial legacy of ‘monstrosity’, which relates to their perception as primitive and irrational, and concludes that a more considered examination of ATRs within the Religious Studies framework has the potential to dismantle this legacy. -
The Soteriological Context of a Tibetan Oracle
HIMALAYA, the Journal of the Association for Nepal and Himalayan Studies Volume 39 Number 1 Article 8 July 2019 The Soteriological Context of a Tibetan Oracle Katarina Turpeinen University of California, Berkeley, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/himalaya Recommended Citation Turpeinen, Katarina. 2019. The Soteriological Context of a Tibetan Oracle. HIMALAYA 39(1). Available at: https://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/himalaya/vol39/iss1/8 This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License. This Research Article is brought to you for free and open access by the DigitalCommons@Macalester College at DigitalCommons@Macalester College. It has been accepted for inclusion in HIMALAYA, the Journal of the Association for Nepal and Himalayan Studies by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@Macalester College. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Soteriological Context of a Tibetan Oracle Acknowledgements The author would like to thank Lhamo Pema Khandro for patiently answering her questions in a series of interviews and allowing her to witness the possession rituals. She is also grateful to the nuns of Tsho Pema, especially Ani Yangtsen Drolma for guiding her in the social dynamics of the village, as well as Prof. Jacob Dalton for offering many helpful suggestions that shaped her writing. This research article is available in HIMALAYA, the Journal of the Association for Nepal and Himalayan Studies: https://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/himalaya/vol39/iss1/8 The Soteriological Context of a Tibetan Oracle Katarina Turpeinen This paper contributes to the study of Tibetan which is a practice of a village oracle often oracles by analyzing a distinctive case of a regarded as involving mainly mundane and contemporary Tibetan oracle living in exile pragmatic ends, is conspicuously integrated in India. -
Why Explaining Religion Is Not Sufficient to Explain Away Religion
Why Explaining Religion Is Not Sufficient to Explain Away Religion An argumentative exploration of the leading evolutionary explanatory accounts of religion to demonstrate the inability of science to explain away religious belief Author: Vipusaayini Sivanesanathan Edited by: Ko-Lun Liu 1. Introduction While science continues to make significant progressive strides, religion has yet to add to its historically established doctrines. Not only has the rapid expansion of science brought into question the validity and necessity of religion, part of scientific inquiry now focuses on how ‘counterintuitive’ notions of religion came to be. ‘Counterintuitive’ ideas of religion posit religious beliefs to go against or violate empirically verified facts or knowledge. Some argue that we can utilize the knowledge attained from advancements in science to explain away religion. One particular aspect of science that is used to explain away religion are evolutionary theories. In this paper, I will argue that while evolutionary accounts can explain our affinity towards religion, it has yet to explain away religion. I will explicate and refute the three different argument for evolutionary accounts of religion, including the socio-evolutionary, bio-evolutionary and cultural-evolutionary, to demonstrate how science has not succeeded in explaining away religion. 2. Why Does Science Try to Explain Away Religion? There is a prominent assumption in academia that science and religion are two separate and distinct fields which fundamentally do not, and (for some) cannot overlap. Both science and theism attempt to answer the central questions concerning the design and function of natural phenomena (i.e., evolution, questions of the universe, life etc). -
100 Necromancers and Their Plots 6
100 Necromancers and their Plots 6. Helosia Tremastag A grim beauty dwells in a ruined temple outside of town and is trying to drain beauty from other maidens. Her giant 1. Kustarg Durmargis undead ravens kidnap the girls from their beds. A middle aged necromancer who sets his students to work 7. Lady Marsia Beradee building a defence force of basic undead. From his Bathes in blood of young girls to retain her beauty. Her underground lair he has been seeking to plumb the secrets servants are helping her and she spends far too much time of a well reputed to hold a fragment of a dead god. with pretty young men to perfect the process. Any men 2. Dr Nosterang Barlanth who see her change to her true age her servants kill. Her A portly bespectacled dissections and flesh golem maker incomplete research keeps turning up after her destruction, has students grave robbing terrorising locals who fear spreading the cycle of death forever. relatives bodies being robbed. A pit filled with reject 8. Kiasaar Mendloth creations has started to make lots of noises. Had all her kin die in a plague but has returned them as 3. Lady Pahrzethra Molochi undead to serve her. She tries to cover it with illusions and A beautiful widow has been poisoning young men about invites travelers into her luxurious but dusty and a bit town to be her undead consorts, her students procure her stinky home. If they see the true horror she sets her kin to the bodies of those who she kills from afar. -
Hunter, Shaman, Oracle, Priest : an Ethnohistorical Overview of Inspirational Practices in Highland Georgia
Hunter, shaman, oracle, priest : An ethnohistorical overview of inspirational practices in highland Georgia. Kevin Tuite Université de Montréal Sixth Harvard Round Table on Archaeology, Language, Genetics and Comparative Mythology May 2004 [email protected] www.philologie.com SOME APPROACHES TO THE DEFINITION OF SHAMANISM 1. STADIALIST (e.g. Lev Shternberg’s theory of divine election [izbrannichestvo]) 2. PROTOTYPE-BASED (cp. Eliade’s shamanic prototype primarily drawn from Siberian data: ecstatic voyage to sky or underworld, mastery of fire, psychopomp) 3. CULTURALLY-SITUATED (cp. R. Hamayon’s definition of shaman’s role in terms of imagined alliance and gender asymmetries, contrasting it to spirit possession — Prototypical shaman adopts a masculine role, as imagined by his society, as an active seeker of women and resources outside of the community. Possession, by contrast, is a passive and stereotypically feminine stance: the possessed does not seek, but rather is sought, by the soul or spirit that seizes her) 4. POLITICALLY/HISTORICALLY/SOCIALLY-SITUATED (cp. contributions to N. Thomas & C. Humphreys 1994 Shamanism, history, and the state, which seek to “loos[en] the classificatory paradigms” left by Eliade, in favor of a “historical anthropology of inspirational practices”, that situates shamanism and shamans in their historical and political context) PREVIOUS ATTEMPTS TO IDENTIFY SHAMANISM IN THE CAUCASUS 1. G. Nioradze (1940) likened Abkhazian and Georgian “soul-returning” rituals to similar practices performed by Buryat shamans. 2. R. Bleichsteiner (1936) on “Reste von Schamanismus” in ethnographic descriptions from the highland provinces of northeast Georgia, in particular, those of Pshavi and Xevsureti (subsequently cited by Eliade in his monograph).