religion

More on ancient Egypt (and Hinduism)

One enduring mystery from ancient Egypt is the identity and import of Horus the Elder. This is little understood in the modern day. What is sometimes called the Ennead describes a group of deities who had incarnations over time and encountered one another often. Horus the Elder belongs in this group, although the Ennead of Heliopolis does not always include him. In the stories that survive, Set killed Osiris, whom other factors in the religion seem to suggest remains dead due to being evil. Why did Set do this? It is not so much a senseless act when one looks for Horus the Elder in the story. Horus the Elder had been killed by Osiris. The fact that Horus the Younger appears later could suggest that Horus the Elder was really his father and the murder had a motive of passion, since it was Osiris who was married to Horus the Younger’s mother Isis, and not Horus the Elder. Alternatively, connecting Horus the Elder and Horus the Younger through theories of reincarnation could have been a preoccupation in Egypt, and may have resulted in the theories Egyptians had of multiple souls and their vagaries. Why would this matter? You’d have to know Horus the Elder to understand.

The relationships between Egyptian gods and their associations in the Hindu pantheons may be surprising sometimes if looked at today, and obviously most of them are lost to time, but there was a period in history when they were intentional and fairly well understood, perhaps as much as the Greek and Roman gods.

For instance, Horus the Elder has an association which should not be listed, as does Ptah. But Horus the Younger is associated with Rudra, which is surprising in view of Set’s association with Shiva because in Hinduism Rudra is considered something like a vedic Shiva, to say the very least. Often Rudra is seen to be an aspect of Shiva outright. Hathor is associated with Parvati, though, which starts to bring things into focus again if we consider the myths involved. The truth of what we can infer about Set and Horus may carry much esoteric value, but it does suggest that there’s more to their relationship than myths we hear of today that mostly play out ancient Egyptian warnings about strangers and foreign influences. These were very common in ancient Egypt and were the major system for warning people of foreign threats.

Bast is associated with Sachi. Nephthys is associated with Lakshmi. Thoth may be associated with Kartikeya in his Subrahmanya aspect, but this is a little less clear.

──── by Lync Dalton ────

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Sacred writ

If you have a holy book that you cherish, it is almost certainly connected to some religion or another. It’s very important that a holy book have sound and adequate morals that it conveys. It’s very important to pay attention to the valid moral elements of the holy writ, and not to take its message too much out of context.

In the case of the Bible, for instance, it’s best to keep in mind its unique context in history, also to consider how modern politics have shifted in ways that demand further interpretation of the spirit of the work, and to stay away from falling into the quagmire of fundamentalism. Fundamentalism is an aggressive interpretation of scripture and/or religion that takes excerpts out of context and/or has a tendency to focus on the wrong points. Looked at in-depth, fundamentalism often becomes indistinguishable from superstition, and at that point, it usually carries no philosophy whatsoever. Superstition beggars belief.

Another way that fundamentalism can creep in is when something entirely out of context is selected from a sacred writ and applied to the reader’s life or the contemporary world without a clear connection to the moral message of the scripture. Again, to use the Bible as an example, it is particularly rewarding to read entire chapters in order to complete one book at a time rather than read random excerpts, and to pay close attention to the spirit of the work and its moral message in context (though this would be less applicable in the case of Psalms, for instance). Many people actually use the Bible for divination (instead of using the tarot, for instance) by flipping through it randomly and applying whatever text their eyes land on to their current situation or whatever question they’re focusing on. This is not equivalent to Bible study, and tends not to convey the same things a complete book of the Bible communicates.

Certain kinds of fundamentalists have promoted the idea that Earth is about 6,000 years old, and others have promoted the idea that we can use ancient imagery talking about time and its vagaries to conclude we have to wait hundreds of thousands of years to reach the Satya Yuga. Both theories can be disheartening. In truth, humans in general have never been as good at calendars as we are now, and old scriptures are at their best when we interpret them responsibly and deftly.

──── by Lync Dalton ────

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Astrology

Some people really don’t like astrology because they think it isn’t scientific enough.

Astrology is about how time actually feels to a person, and how it moves in steady and predictable ways and cycles. It’s a complex and nuanced system mostly invented to describe things, including seasons. It’s the foundations of astronomy, it’s geometry, it’s art.

Some people don’t like astrology because they think it’s against their religion.

Most religions have had highly respected and influential adherents who were astrologers. For example, astrologers of faith have often figured largely in Christendom. Most Christian royal courts have had respected astrologers. There was a period of time in Britain and North America called the First Great Awakening (18th Century) when self-published religious philosophers in some regions came out against astrology. It was controversial to demonize it at the time, and there wasn’t a very clear reason for it. Throughout history many people have thought of astrology as devout observation of God’s Creation.

──── by Lync Dalton ────

PLEASE DONATE TO WEIRDO CAMP. Do you enjoy and/or enrich yourself with Weirdo Camp? Please send a donation via Paypal (see site sidebar) or to $alchemylynx on Cash App.
Want the coolest tax deduction in the world? Donate to Terra Thesis Institute.