Lawrence R. Spencer's Blog, page 464

ALIEN LANGUAGE

PYTHIA ~ ORACLE PRIESTESS OF DELPHI

“The first true departure that Zeus made from Olympus was to take a body – that of Alexander, the Macedonian prince. As soon as he took over the body, he lost his memory of himself. Amnesia is the condition common to all humans. (As you know, the demands and sensations of the flesh can be quite overwhelming to the being and consume all of one’s attention). Thereafter, Zeus spent all of his time trying to regain his memory of his true self.   For example, in his travels across the world, Alexander paused at the Temple of Claros near the western shores of Ionia along his route to Persian conquest from Greece. With a few of his retinue he camped for several days to consult the oracle staff, searching for the answer to his lost omnipotence, yet not knowing what questions to ask them.

At the outset of his crusade for personal power he crossed the Dardenelles from Thrace with 100,000 soldiers and camp followers. Alexander stopped at Ilium to see the hallowed walls of Troy, though without his memory, not really knowing why. By that time he had already severed the famed Gordian Knot with his sword. This was the deed he used to legitimize his divine destiny of conquest to the plunder hungry hordes of his ever-growing army.

The Oracle of the ancient and prestigious Temple of Apollo at Delphi had already reaffirmed his godly origins. Or so he cared to think. He arrived at Delphi to seek the prediction of the oracle priestess concerning his future as conqueror of the world, at a time she thought to be unpropitious for the god Apollo to entertain his request. She refused to see him and told him to wait for a time more convenient for the god.

Alexander was outraged at her impudence and demanded an audience with her. Again she refused him. Not to be put off by so lowly a one as the prophetess of Apollo, though highly revered by the rest of the Greek world, he ordered her brought to him by force. Spitting, swearing and struggling into his presence, held by his soldiers at spear point, she screamed at him, “You are incorrigible!”

At this admonition from the priestess, Alexander waved her away. Thinking that her words meant that he was invincible, rather than rude and brutish, he wished to hear no more from Apollo. This was the prophecy he sought.

If Alexander would have been patient enough to wait for a proper reply, this is the response which he should have been given by the priestess when he consulted the Oracle of Apollo”, Penelope said sadly as Derek listened intently:

“Behold, Ye Gods and hearken!

Here hides The Holy Harlequin!

His guise, we see, is paper thin.

Though masked in mortal coil,

We know Thee still, Olympian.

 He’s here with us, right now on Earth !

Still with us on this speck of dirt:

His power now has been debased —

Celestial Clouds were once His berth.

His Mighty Realm has been defaced !

 Omnipotent Abilities ?

What of Heaven’s Mighty Hand ?

He always was so strong and free:

Now, masquerading as a man —

Amnesia drives Him to his knees !

 Where to, Celestial Company ?

What of Apollo and The Rest ?

Entombed in mortal effigy !

Omniscient Immortality ?

Like each of Us, covered up with flesh . ”

~ excerpted from the book PAN ~ GOD OF THE WOODS

by Lawrence R. Spencer

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FOOTNOTE:

The Pythia, commonly known as the Oracle of Delphi, was the name of any priestess throughout the history of the Temple of Apollo at Delphi, which was located on the slopes of Mount Parnassus, beneath the Castalian Spring on the north shore of the Corinthian Gulf in Greece. Each new priestess was selected after the death of the current priestess, and after the legendary death of a man, was always a woman, who surrendered her name and position upon becoming the oracle. The Pythia, established in the 8th century BC, was widely credited for her prophecies inspired by being filled by the spirit of god (or enthusiasmos), in this case Apollo.

The Delphic oracle may have been present in some form in Late Mycenaean times, from 1400 BC and was abandoned, and there is evidence that Apollo took over the shrine from an earlier dedication to Gaia. The last recorded response of the oracle was given about 395 A.D. to Emperor Theodosius I, after he had ordered pagan temples to cease operation.

During this period the Delphic Oracle was the most prestigious and authoritative oracle among the Greeks, and she was without doubt the most powerful woman of the classical world. The oracle is one of the best-documented religious institutions of the classical Greeks. Authors who mention the oracle include Aeschylus, Aristotle, Clement of Alexandria, Diodorus, Diogenes, Euripides, Herodotus, Julian, Justin, Livy, Lucan, Nepos, Ovid, Pausanias, Pindar, Plato, Plutarch, Sophocles, Strabo, Thucydides and Xenophon.

The name “Pythia” is derived from Pytho, which in myth was the original name of Delphi. In etymology the Greeks derived this place name from the verb, pythein (πύθειν, “to rot”), which refers to the sickly sweet smell of the decomposition of the body of the monstrous Python after he was slain by Apollo. Pythia was the House of Snakes.

RED RISING REVIEW

“The Red Rising Trilogy is an epic Macho Cinderella Story. The story and characters are eloquently sculpted from well-weathered egalitarian clichés of Star-Wars-Hunger-Game-Of-Thrones post-apocalyptic-peasant-revolts set in a high-tech ultra-hierarchal-Greco-Roman-space-opera-society.  Brilliant prose, plot twists and legions of antagonists are collectively dedicated to dystopian gore, guts and glory of gold-obsessed class-based blood feuds wherein the purposelessness of human life is to learn to love pain and power.

Predictably, The “Golden Couple” get married and live happily ever after, as most human fantasy stories aspire… getting married, having babies, living in a castle, served and lauded by the peasants is a “happy ending”.

The unwritten story, as usual, is that humans all die, inevitably, with nostalgic finality to seek their reward in “The Veil”.

This trilogy is perfect Hollywood film fodder for servants of money-motivated vested interests of the planetary power elite. The subservient classes: Red, Pinks, Browns etc., will spend their minimum wages in theaters by the shovel full to wallow in the “beautiful dramatic pain” of egalitarian dreams crushed in the subterranean mines of Mars.

Sadly, the genius of Pierce Brown as a masterful wordsmith and epic storyteller is wasted on repeating the same worn out “Hero Epic” story line recycled ad nausea since the days of Homer. Humans live in painful servitude until they die to be rewarded in the “afterlife”.  All in a blink of the eye for the soulless of “gods” who worship power and gold.

Where have all the Immortals gone?  Buried in the gory-damn dust of impossible dreams.

~ Lawrence R. Spencer ~

VOLTAIRE OPINIONS

“Opinions have caused more ills than the plague or earthquakes on this little globe of ours.”  ~ Voltaire ~

Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet) lived from 21 November 1694 – 30 May 1778.  He was a French Enlightenment writer, historian, and philosopher famous for his wit, his attacks on the established Catholic Church, and his advocacy of freedom of religion, freedom of expression, and separation of church and state.

His book Candide was listed as one of The 100 Most Influential Books Ever Written, by Martin Seymour-Smith.

Voltaire was a versatile writer, producing works in almost every literary form, including plays, poems, novels, essays, and historical and scientific works. He wrote more than 20,000 letters and more than 2,000 books and pamphlets. He was an outspoken advocate of several liberties, despite the risk this placed him in under the strict censorship laws of the time. As a satirical polemicist, he frequently made use of his works to criticize intolerance, religious dogma, and the French institutions of his day.

Voltaire was also known to have been an advocate for coffee, as he was reported to have drunk it 50–72 times per day. It has been suggested that high amounts of caffeine acted as a mental stimulant to his creativity.

He is remembered and honoured in France as a courageous polemicist who indefatigably fought for civil rights (as the right to a fair trial and freedom of religion) and who denounced the hypocrisies and injustices of the Ancien Régime. The Ancien Régime involved an unfair balance of power and taxes between the three Estates: clergy and nobles on one side, the commoners and middle class, who were burdened with most of the taxes, on the other. He particularly had admiration for the ethics and government as exemplified by Confucius.

DIOGENES THE CYNIC

Diogenes of Sinope  was a Greek philosopher and one of the founders of Cynic philosophy.  The term “Cynic” itself derives from the Greek word κυνικός, “dog-like”. Later Cynics also sought to turn the word to their advantage, as a later commentator explained:

There are four reasons why the Cynics are so named. First because of the indifference of their way of life, for they make a cult of indifference and, like dogs, eat and make love in public, go barefoot, and sleep in tubs and at crossroads. The second reason is that the dog is a shameless animal, and they make a cult of shamelessness, not as being beneath modesty, but as superior to it. The third reason is that the dog is a good guard, and they guard the tenets of their philosophy. The fourth reason is that the dog is a discriminating animal which can distinguish between its friends and enemies. So do they recognize as friends those who are suited to philosophy, and receive them kindly, while those unfitted they drive away, like dogs, by barking at them.

Diogenes of Sinope he was born in Sinope (modern-day Sinop, Turkey), an Ionian colony on the Black Sea, in 412 or 404 BCE and died at Corinth in 323 BCE.  He was a controversial figure. His father minted coins for a living, and when Diogenes took to debasement of currency, he was banished from Sinope. 

After being exiled, he moved to Athens and criticized many cultural conventions of the city.  He believed that virtue was better revealed in action than in theory. He used his simple lifestyle and behavior (which arguably resembled poverty) to criticize the social values and institutions of what he saw as a corrupt or at least confused society. In a highly non-traditional fashion, he had a reputation of sleeping and eating wherever he chose and took to toughening himself against nature.

He declared himself a cosmopolitan and a citizen of the world rather than claiming allegiance to just one place.  Diogenes made a virtue of poverty. He begged for a living and often slept in a large ceramic jar in the marketplace. He became notorious for his philosophical stunts such as carrying a lamp in the daytime, claiming to be looking for an honest man. He criticized and embarrassed Plato, disputed his interpretation of Socrates and sabotaged his lectures, sometimes distracting attendees by bringing food and eating during the discussions.

Diogenes was also noted for having publicly mocked Alexander the Great: 

“Alexander the Great found the philosopher looking attentively at a pile of human bones. Diogenes explained, “I am searching for the bones of your father but cannot distinguish them from those of a slave.”

BEWARE THE FULL MOON IN MARCH, MAY, JULY AND OCTOBER

The assassination of the first self-appointed Roman Emperor, Gaius Julius Caesar, by Roman Senators, made the Ides of March a turning point in Roman history. Although March (Martius) was the third month of the Julian calendar, in the oldest Roman calendar it was the first month of the year. The holidays observed by the Romans from the first through the Ides often reflect their origin as new year celebrations.

The Romans did not number days of a month sequentially from the first through the last day. Instead, they counted back from three fixed points of the month: the Nones (5th or 7th, depending on the length of the month), the Ides (13th or 15th), and the Kalends (1st of the following month). The Ides occurred near the midpoint, on the 13th for most months, but on the 15th for March, May, July, and October. The Ides were supposed to be determined by the full moon, reflecting the lunar origin of the Roman calendar. On the earliest calendar, the Ides of March would have been the first full moon of the new year.Most pre-modern calendars the world over were lunisolar, combining the solar year with the lunation by means of intercalary months. The Julian calendar abandoned this method in favor of a purely solar reckoning while conversely the 7th-century Islamic calendar opted for a purely lunar one.

The Ides of each month was sacred to Jupiter, the Romans’ supreme deity. The Flamen Dialis, Jupiter’s high priest, led the “Ides sheep” (ovis Idulius) in procession along the Via Sacra to the arx, where it was sacrificed.

— excerpted and edited from Wikipedia.org

DEMENTED

“A LOVER SHOULD BE REGARDED AS A PERSON DEMENTED”

~ Roman proverb ~

“demented” is from the Latin word:  demens ‘out of one’s mind‘.

The ancient Roman mosaic shows a Satyr and Nymph, borrowed from Greek Mythology of Pan. The mosaic tile image was excavated from the ruins of The House of the Faun (Italian: Casa del Fauno), which built during the 2nd century BC. The villa was covered in the ash of the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius in 79 AD.  The mountain is still a very volatile volcano.  Sexual love, like a volcano, could be said to be as potentially devastating as a volcanic eruption.

TWILIGHT ZONE: HOW TO SERVE MAN

This is one of the best, and possibly prophetic, episodes of Twilight Zone, HOW TO SERVE MAN.  You will never think about “E.T.” the same way again!  The Twilight Zone ran from 1959 until 1964. 

HERE IS A LINK TO 24 EPISODES OF THE TWILIGHT ZONE

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLYkG4AyFVMHK4d9VDUH1EwaMrYaAHl3jy

INNER CHILD

Painting by Jana Heidersdorf  (http://janaheidersdorf.com)

The End of Illusions is The Death of The Inner Child

~ Lawrence R. Spencer ~

WITCHES RITE OF RENUNCIATION

(This article is reposted from “quedavathegrey” on Tumbler)

“The Witches’ Rites of Renunciation are meant to sever the religious ties of your own personal past. This is done (I have found) for two distinct reasons: to shed the preconceptions forced by organized religion, including both the doctrines and the antithetic notion of hierarchal power in regards to Enlightenment, and as a symbol of rebirth. Much like a baptism! Only in this instance, the sin you wash away is the sin of religious indoctrination, hypocrisy and the very human realities that accompany the notion of “church.” It is meant to be a freeing exercise – one that cleanses all the malformed ideologies imbued on you throughout your earlier life. Of course, that is easier said than done and no one ritual can truly clear the slate completely, but it serves as a formal boundary between the past and the future – a future in which you must relearn your understanding of the world at large. One in which the answers presented are not set in stone, but fluid – from which you must come to your own conclusions, test your own theories and tessellate the scattered mythos and ideas into a cohesive faith – you own faith, reliant wholly on none other than yourself.

That is The Witches’ Baptism, and this is one example of how it may be performed:

Ideally, the rite should be done at a Crossroad (of whichever type speaks to you the most) as it is a transformative ritual! Bring with you whatever you need to light a fire in your preferred method – such as wood for a classic bonfire, Sacred Fire to light in a bowl/cauldron/vessel, or alcohol – which can be poured in a circle (note: isopropyl alcohol isn’t fond of the cold or wind, so either plan according to weather or bring a backup solution).

On site, when you are emotionally prepared, build your fire. Depending on your chosen medium, your window of opportunity will differ greatly (the above are listed from greatest to least burn-time), so factor this in as well. For those of you who thoroughly enjoy taking your time, I recommend building a true fire.

The following part should be personalized to fit your taste, as how you wish to release the past is up to you. You can do it simply, by speaking out loud that you rebuke the religion of your youth/past (traditionally, this is done by rebuking the Holy Spirit of Christianity – the unforgivable blasphemy – so as to free oneself from its vice-grip, though the renunciation can extend to any religion [or even no religion]).

A few other options consist of writing these things out – in as long-winded or concise a manner as you wish (these can even be written days in advance) – or burning a symbol of the past. The flames are freeing – allow them to be.

Purge these broken things from the mind and heart, and cast them symbolically into the consuming fire of creation and destruction. It is these things that stand as obstacle – let them be cleansed from you. And when the time has come, when these things have been expressed and used as kindling (carefully) leap the fire (and try not to wear any hairspray!). Then you are free.

Upon the other side, you may douse the fire, allow it to burn out, or use this time to connect with another Spirit or Deity (I said you were free, not that you had to stay free!), Nature at large, or even with yourself – whichever is most befitting your chosen path. Theoretically, this could be done by an Abrahamic witch if only to cleanse the effects of church indoctrination – for those who wish to follow the gospels/tomes in a unique or personal way.”

IMAGE:   “Baptism of fire: Girls leap over flames as part of ancient cleansing ceremony held on the birthday of John the Baptist,”