Showing posts with label history. Show all posts
Showing posts with label history. Show all posts

Monday, May 1, 2017

America's Pagan Heritage

While many either like to ignore, or simply don't know its reality, America's Pagan heritage is abundantly clear. In this post, I hope to reveal that reality to a wide range of American readers. This is a topic I have wanted to cover and share for a very long time because I hear so many people in our country trying to say that America is only meant for one kind of people and culture, when in fact we have always been a pluralistic nation for everyone from everywhere.

Take a look at the picture to your left. What is that? That's the US capitol. In fact, the House of Representatives, White House and many other government buildings and courthouses have this ancient Greek and Roman architecture, and the reason we mirror it is because ancient Greece was the first democracy and ancient Rome was the first republic. If you take a stroll inside our House of Representatives, you will see the faces of many historical lawmakers throughout the world's history on the wall where our lawmakers meet, among them being the Greek Polytheists Solon of Athens and Lycurgus of Sparta. The cradle of Western Civilization has always been in the hands of the ancient Greeks in so many ways.

What about this picture to your right? Surely you know what that is, right? It's the Statue of Liberty. But have you ever asked yourself, who is the statue depicting? The person you see is Libertas, the Roman Goddess of liberty. Speaking of New York, have you ever been to the amazing Grand Central Station? If not, pictures of it can be easily googled. Above the entrance, a God stands with a winged hat and a caduceus. He is Hermes, the Greek God of Travel and the Patron of Travelers. Some would also interpret Him to be Mercury, the Roman God. Several other statues of Greek Gods can be found at notable places around our nation, such as the golden Prometheus at Rockefeller Center.

Take a look at the picture to the left. Recognize that? It's the famous Washington Monument, which was built in honor of the commander of the colonial army against British tyranny in the American Revolution, George Washington. He was, of course, also our first official president of the new United States nation. It stands amazingly over 500 feet tall. It's definitely not something that would be easy to miss, but a lot of people probably don't know that the structure is an ancient Egyptian obelisk. The ancient Egyptians were among the most religious people in the world's history, and they worshiped the well-known Egyptian pantheon. The obelisk is considered one of ancient Egypt's most popular religious structures, one of their functions being to commemorate Egyptian spirituality and religion. 

Many Americans and westerners don't realize it, but if all of the Pagan heritage was taken away, there would be very little left. We stand upon the values and images of the ancient world, and I think it's time to, one, realize that truth, and two, understand that we can all live together without trying to push one another out for the sake of dominance. America is for you as well as me and everyone else. 

In the Goodness of the Gods,
Chris.

Saturday, April 29, 2017

Artemis Is Not A Vegetarian, An Abortionist, or A Man-Hater

Some people in the modern Pagan community (though not the norm), are ripe with their own versions of the ancient Gods, which in itself isn't a bad thing. But when they basically create their own Gods and give them ancient names and images, that's when I find myself compelled to say something. One of the most common of these has to do with Artemis. She's one of the most commonly-adopted Deities by Neo-Pagans and Wiccans. While these people are a minority in the community, there are still Pagans who want to start a culture, gender or race war within Paganism. Therefore, being a historical Hellenist and someone who has worshiped and studied Artemis since 2009, I want to set the record straight about the Goddess. These are not opinions, these are facts of religious and cultural Greek history.

Claim #1 - Artemis Is Against Hunting
The argument that Artemis is against hunting or meat eating should, in and of itself, be an obvious ridiculousness from the start. She's the Goddess of the Hunt. The first sentence of the Homeric Hymn to Artemis calls Her the "slayer of stags," and talks about her chasing and striking down the wild beasts. To say that Artemis rebukes hunting or opposes the consumption of game that was killed in ancient times specifically for eating, is a blatant historical falsehood.

Claim #2 - Artemis Supports Abortion
Whatever your views on abortion are, that's not the concern here. Not everyone has the same beliefs on the issue. Some are pro-life, some are pro-choice, and some are moderate; I understand that. But to say that Artemis revels in abortion, is simply not supported by anything other than someone's own personal theory. Artemis is the Goddess of childbirth and the protector of infants and children. She carries no historical epithet that refers to Her as an abortive Goddess whatsoever. She fiercely protected the weak and vulnerable. When Atalanta's father threw Her away at birth, it was Artemis who came and saved Her life. Another manifestation of Artemis is the legendary Artemis of Ephesus, which is a multi-breasted form to symbolize Her as "the Great Mother." The ancient Greek religion, in many cases, took a stance against abortion itself in some of its main cultural declarations. For example, the famous physician's Hippocratic Oath, which swears before "all the Gods and Goddesses" to not give an abortion. People in ancient Greek myth who harmed children were also dealt with very severely by the Gods. A good example would be Lycaon, who dismembered a young boy and tried to offer the remains to Zeus, who was so repulsed and offended that He wiped out the entire Bronze Age of Greece.

The historical fact of the matter is simply that Artemis never possessed a title, epithet or function even remotely similar to abortion. Quite the opposite, actually. 

Claim #3 - Artemis Is A Matriarch Who Hates Men
This idea mainly comes from a misunderstanding about Her refusal to take a husband and the death of Actaeon. While She did not marry, She always remained in recognition of the Supremacy of Zeus, the King of all the Gods. In fact, She sought His permission to remain chaste. She did not take it upon Herself to make the decision without Him. She also never decided that She was going to run everything. Zeus was always Her dear Father and the Ultimate Authority. All of the Gods, male and female, called Zeus the King. It wasn't as if the male Gods weren't expected to revere Zeus. The King was the King because He was King. It's that simple. While women worshipers today can find a great deal of independence in Her Divinity, She does not think of Herself as the ultimate ruler, or that She has a natural right to be at the top of the rule because of her gender, as a Matriarch would. The fallacy that people have here is the idea that one must be a gender-supremacist in order to be free, strong and independent. Nothing could be more untrue. One can be those things without crushing the opposite sex. Artemis is strong, powerful, wise, free and independent, but She doesn't try to usurp Zeus as we would think a Matriarch would, nor does She feel that He is a threat to Her own greatness or Her own rule over Her domains. There is no competition or war. To call Artemis a Matriarch, is to basically call Her a sexist, and the Gods are far above such human pettiness. 

As far as the man-hating label She routinely gets tagged with, this comes from the myth that the hunter Actaeon secretly spied on Artemis naked in the forest, and after She spotted him, turned the hunter into a stag and his hounds attacked and killed him. This probably had a far broader ancient meaning. Artemis didn't like sex, and therefore, did not want to be sexualized, and sexualization in those days was largely portrayed between male and female. But Artemis had and still has many male worshipers who show Her proper respects and don't end up on Her bad side. In fact, I built a sanctuary to Her in my yard and She was one of the main Gods I prayed to for help in saving my son's life when he was born prematurely. I am doing fine and so is my boy. I don't think we need to get so caught up in gender that we make everything about gender or sexism. Why can't we be great together?

Conclusion
There's nothing wrong with having UPG in your own private religious life, but to make it a universal declaration of the religion or the Deity, is quite another matter. In closing on this issue, I think back to something Susan B. Anthony once said. "I distrust those who know so well what God wants, because it's always the same as their own desires."

In the Goodness of the Gods,
Chris.

Friday, March 20, 2015

Who Were The Trojans?

We all know the famous story of the Trojan War (City of Troy VII), how the Greeks and Trojans across the sea, fought each other for ten years, until the Greeks, led by Odysseus, tricked the Trojans with the famous Trojan Horse. The story is enshrined in the human imagination, and thanks to Heinrich Schliemann, is also embedded in the books of human history. But who were the Trojans of this time, really? Has that question ever been successfully answered? 

The first possibility is that they were a group of Greeks themselves. The Greeks came from the east and settled in mainland Greece. Troy is also in that direction. Remember, the Greeks had differently named settlements. Homer doesn't even call the invaders of Troy "Greeks," but rather Argives and Achaeans. So it's entirely possible that Troy itself was a Greek settlement, just called by its name instead of identifying with an entire ethnic category. It's also possible that the Trojans were Hittites, as the Hittite Empire was in Asia Minor, which is also where Troy was located. 

Some people think that the Trojans went on to become the Romans. Legend has it that, when Troy fell, a Trojan named Aeneas, fled the city and founded what would become Rome, which, as Karma would have it, later conquered Greece. However, if it's true that the Romans were the remnants of the Trojans, it would be very, very early Rome. Remember, Rome became a mighty empire, and many different bloodlines lived and populated there. Even today, a Roman citizen might not be the same as a Roman even five-hundred years ago. I think it would be very far-fetched to go to Rome today, point to someone and say, "you're a Trojan." I think the Trojan bloodline is basically extinct, that it died out a long time ago, certainly as history knew it.

Who were the Trojans of the famous war? I think the fair answer is that we don't really know. But we do know that there was a Troy, and we know it as a fact because it was excavated by Schliemann, proven to the world, and we do know it was one of the greatest times of Gods and Heroes ever written about in the history of humanity. The brave men on both sides live forever in history and in our hearts.

In the Goodness of the Gods,
Chris.

Tuesday, December 30, 2014

Did Ancient Egypt REALLY Build Ancient Greece?

As a Hellenic Polytheist, I have grown weary of this absurd claim. Not the claim that Greece borrowed things from its neighbors. It most certainly did. I am weary and sick of the claim that Hellas and Hellenism is nothing but a rip off of Kemet (Egypt) and Kemeticism. So, in this post, I will explain how these two ancient civilizations were fundamentally different. I would like to begin by saying that I have some Kemetic friends, and this is certainly not aimed at attacking them, their religion or their culture. It is aimed at historical honesty and reason. In fact, it may even help to give their religion back its independence in some ways. I don't have time or the room to talk about it a whole lot, but I will cover some basics. 

There are several things we can look at to show the immense difference between Egypt and Greece, one being their governments. As we know, Greece is credited with having established democracy. Egypt, however, was never a democracy, they were a dictatorship with a God-King, worshiped by his people as a God. At one point, Egypt was even a united land, while Greece maintained a division of city states, each with their own unique culture, mythology and religious practice. 

Since we're on the subject of religion, that would be another great place to start exploring since religion immensely differed in these two nations. Now, in both countries, religion was central to life. However, the beliefs, practices, mythology and Gods surrounding that were distinct in their own. The Greeks and Egyptians did not even believe in the existence of Deity the same way. According to renowned Egyptologist and Kemetic religious leader, Tamara L. Siuda, the Egyptians looked at Deity through the eyes of soft polytheism, which means that all Deities come from one Divine Source. The Greeks, however, were most certainly hard polytheists, which is the belief that all Deities are their own Divine Source. They don't come from anything other than themselves and are not dependent on any Source for their existence and powers other than themselves. The religious structure in Egypt and Greece was also completely different. The Greeks did not believe in the practice of magic like the Egyptians did. Certain spells were designed to dictate the actions of Deities, and the Greeks would have looked at this as high hubris. The Greeks were not the same or next to their Gods, they were under their authority. In Greek religion, there was also no book to gain access to the afterlife, you instead paid Kharon to boat you across, which is why the dead were buried with coins. 

Egyptian and Greek Gods also get compared to one another on a daily basis. It was not uncommon in ancient times for people to see other Gods as different manifestations or extensions of their own Gods. That is not something contested. What is not, however, a fact, is that the Greek and Egyptian Gods were the same, or that the Greek Gods came from the Egyptian Gods. If one looks hard enough, they can find comparisons between any two Gods in any pantheon. For example, one could compare Aset (Isis) to a host of other Mother Goddesses in the world, but that doesn't mean the Egyptians stole Aset from all those places. While some of the Greek Gods did not originate in Greece, they also did not originate in Egypt. For example, Dionysos, who constantly gets labeled as being a mirror copy of Wesir (Osiris), actually originated in Thrace and a place in modern Turkey called Phrygia. Apollon was also a God from Asia Minor. Aphrodite's birthplace was Kypros. In fact, because of geography, some of the Greek Gods are incompatible with Egypt. For example, there are no forests in Egypt, so where would you place Artemis since the forest is one of Her closest domains? Switching around, Gods like Khnum, Sobek, and Hapi were explicitly connected to the Nile, but there is no Nile in Greece. So where would they be placed in Greek religion? The answer is, no place. Egyptian religion was heavily tied to the surrounding land mass. It was not a universal system. There is also far more nature in Greece, which means that many of the Greek Gods could not have originated in Egypt because such natural things did not exist there. Remember, Egypt is mostly desert, and Greece flourishes with natural beauty. The sex of Deities also differed. For example, The Moon and Earth Deity is male in Egypt, while female in Greece. Somethings were not only different, but complete opposites.

The idea that the Greeks and Egyptians had a consensus on religious belief is absolutely absurd!

Architecture is another big difference when it comes to Greek and Egyptian culture. Certainly, the idea of columns that hold up roofs is a very general one, but what of the immense difference in structure and art that we see between these two cultures? Temples were not even structured the same way. Compare the Parthenon with the temple at Karnak. 

The last thing to remember is that, while the Greeks did incorporate other ideas and Gods from other cultures, they did not do so haphazardly. They did so based on whether or not it could fit into the Greek views and beliefs, and very, very few things within Kemeticism can fit into the Greek way of thought. The things they borrowed, adopted and incorporated HAD to be compatible with Greece, which means that the things they allowed into their culture were already Greek in the first place. They did not "steal" it, they simply agreed with it. 

In the Goodness of the Gods,
Courage and Honor,
Chris.