Things Betwixt

[sdi]

For ah! what is there, of inferior birth,
That breathes or creeps upon the dust of earth,
What wretched creature of what wretched kind,
Than man more weak, calamitous, and blind?

(Zeus speaking. Homer, Iliad XVII, as translated by Alexander Pope.)

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In the meanwhile you will have two kinds of animals, Gods very much differing from men, in sublimity of place, in perpetuity of life, in perfection of nature, and having no proximate communication with them; since those supreme are separated from the lowest habitations by such an interval of altitude; and the life there is eternal and never-failing, but is here decaying and interrupted; and the natures there are elevated to beatitude, but those that are here are depressed to calamity. What then? Does nature connect itself by no bond, but leave itself separated into the divine and human part, and suffer itself to be interrupted, and as it were debile? [... No,] there are certain middle powers, [...] called by the Greek name dæmons.

(Apuleius, On the God of Socrates, as translated by Thomas Taylor.)

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Many occult schools seem teach that humanity is in the middle of the universe—that above us is happiness, below us is misery, and we are poised on the balance between them, partaking of both. I can't see that, at all, at all: it seems to me that, as Homer says, humans have only misery as their lot. Consequently, if the gods are happy, then it must fall to dæmons who partake of both natures.

Just as the highest dæmons are like gods, the highest humans are like dæmons. So, even if you attain—and blessed indeed are you who do!—the work does not end here, and the rewards is, perhaps, only a partial respite from your labors.

I am anxious for a respite, of course, but that mustn't be the reason why we strive.

Comments

[thinking_turtle]

Thanks for your link to Cupid and Psyche yesterday.

If I walk through nature and the sun, I feel quite happy! So I wouldn't say life is only misery. When I walk around a very poor neighborhood, it looks like the lowest of us have an easier time of it.

[sdi]

You're welcome!

Speaking of myths, I've been spending a lot of time on them lately—you want to know what got me started unpacking them? It wasn't Sallustius. It wasn't Plotinus. No, I was reading translations of some of the various versions of Innana's Descent into the Underworld that we've dug up, where the Sumerians describe the underworld as a wasteland where everything is colored gray and all the food tastes like dust. I said to myself, "Oh! That sounds just like our world!" And then the penny dropped—the mythic underworld is our world, and all the other pieces of that myth and others like it fell into place pretty easily from there.

[boccaderlupo]

I suspect you have something there...the material world we inhabit with our corporeal selves seems to be the farthest extension from the Divine source. Those who get caught up in it, I suspect, have a rough road ahead.

But I fear there may be even father extensions along the spectrum from the Divine, the farthermost outreaches...a Tartarus of some kind. Not a place I spend much mental energy focusing on, for perhaps obvious reasons...

Axé and may you be suffused with Divine light for all that ails you.

[sdi]

And you, friend.

Regarding your fear, I've come across no lore on it that I would consider reliable; and, like you, my thoughts are Elsewhere.

[sdi]

Found this reference for you:

Pythagoras thought that the empire of Pluto began downwards from the milky way, because souls falling from thence appear to have already receded from the Gods. [Macrobius, Commentary on the Dream of Scipio, XII]

[boccaderlupo]

Wow! Great find! Thank you!!

[sdi]

Oh, and another one: Porphyry says [in his Life of Pythagoras XLI] that the Pythagoreans called the seven planets, "the hounds of Persephone." He doesn't say why, but it makes sense if we equate the material world with Hades: Persephone is the mistress of the material cosmos, the planets are the guardians that keep us here, and they are forever nipping at us...

[boccaderlupo]

Wow! Another strong candidate...appreciate the note!

[sdi]

And Heraclitus says, "Death is what we see when awake, when we are asleep it is dreams."

And also, "The death of the soul is our life, and our death is the soul's life."

[boccaderlupo]

Interesting finds!! Thank you.

[thinking_turtle]

In a way food mirrors what you think about it. If you think it tastes like dust, you will buy ingredients without caring, and prepare it without love, and it will taste like dust. If you love food, buy ingredients carefully, and prepare it with attention, your food will taste like ambrosia.

This reminds me of a question JMG asked in Well of Galabes:

what does it imply about the universe if getting closer to reality makes reality more open to change?

[sdi]

Perhaps it would help if I mentioned that, due to various health crises, I've almost completely lost my senses of taste and smell? Food does, in fact, taste like dust :)

[thinking_turtle]

Sorry to hear that your health crises took away most of your sense of taste and smell. As I grow older, I feel my senses dull as well, although I've been spared a health crisis.

What keeps you from enjoying the senses that remain?

[sdi]

Physically speaking: severe pain, severe fatigue, severe mental fog, and severe allergies! For example, I'm unable to get outside at all during the summer months since the pollen and pesticides in the air are enough to trigger an autoimmune attack; but even if I could, I could hardly get around the house this last week, anyway. So there's just many layers of physical impediments to such things.

But more generally, it depends on what you mean by "enjoy." I spend what time and energy I'm able on my kids and on reading and things like that, but I think joy is more like a Muse than something one can attain by effort—it comes upon you and inspires you as it will. So I do what I can to allow for the opportunity, but opportunities are nonetheless few.

Nonetheless, if I could have chosen to trade my senses for wisdom, I would have gladly done so—it's hard to be too upset when the trade was made for me!

[thinking_turtle]

Thanks for your reply! I like your analogy of the Muse. For me, enjoyment often comes with effort, although not reliably so, and certainly not in a way I control.

The concept of "autoimmune" reminds me of modern medicine which nowadays frightens me.

[sdi]

Yes, my health problems are medically-caused.

[sdi]

I should have included Hesiod, too:

ἄλλα δὲ μυρία λυγρὰ κατ' ἀνθρώπους ἀλάληται:
πλείη μὲν γὰρ γαῖα κακῶν, πλείη δὲ θάλασσα.

But myriad miseries stray against men
For earth is full of evil, as is the sea.