sdi

To the Ecosophian Community

Fri, 29 Aug 2025 20:27:45 GMT

Hear the words of Athene:

ἀλλά μοι ἀμφ’ Ὀδυσῆι δαΐφρονι δαίεται ἦτορ,
δυσμόρῳ, ὃς δὴ δηθὰ φίλων ἄπο πήματα πάσχει
νήσῳ ἐν ἀμφιρύτῃ, ὅθι τ’ ὀμφαλός ἐστι θαλάσσης.
νῆσος δενδρήεσσα, θεὰ δ’ ἐν δώματα ναίει,
Ἄτλαντος θυγάτηρ ὀλοόφρονος, ὅς τε θαλάσσης
πάσης βένθεα οἶδεν, ἔχει δέ τε κίονας αὐτὸς
μακράς, αἳ γαῖάν τε καὶ οὐρανὸν ἀμφὶς ἔχουσιν.
τοῦ θυγάτηρ δύστηνον ὀδυρόμενον κατερύκει,
αἰεὶ δὲ μαλακοῖσι καὶ αἱμυλίοισι λόγοισιν
θέλγει, ὅπως Ἰθάκης ἐπιλήσεται: αὐτὰρ Ὀδυσσεύς,
ἱέμενος καὶ καπνὸν ἀποθρῴσκοντα νοῆσαι
ἧς γαίης, θανέειν ἱμείρεται. [...]
But my heart is torn for wise Odusseus, that hapless one, who far from his friends this long while suffers affliction in a seagirt isle, where is the navel of the sea, a woodland isle, and therein a goddess has her habitation, the daughter of the mischievous Atlas, who knows the depths of every sea, and himself upholds the tall pillars which keep earth and sky apart. His daughter it is that holds the hapless man in sorrow: and ever with soft and guileful tales she is wooing him to forgetfulness of Ithake. But Odusseus—yearning to see even the smoke leaping upwards from his own land—has a desire to die.

(Homer, Odusseia I 45–59A, as translated by S. H. Butcher and A. Lang, with minor edits by yours truly.)

If you, Ecosophians, are content to wed Kalupso and so obtain immortality—no mean thing, to be sure!—then so be it! But please, do not begrudge those who sit on the shore, gaze longingly for a wisp of smoke, and wish for death; for Zeus Mekhaneus does not forget such and contrives a way home for them...

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(But Mr. Ed Means "Wealth")

Tue, 26 Aug 2025 23:10:17 GMT

Okay, okay, while I think that names matter, they don't all matter. Akhilleus's two divine horses were named Ξάνθος "Goldie" and Βαλίος "Spotty."

(Other horses in the Iliad include Πήδασος "Jumper," Ἀρείων "Better," Αἴθη "Blaze," and Πόδαργος "Swiftfoot.")

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Against Hyperborea

Sat, 23 Aug 2025 23:28:45 GMT

So, Tacitus says something odd about the Suebi, a Germanic tribe living in what is now Eastern Germany:

Some of the Suebi sacrifice also to Isis. I cannot determine the reason and origin of the foreign cult, but her emblem, fashioned in the form of a Liburnian ship, proves that her worship comes from abroad.

(Tacitus, Germania IX, as translated by J. B. Rives.)

Possibly this is simply interpretatio romana, and this is what most scholars seem to assume as a matter of course. But let's suppose it isn't? Diodoros claims, after all, that Leto (= Isis) and her children came to Greece from Hyperborea, so perhaps Isis really is from the north and it shouldn't be surprising to see her in Germany?

But I realized something just now. I have said that the Isis myth is astrological, and is written in the constellations; we even see the various parts of the myth in the rising and setting of these constellations. But the ship of Isis, which we call Argo Navis, is too far south to be seen even from Greece. (I've lived on the same latitude as Cythera, and only the very, very tip of the nose of the ship is visible from there!) I suppose that this is why the Greeks, when they imported the Isis-Horos myth as Danae-Perseus, found new constellations for it in the northern sky.

But Germany is much further north even than that, and Hyperborea further still. So if the myth originated in the north, why are the constellations for it found in the south?

So while none of this is conclusive, it's another datapoint in favor of, no, Leto being Egyptian after all.

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The Gifts of the Gods

Thu, 21 Aug 2025 18:25:46 GMT

Remember how Hesiod and Teiresias were each given initiation presents by their initiators? I just realized that apparently Teiresias traded his staff of cornel-wood for one of gold when he left his mortal body behind:

ἦλθε δ’ ἐπὶ ψυχὴ Θηβαίου Τειρεσίαο
χρύσεον σκῆπτρον ἔχων, [...]
Then the soul of Teiresias of Thebai came to me,
holding a golden staff, [...]

(Odusseus speaking. Homer, Odyssey XI 90–1.)

This made me wonder about other heroes' god-given gifts, and what happened to them after their quests. Here's a short list I made from memory, though I am interested to find others:

Hermes and Athene gave Perseus a vorpal sword and mirror shield, which he returned after his quest.
Athene gave Bellerophon a golden bridle to tame Pegasus, which went to Zeus after Bellerophon died.
Athene gave Teiresias a cornel-wood staff, which he apparently traded for a golden one when his soul went to Haides.
Hermes, Apollon, Hephaistos, Athene, and Athene again gave Herakles a sword, a bow and arrows, a breastplate, a πέπλος "dress," and a lock of Medousa's hair in a bronze jar. The jar was given to Sterope, who used it to defend Tegea from the Argives; the bow was given to Philoktetes, who used it to kill Paris at Troia; of all the items, nothing further is said.
Hephaistos gave Akhilleus a panoply, which became the property of Odusseus, and evidently ended up at the bottom of the sea (returning to Thetis, who asked Hephaistos for them?).
The White Goddess gave Odusseus her κρήδεμνον "head-tie," which he returned after swimming to the land of the Phaiakians.
The Muses gave Hesiod a laurel staff, of which nothing further is said.

Because the quest is "immortality" (e.g. ascending to a greater-than-human life), each of these are representative of god-given capacities that an initiate is to master to complete the quest, after which they are returned since they are of no further use in the upper world. For example, of Perseus's gifts, Hermes's sword is discrimination and Athene's shield is reflection, both essential tools of the initiate.

But there are three exceptions, and I am curious about them:

All of the gifts are either returned to their owners or left behind for others to use in their own quests, except for Teiresias's, which is instead perfected.
All of the gifts are coded masculine (arms, armor, phalluses, etc.) except for Athene's dress and the White Goddess's hair ribbon or headscarf, which are coded feminine.

These exceptions are worth consideration, I think...

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A Hint

Sun, 17 Aug 2025 23:32:30 GMT

The sword of Orion opens the doors of the sky.
Before the doors close again the gate to the path
over the fire, beneath the holy ones as they grow dark
As a falcon flies as a falcon flies, may Unis rise into this fire
Beneath the holy ones as they grow dark.
They make a path for Unis, Unis takes the path,
Unis becomes the falcon star, Sirius. [...]

Though placed in the tomb, men fly away to them, the stars.
Sirius makes Unis fly to heaven among his brothers, the stars. [...]

The shining falcon is yours, Unis,
He does not give it to another rising to him.
Unis goes to the sky with you falcon shining. [...]

Unis himself is destroyed upon his ascent to heaven.
Wepwawet flies Unis to heaven among his brothers the stars.

(The Pyramid Texts, as translated by Susan Brind Morrow. Emphasis mine.)

Procyon (woof woof) precedes the heliacal rising of Sirius (woof woof) into the sky to shine brightest of the stars after being hidden below the horizon all winter.

Wepwawet (woof woof) leads the flayed Horos into Lower Egypt to rule his people after living in exile.

The White Goddess guides the shipless and naked Odusseus to land and home after being stranded abroad for twenty long years.

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I Found Another Osiris

Sat, 09 Aug 2025 20:35:09 GMT

Hyginus, in his De Astronomia, tells us the myths associated with various constellations; in his discussion of the constellation Βοώτης Bootes "ox-driver," tells us the story of Ἰκάριος Ikarios. Evidently, Ikarios was just and pious and so Dionusos taught him how to grow grapes and make wine from them. Once he had mastered this, he loaded up his ox-cart with wine and went around giving wine to the shepherds of Attike. Becoming drunk, they supposed that he had given them poison, and so they killed him and buried his body under a tree. When he never came home, his daughter Ἠριγόνη Erigone "Becoming Spring" worried, and after Ikarios's dog, Μαῖρα Maira "Sparkling," who had traveled with him, came home howling and whining, her worry turned to grief. The dog led her to his master's body, and the poor girl hung herself on the tree under which he was buried, and the dog lied down and died with her. Dionusus, pitying the three unjust deaths, placed them among the stars as the constellations Bootes, Virgo "maiden," and the star Προκύων Prokuon "guide-dog" (woof woof).

This seems to me to be yet-another dim memory of the Osiris myth, with Ikarios being Osiris, Erigone being Isis, and Maira being the dogs who guided Isis to Anoubis (who, in turn, helped her find the pieces of Osiris), making it another argument in favor of my Upuat/Procyon theory.

I think it's interesting that Erigone (= Isis) is the daughter of Ikarios (= Osiris), rather than his wife; this bears similarities to Kore (= Osiris) being the daughter of Demeter (= Isis) or Danae (= Isis) being the daughter of Akrisios (= Seth) and the illicit lover of Proitos (= Osiris). I guess the Egyptians had a high opinion of romantic love, while the Greeks had a high opinion of filial love.

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Sphinx's Riddle

Sat, 09 Aug 2025 17:04:54 GMT

WAIT A SECOND

When Sphinx asked Oidipous, "What is that which has one voice and yet becomes four-footed and two-footed and three-footed," he answered "man, for as a babe he is four-footed, going on four limbs; as an adult he is two-footed; and as an old man he gets besides a third support in a staff."

This is a myth, and so a mystery teaching; therefore, while Oidipous's answer is "correct," it also hides the true answer, which is man's greater life. The one voice is the soul, which reincarnates in many bodies; the four limbs is when the human soul is originally incarnated in beastly lives, living without virtue; the two limbs is when the human soul is as a "normal" human, living the civic virtues; and the three limbs is when the human soul is initiated (cf. Hesiod receiving a laurel-wood staff from the Mousoi and Teiresias receiving a cornel-wood staff from Athene), living the purificatory virtues. Prior to that, the soul isn't individuated (being a part of the undifferentiated group-soul); after that, it isn't strictly human (or, indeed, strictly individual anymore).

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Dogs Again

Fri, 08 Aug 2025 23:26:01 GMT

Oh!

𓃣𓃪𓃧
woof woof woof woof woof woof

There are three canines in the Isis myth: Anoubis, the guard dog; Seth, the dangerous wild dog; Upuat, the tracker, the guide. These are the just same as the three heads of Kerberos, the guardian of Haides, and they represent, collectively, karma in it's three functions: keeping the children safe, keeping the dead in, and showing the living the way back out.

Notice, too, how Anubis is depicted in hieroglyphs lying down; Seth, sitting; and Upuat standing; representing one growing more active as they develop...

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More Dogs

Thu, 07 Aug 2025 18:43:57 GMT

I mentioned before that I think Horos is the star Sirius (Greek Σείριος "scorcher," referring to the "heat" it causes in midsummer; cf. Hesiod, Works and Days 585) and Anoubis is the star Canopus (Greek Κάνωβος—probably derived from Anoubis—the name of the pilot of Menelaus's (=Isis's) ship; cf. Conon, Fifty Stories VIII; Strabo, Geography XVII i §17).

I think I've identified a third star: Upuat (𓄋𓈐𓈐𓈐 "opener of ways") is Procyon (Greek Προκύων "before-dog"), the eighth-brightest star in the entire night sky. (You can see it in the star map I posted earlier: it is the bright star to the left of Orion and above-and-to-the-left of Sirius.) Apparently the name comes because it is seen to rise before Sirius, in the same way that Upuat "opens the way" for the rising soul, identified with Horos/Sirius, in the Pyramid Texts. It is also (along with Sirius) more northerly than Canopus (the three are more or less in a straight line), suggestive of the dogs that led Isis to Anoubis (which better fits Ploutarkhos's interpretation of the myth, though I think it's a later version).

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On Providence

Tue, 05 Aug 2025 18:26:50 GMT

ὃ δ’ ἀφήμενος οὐκ ἀλεγίζει οὐδ’ ὄθεται
but he sits apart neither heeding nor caring

(Hera speaking of Zeus. Homer, Iliad XV 106b–7a, as translated by yours truly.)

We homeschool my daughter, and the curriculum we are working from is a Christian curriculum—not surprising, I suppose, as most homeschoolers in the USA are so for religious reasons, and so most of the materials on the market cater to that. In any case, the English textbook she is studying had her working with Christian hymns today, and she was complaining about these; so, as a counterpoint, I read her a few bits and pieces from the Homeric Hymns and Orphic Hymns and Porphyry's Hymn to the Intellect, and we discussed what the point of the hymns are, coming to the conclusion that the hymns in her book were about lowering god to the man, while the hymns I showed her were about raising man to the god. This led to a pretty interesting dialogue:

Daughter. But why should we raise ourselves to Zeus (for example)?

Me. Do you care about the cells in your body?

Daughter. What? ... No, not really. I don't even think about them.

Me. But you are like a "cell" in the "body" of Zeus.

Daughter. So Zeus doesn't care about us?

Me. I don't think so. (That's pretty different from what the hymns in your book say, isn't it?) But you still take care of the cells in your body, don't you?

Daughter. I don't try to, but yeah, I guess I kinda do. I mean, if I didn't, I'd get sick and die.

Me. I think that's how it is with Zeus, too. He doesn't care of us but that doesn't mean he doesn't take care of us. (That's what angels are for, after all!) So to raise yourself to Zeus is to harmonize with Zeus: it's like your cell trying to harmonize with your body. Wouldn't your body work better if all your cells tried to be as aware of the whole as possible?

She went away very contemplative...

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Retracing Old Ground

Tue, 05 Aug 2025 17:38:04 GMT

One of my prized possessions, back in the day, was an over-the-top, folio-sized copy of Manly P. Hall's The Secret Teachings of All Ages. (It didn't survive the trip when we fled our old home, alas; but just as well, since it wasn't the direction I needed.)

The highlight of that book, I think, was it's extravagant full-page illustrations by John Augustus Knapp. I had occasion to be looking back over these today, and what do I see in the painting accompanying Hall's essay on Hermetism?

woof woof

Why, it's our old and faithful friend Upuat, waiting to guide us into the ruins of ancient wisdom! Hey there, buddy! Who's a good boy?

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On Digestive Organs

Tue, 29 Jul 2025 14:01:08 GMT

Okay, you guys, it's driving me nuts how everyone says "evil livers" and I need to get to the bottom of it. Murray's translation of Sallustios XIX reads,

[...] which is seen about graves, especially the graves of evil livers.

In the original, this is,

ὃ περὶ τοὺς τάφους καὶ μάλιστα τῶν κακῶς ζησάντων ὁρᾶται.

All of these are genitive case, hence "of." τῶν is the definite article. κακῶς is the adjective "bad" or "evil." ζησάντων is the past-tense active participle of ζῶ "to live," therefore... shit.

SALLUSTIOS HIMSELF SAYS "EVIL LIVERS."

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Spirit and Matter

Sun, 27 Jul 2025 15:49:35 GMT

Plotinos says (Enneads III ix §3) that "Soul is Matter to the Intellectual-Principle."

That is, the Intellect is matter to the One; Soul is matter to the Intellect; and Matter is matter to Nature. Conversely, Soul is spirit to Nature; the Intellect is spirit to Soul; and the One is spirit to the Intellect (insofar as the One is anything at all).

To put it another way, we say that the spirit is potential and matter is actualization; our soul is, in potential, what our body becomes in actuality. So it is that while dead, we see but do not act, and while alive, we act but do not see.

But this is only true from the perspective of the material life: the soul itself is the actualization of its potential in the Intellect. So what do souls do when free from all body? They live, just as we do, in the manner peculiar to their sphere...

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Orphic Hymn to the White Goddess

Fri, 25 Jul 2025 03:05:55 GMT

Λευκοθέας, θυμίαμα, ἀρώματα.
Λευκοθέην καλέω Καδμηΐδα, δαίμονα σεμνήν,
εὐδύνατον, θρέπτειραν ἐϋστεφάνου Διονύσου.
κλῦθι, θεά πόντοιο βαθυστέρνοιο μέδουσα,
κύμασι τερπομένη, θνητῶν σώτειρα μεγίστη.
ἐν σοὶ γὰρ νηῶν πελαγοδρόμος ἄστατος ὁρμή,
μούνη δὲ θνητῶν οἰκτρὸν μόρον εἰν ἁλὶ λύεις,
οἷς ἂν ἐφορμαίνουσα φίλη σωτήριος ἔλθοις.
ἀλλά, θεὰ δέσποινα, μόλοις ἐπαρωγὸς ἐοῦσα
νηυσὶν ἐπ’ εὐσέλμοις σωτήριος εὔφρονι βουλῇ,
μύσταις ἐν πόντῳ ναυσίδρομον οὖρον ἄγουσα.

For the White Goddess. (Cense with aromatics.)
I call the White Goddess, daughter of Kadmos, august divinity,
well-able nurse of well-crowned Dionusos—
hear me, leading goddess of the deep-bosomed sea,
delighting in the waves [of adversity], great savior of mortals;
for by you ships fly unceasingly over the sea,
and you alone untie the pitiable fate of sea-bound mortals,
those to whom you would rush to as a rescuing friend.
But, mistress goddess, come be a helper
to well-decked ships, dispensing gracious advice,
and bring a ship-speeding stretch to sea-going initiates.

(As translated—probably very poorly as the hymns are grammatically difficult!—by yours truly.)

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Riddles

Thu, 24 Jul 2025 04:09:41 GMT

Isn't it interesting how Kalupso's ("she who veils") clothing drags Odusseus down, while Leukothea's veil buoys him up?

Isn't it interesting how the "veil" separates us from spirit, but how the "veiled" mysteries connect us to it?

Isn't it interesting how Loxias ("the oblique one") always shoots straight?

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A Sminthean Postscript

Mon, 21 Jul 2025 13:29:06 GMT

[The goddess] turned [...] Teiresias into a mouse, which is why they say a mouse [...] can tell the future (because it is Teiresias). That it can tell the future is clear because [...] it flees a house in danger of collapse.

(Eustathios of Thessolonike on the Odyssey 1665.48 ff.)

But as [when king Laodamas had been killed in battle,] Teiresias told [the Thebaians] to send a herald to treat with the Argives, and themselves to take to flight, they did send a herald to the enemy, and, mounting their children and women on the wagons, themselves fled from the city.

(Apollodoros, Library III vii §3, as translated by J. G. Frazer.)

Sophocles, the tragic poet, in his drama Laocoon represents Aineias, just before the taking of the city, as removing his household to Mount Ida in obedience to the orders of his father Ankhises, who recalled the injunctions of Aphrodite and from the omens that had lately happened in the case of Laocoon's family conjectured the approaching destruction of the city. His iambics, which are spoken by a messenger, are as follows:

Now at the gates arrives the goddess' son,
Aineas, his sire upon his shoulders borne
Aloft, while down that back by thunderbolt
Of Zeus once smit the linen mantle streams;
Surrounding them the crowd of household slaves.
There follows a multitude beyond belief
Who long to join this Phrygian colony.

(Dionusios of Halikarnassos, Roman Antiquities, as translated by Earnest Cary and Edward Spelman, with minor edits by yours truly.)

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Five Years of Gods

Mon, 21 Jul 2025 04:44:37 GMT

Oh, it looks like my five-year anniversary of blogging on this platform was a week or so ago! As is tradition, I went ahead and grep-ed through my history to determine the relative frequencies of the various gods I mention:

Inana/Ishtar/Astarte/Aphrodite/Venus: 15%
Angel/Daimon/Muse: 14%
Isis/Demeter/Ceres/Hera/Juno/Leto/Latona: 10%
Osiris/Dionusos/Bacchus/Poseidaon/Neptune: 8%
Horos/Apollon: 7%
Intellect/Mind/Nous/Monad/Kronos/Saturn: 7%
Ouranos/the One/the Good/the Tao: 6%
Seth/Haides/Aidoneus/Plouto: 4%
Zeus/Jupiter/Jove/World Soul: 4%
Eros/Cupid/Love: 4%
Helios/Sol/Sun: 3%
Selene/Luna/Moon: 2%
Hermes/Mercury: 2%
Tukhe/Fortuna: 2% (probably so high because of geomancy)
Ares/Mars: 1%
Athene/Minerva: 1%
Anoubis/Artemis/Diana/Hekate: 1%
Persephone/Proserpine: 1%

I have been extremely inconsistent with spelling over the years, and have attempted to account for this. There were also quite a number of miscellaneous other deities from half a dozen pantheons, but I've omitted any that scored less than 1%. Biggest changes from last time are the obviously large boost to Isis/Osiris/Horos based on my studies over the last year, and changes in how I syncretize deities.

(Yes, I syncretize Isis to somehow fight on both sides of the Troian war. What can I say? Greek theology is a mess.)

I didn't touch the heroes that are obviously derived from the myths of the gods, but counting them wouldn't have changed much: as far as I can tell, Horos would have switched places with Osiris, but that's about it.

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On Fate

Fri, 18 Jul 2025 02:46:39 GMT

After the grievous death of his daughter, it next happened to Menkaure that an oracle was sent to him from the city of Bouto, declaring that he had but six years to live and must die in the seventh. The king deemed this unjust, and sent back to the oracle a message of reproach, blaming the god: why must he die so soon who was pious, whereas his father and his uncle had lived long, who shut up the temples, and regarded not the gods, and destroyed men? But a second utterance from the place of divination declared to him that his good deeds were the very cause of shortening his life; for he had done what was contrary to fate; Egypt should have been afflicted for an hundred and fifty years, whereof the two kings before him had been aware, but not Menkaure. Hearing this, he knew that his doom was fixed.

(Herodotos, Histories II §133, as translated by A. D. Godley with minor edits by yours truly.)

Assuming Herodotos's story is trustworthy, this is a fantastic theological argument for something; I'm just not sure what...

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Smintheus

Wed, 16 Jul 2025 21:43:15 GMT

So I'm presently reading Herodotos through for fun, having only read bits and pieces from him before. Today I came across this:

Ἀπάγονται δὲ οἱ αἰέλουροι ἀποθανόντες ἐς ἱρὰς στέγας, ἔνθα θάπτονται ταριχευθέντες, ἐν Βουβάστι πόλι [...]. τὰς δὲ μυγαλᾶς καὶ τοὺς ἴρηκας ἀπάγουσι ἐς Βουτοῦν πόλιν, τὰς δὲ ἴβις ἐς Ἑρμέω πόλιν.
Dead cats are taken away into sacred buildings, where they are embalmed and buried, in the city of Bubastis [...]. Field mice and falcons are taken away to Buto, ibises to the city of Hermes.
(Herodotos, Histories II §67, as translated by A. D. Godley with minor edits by yours truly.)

This struck me, since Bubastis (hence the cat) was the holy place of Bastet (Artemis/Hekate), while Buto (hence the mouse and falcon) was the holy place of Horos (Apollon), being his birthplace. Now, we're very familiar with cats, but the Greeks weren't; they kept weasels to hunt mice, and while we tell silly stories about cats and mice, they told the same sorts of stories about weasels and mice. Here's a dopey example I ran across back when I was studying Teiresias:

[...] δειπνῆσαι ἐν τοῖς Θέτιδος καὶ Πηλέως γάμοις. ἔνθα ἐρίσαι περὶ κάλλους τήν τε Ἀφροδίτην καὶ τὰς Χάριτας, αἷς ὀνόματα Πασιθέη Καλὴ καὶ Εὐφροσύνη. τὸν δὲ δικάσαντα κρῖναι καλὴν τὴν Καλὴν, ἣν καὶ γῆμαι τὸν Ἥφαιστον, ὅθεν τὴν μὲν Ἀφροδίτην χολωθεῖσαν μεταβαλεῖν αὐτὸν εἰν γυναῖκα χερνῆτιν γραῖαν, τὴν δὲ Καλὴν χάριτας αὐτῇ ἀγαθὰς νεῖμαι καὶ εἰς Κρήτην ἀπαγαγεῖν, ἔνθα ἐρασθῆναι αὐτῆς Ἄραχνον, καὶ μιγέντα αὐχεῖν τῇ Ἀφροδίτῃ μιγῆναι. ἐφ' ᾧ τὴν δαίμονα ὀργισθεῖσαν τὸν μὲν Ἄραχνον μεταβαλεῖν εἰς γαλῆν, Τειρεσίαν δὲ εἰς μῦν, ὅθεν καὶ ὀλίγα φησὶν ἐσθίει ὡς ἐκ γραός, καὶ μαντικός ἐστι διὰ τῶν Τειρεσίαν. ὅτι δὲ μαντικόν τι καὶ ὁ μῦς δηλοῦσιν ὅ τε χειμών, οὗ σημεῖον ἐν καιρῷ οἱ τῶν μυῶν τρισμοὶ, καὶ αἱ ἐκ τῶν οἰκιῶν φυγαὶ, ἃς διαδιδράσκουσιν ὅτε κινδυνεύοιεν καταπεσεῖν.
[Teiresias] dined at the wedding of Thetis and Peleus. A beauty contest between Aphrodite and the Graces, named Pasithea ["the goddess of all," wife of Sleep, hence refreshment], Kale ["beauty"], and Euphrosune ["happiness"], was held there. He was made judge and judged Kale the most beautiful, and she married Hephaistos, which so galled Aphrodite that she turned Teiresias into an old spinster, but Kale made her very beautiful and brought her to Crete, where Arakhnos ["spider"] fell in love with her and, having had sex with her, bragged that he lain with Aphrodite herself. This so infuriated the goddess that she turned Arakhnos into a weasel and Teiresias into a mouse, which is why they say a mouse eats so little (because it is an old woman) and why they say it can tell the future (because it is Teiresias). That it can tell the future is clear because its squeakings are a timely sign of a storm, and that it flees a house in danger of collapse.
(Eustathios of Thessolonike on the Odyssey 1665.48 ff., following Sostratos, Teiresias, as very hastily translated by yours truly—please consider it a mere paraphrase.)

Both of these—the association of Horos with mice and the association of the hero Teiresias with a mouse—of course calls to mind how Khruses, the high priest of Apollon, calls to Apollon Smintheus ("Apollon of the Mouse") to visit a plague upon the Akhaians at the beginning of the Iliad:

κλῦθί μευ ἀργυρότοξ’, ὃς Χρύσην ἀμφιβέβηκας
Κίλλάν τε ζαθέην Τενέδοιό τε ἶφι ἀνάσσεις,
Σμινθεῦ εἴ ποτέ τοι χαρίεντ’ ἐπὶ νηὸν ἔρεψα,
ἢ εἰ δή ποτέ τοι κατὰ πίονα μηρί’ ἔκηα
ταύρων ἠδ’ αἰγῶν, τὸ δέ μοι κρήηνον ἐέλδωρ:
τίσειαν Δαναοὶ ἐμὰ δάκρυα σοῖσι βέλεσσιν.
O Smintheus! sprung from fair Latona's line,
Thou guardian Power of Cilla the divine,
Thou source of light! whom Tenedos adores,
And whose bright presence gilds thy Chrysa's shores;
If e'er with wreaths I hung thy sacred fane,
Or fed the flames with fat of oxen slain;
God of the silver bow! thy shafts employ,
Avenge thy servant, and the Greeks destroy.
(Homer, Iliad I 37–42, as translated by Alexander Pope.)

Evidently the ancients thought this very strange and spent a lot of ink trying to make sense of it. One example, concerning not only Apollon and mice but also weasels, runs like this:

Αἰγύπτιοι μὲν οὖν σέβοντές τε καὶ ἐκθεοῦντες γένη ζῴων διάφορα γέλωτα ὀφλισκάνουσι παρά γε τοῖς πολλοῖς: Θηβαῖοι δὲ σέβουσιν Ἕλληνες ὄντες ὡς ἀκούω γαλῆν, καὶ λέγουσί γε Ἡρακλέους αὐτὴν γενέσθαι τροφόν, ἢ τροφὸν μὲν οὐδαμῶς, καθημένης δὲ ἐπ᾽ ὠδῖσι τῆς Ἀλκμήνης καὶ τεκεῖν οὐ δυναμένης, τὴν δὲ παραδραμεῖν καὶ τοὺς τῶν ὠδίνων λῦσαι δεσμούς, καὶ προελθεῖν τὸν Ἡρακλέα καὶ ἕρπειν ἤδη.
καὶ οἱ τὴν Ἁμαξιτὸν τῆς Τρωάδος κατοικοῦντες μῦν σέβουσιν: ἔνθεν τοι καὶ τὸν Ἀπόλλω τὸν παρ᾽ αὐτοῖς τιμώμενον Σμίνθιον καλοῦσί φασιν. ἔτι γὰρ καὶ τοὺς Αἰολέας καὶ τοὺς Τρῶας τὸν μῦν προσαγορεύειν σμίνθον, ὥσπερ οὖν καὶ Αἰσχύλος ἐν τῷ Σισύφῳ ἀλλ᾽ ἀρουραῖός τίς ἐστι σμίνθος ὧδ᾽ ὑπερφυής. καὶ τρέφονται μὲν ἐν τῷ Σμινθείῳ μύες τιθασοὶ δημοσίας τροφὰς λαμβάνοντες, ὑπὸ δὲ τῷ βωμῷ φωλεύουσι λευκοί, καὶ παρὰ τῷ τρίποδι τοῦ Ἀπόλλωνος ἕστηκε μῦς.
μυθολόγημα δὲ ὑπὲρ τῆσδε τῆς θρησκείας καὶ ἐκεῖνο προσακήκοα. τῶν Αἰολέων καὶ τῶν Τρώων τὰ λήια πολλὰς μυῶν μυριάδας ἐπελθούσας ἄωρα ὑποκείρειν καὶ ἀτελῆ τὰ θέρη τοῖς σπείρασιν ἀποφαίνειν. οὐκοῦν τὸν ἐν Δελφοῖς θεὸν πυνθανομένων εἰπεῖν ὅτι δεῖ θύειν Ἀπόλλωνι Σμινθεῖ, τοὺς δὲ πεισθέντας ἀπαλλαγῆναι τῆς ἐκ τῶν μυῶν ἐπιβουλῆς καὶ τὸν πυρὸν αὐτοῖς ἐς τὸν νενομισμένον ἄμητον ἀφικνεῖσθαι.
ἐπιλέγουσι δὲ ἄρα τούτοις καὶ ἐκεῖνα. ἐς ἀποικίαν Κρητῶν οἱ σταλέντες οἴκοθεν ἔκ τινος τύχης καταλαβούσης αὐτοὺς ἐδεήθησαν τοῦ Πυθίου φῆναί τινα αὐτοῖς χῶρον ἀγαθὸν καὶ ἐς τὸν συνοικισμὸν λυσιτελῆ. ἐκπίπτει δὴ λόγιον, ἔνθα ἂν αὐτοῖς οἱ γηγενεῖς πολεμήσωσιν, ἐνταῦθα καταμεῖναι καὶ ἀναστῆσαι πόλιν. οὐκοῦν ἥκουσι μὲν ἐς τὴν Ἁμαξιτὸν τήνδε καὶ στρατοπεδεύουσιν ὥστε ἀναπαύσασθαι, μυῶν δὲ ἄφατόν τι πλῆθος ἐφερπύσαν τά τε ὄχανα αὐτοῖς τῶν ἀσπίδων διέτραγε καὶ τὰς τῶν τόξων νευρὰς διέφαγεν: οἳ δὲ ἄρα συνέβαλον τούτους ἐκείνους εἶναι τοὺς γηγενεῖς, καὶ μέντοι καὶ ἐς ἀπορίαν ἥκοντες τῶν ἀμυντηρίων τόνδε τὸν χῶρον οἰκίζουσι, καὶ Ἀπόλλωνος ἱδρύονται νεὼν Σμινθίου.
ἡ μὲν οὖν τῶν μυῶν μνήμη προήγαγεν ἡμᾶς ἐς θεολογίαν τινά, χείρους δὲ αὑτῶν οὐ γεγόναμεν καὶ τοιαῦτα προσακούσαντες.
People make fun of the Egyptians for regarding different kinds of animals as gods and worshipping them, but I hear that the Thebaians, despite being Hellenes, worship a weasel, since they say that it was the nurse of Herakles himself when he was born, or if it wasn't his nurse, that when Alkmene was in labor and wasn't able to give birth, it ran by and the bind on her labor was released, and Herakles was born and began to crawl right away.
And those who live in Hamaxitos in the Troad worship a mouse, and they say that for that reason they call Apollon, who they worship, by the name "Smintheus," because even today the Aioleans and the Troadians call the mouse sminthos, just like Aiskulos in his Sisyphus:
But what's so special about a field mouse?

And in the Smintheon they keep tame mice by a tax on the people's food, and white ones live in a hole under the altar, and a mouse stands beside the tripod of Apollon.
And those same people tell me a further story, that many myriads of mice came upon the yet unripe field crops of the Aioleans and the Troadians and cut them from beneath, causing the summer harvest to fail early. Accordingly they asked the god at Delphi and he answered that they must sacrifice to Apollon Smintheus, and they obeyed and were delivered from the treachery of the mice and their wheat attained a normal harvest.
And they also tell me another story on that topic, that a group of Cretans who had met with some bad luck were dispatched to found a colony and asked the Puthia to show them some good place where it would be advantageous to resettle, and the oracle answered that they should stop and raise a city where the "earth-born" attack them. So they came to where Hamaxitos now is and camped to rest for the night, but an uncountable multitude of mice snuck up and, scattering everywhere, ate their shield straps and bowstrings. They made the connection between these mice and the "earth-born," and anyway, now being without a means of protecting themselves [on the road], built a city and a temple to Apollon Smintheus.
Well, the mention of mice led us into some theology, but perhaps we are none the worse for hearing such stories.
(Aelian on the Nature of Animals XII v; following Strabo, Geography XIII i §48; in turn following Kallinos; as very hastily translated by yours truly—please consider it a mere paraphrase.)

But Aelien apparently misses the crucial point that Herakles's weasel was a human originally, and was transformed into a weasel by Hera as punishment for supporting Alkmene. Here is Antoninus Liberalis's account of the story:

Προίτου θυγάτηρ ἐν Θήβαις ἐγένετο Γαλινθιάς. αὕτη παρθένος ἦν συμπαίκτρια καὶ ἑταιρὶς Ἀλκμήνης τῆς Ἠλεκτρύωνος. ἐπεὶ δὲ Ἀλκμήνην ὁ τόκος ἤπειγε τοῦ Ἡρακλέους, Μοῖραι καὶ Εἰλείθυια πρὸς χάριν τῆς Ἥρας κατεῖχον ἐν ταῖς ὠδῖσι τὴν Ἀλκμήνην. καὶ αὗται μὲν ἐκαθέζοντο κρατοῦσαι τὰς ἑαυτῶν χεῖρας· Γαλινθιὰς δὲ δείσασα, μὴ Ἀλκμήνην ἐχστήσωσι βαρυνομένην οἱ πόνοι, δραμοῦσα παρά τε τὰς Μοίρας καὶ τὴν Εἰλείθυιαν ἐξήγγειλεν, ὅτι Διὸς βουλῆ γέγονε τῇ Ἀλκμήνῃ παῖς χόρος· αἱ δὲ ἐκείνων τιμαὶ καταλέλυνται. Πρὸς δὴ τοῦτ' ἔκπληξις ἔλαβε τὰς μοίρας καὶ ἀνῆκαν εὐθὺς τὰς χεῖρας. Ἀλκμήνην δὲ κατέλιπον εὐθὺς αἱ ὠδῖνες· καὶ ἐγένετο Ἡρακλῆς. αἱ δὴ Μοῖραι πένθος ἐποιήσαντο καὶ τῆς Φαλινθιάδος ἀφείλοντο τὴν κορείαν, ὅτι θνητὴ τοὺς θεοὺς ἐξηπάτησε, καὶ αὐτὴν ἐπόησαν δολερὰν γαλῆν καὶ δίαιταν ἔδωκαν ἐν τῷ μυχῷ καὶ ἄμορφον ἀπέδειξαν τὴν εὐνήν· θορίσκεται μὲν γὰρ διὰ τῶν ὠτῶν, τίκτει δ' ἀναφέρουσα τὸ κυούμενον ἐκ το τραχήλου. ταύτην Ἑκάτη πρὸς τῆν μεταβολὴν τῆς ὄψεως ᾤχτειρε καὶ ἀπέδειξεν ἱερὰν αὐτῆς διάκονον· Ἡρακλῆς δ' ἐπεὶ ἠυξήθη, τἠν χάριν ἐμνημόνευσε καὶ αὐτῆς ἐπόησεν ἀφίδρυμα παρὰ τὸν οἶκον καὶ ἱερὰ προσήνεγκε. ταῦτα νῦν ἔτι τὰ ἱερὰ Θηβαῖοι φυλάττουσι καὶ πρὸ Ἡρακλέους ἑορῇ θύουσι Φαλινθιάδι πρώτῃ.
At Thebes Proetus had a daughter Galinthias. This maiden was playmate and companion of Alcmene, daughter of Electryon. As the birth throes for Heracles were pressing on Alcmene, the Fates and Eileithyia, as a favour to Hera, kept Alcmene in continuous birth pangs. They remained seated, each keeping their arms crossed. Galinthias, fearing that the pains of her labour would drive Alcmene mad, ran to the Fates and Eileithyia and announced that by desire of Zeus a boy had been born to Alcmene and that their prerogatives had been abolished. At all this, consternation of course overcame the Fates and they immediately let go their arms. Alcmene's pangs ceased at once and Heracles was born. The Fates were aggrieved at this and took away the womanly parts of Galinthias since, being but a mortal, she had deceived the gods. They turned her into a deceitful weasel, making her live in crannies and gave her a grotesque way of mating. She is mounted through the ears and gives birth by bringing forth her young through the throat. Hecate felt sorry for this transformation of her appearance and appointed her a sacred servant to herself. Heracles, when he grew up, remembered the favour she had done for him and made an image of her to set by his house and offered her sacrifices. The Thebans even now maintain these rites and, before the festival of Heracles, sacrifice to Galinthias first.
(Antoninos Liberalis, Metamorphoses XXIX, as translated by Francis Celoria.)

The mention of Hekate here is very interesting, and this leads me to my own conclusion concerning Apollon Smintheus, which ties into a theory I expressed before.

Now, one the one hand, Apollon and Hekate have a sort of connection: Hekate means "from afar," and is the feminine form of a common epithet of Apollon (e.g. as a marksman); on the other hand, the two couldn't be more opposite: Apollon is the lord of light, while Hekate is the lady of darkness; Apollon is heavenly, while Hekate is chthonic; Apollon is associated with unity (indeed, the Neopythagoreans derived his name from ἁ-πολλόν "not many"), while Hekate is associated with multiplicity (always appearing triform). From a Neoplatonistic view, one gets the sense of Apollon guiding upwards and Hekate dragging downwards.

I think all these stories give us another angle on the same thing: Apollon is the god of mice, Hekate the goddess of weasels, and weasels eat mice. Since Apollon is the god of the mysteries, we might consider mice as his initiates; similarly, since Hekate is the goddess of magic, we might consider weasels to be magicians. Thus from these symbols it is very little wonder that most of the philosophers warned their students away from magic so vociferously: at that early stage, fired with enthusiasm for things spiritual, they could very easily be consumed by it and drawn to use spiritual means for material ends. As Lucius found out in the Golden Ass, of course, this leads nowhere.

On the other hand, Homer tells us that Apollon is also the god of falcons, which isn't a surprise to anyone who's been following my Horos series:

ὣς ἄρα οἱ εἰπόντι ἐπέπτατο δεξιὸς ὄρνις,
κίρκος, Ἀπόλλωνος ταχὺς ἄγγελος: ἐν δὲ πόδεσσι
τίλλε πέλειαν ἔχων, κατὰ δὲ πτερὰ χεῦεν ἔραζε
μεσσηγὺς νηός τε καὶ αὐτοῦ Τηλεμάχοιο.
As he was saying so a bird flew towards him on the right,
a falcon, the swift messenger of Apollon; and with its feet
it plucked a pigeon it was holding, and feathers fell to the ground
between Telemakhos and his ship.
(Homer, Odyssey XV 525–8, as translated by yours truly.)

If the association of mice with initiates and weasels with magicians is correct, then falcons are surely heroes: those who have mastered the mysteries and soar on the wings so given.

I should also note, of course, that falcons eat weasels.

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Revision of the Doctrine of Guardian Angels

Tue, 15 Jul 2025 15:43:13 GMT

I was down the other day, and whenever I'm down I tend to think about angels, and that got me poking into the textual history of the Works and Days. It turns out that many variants of Hesiod were current even in antiquity, and that seems to be reflected in what we have access to, today.

The description of the daimons that I was familiar with is the scholarly accepted version of a century ago:

#	Greek	English
109 110 122 125	χρύσεον μὲν πρώτιστα γένος μερόπων ἀνθρώπων ἀθάνατοι ποίησαν Ὀλύμπια δώματ᾽ ἔχοντες. [...] τοὶ μὲν δαίμονες ἁγνοὶ ἐπιχθόνιοι καλέονται ἐσθλοί, ἀλεξίκακοι, φύλακες θνητῶν ἀνθρώπων, οἵ ῥα φυλάσσουσίν τε δίκας καὶ σχέτλια ἔργα ἠέρα ἑσσάμενοι πάντη φοιτῶντες ἐπ᾽ αἶαν, πλουτοδόται: καὶ τοῦτο γέρας βασιλήιον ἔσχον.	First of all, a golden race of humans with divided voice the deathless ones having homes on Olumpus made. [...] They are called holy, righteous daimons on the earth, warding off evil, guardians of mortal men, so they tirelessly police laws and works wearing air and going to and fro over all the land, and are givers of wealth (for they have this royal privilege also).

(The translation is my own, hopefully not too bad!)

As it turns out, lines 122–3 are those given by Platon in the Kratulos; the problem with this is that it disagrees with a different version given by Platon in the Republic, the version given by Ploutarkhos in his commentary on the poem, and the version given by Proklos in his commentary. (It seems that all of the manuscripts of the poem that we have adhere pretty closely to Proklos's version, so it was a wilful choice to favor Platon over it, and to favor the Kratulos over the Republic!) It seems Platon bowdlerized the lines in order to fit the purposes of his dialogues (both literary—these are lines recalled from memory by Socrates—and philosophical—as he uses the descriptions to argue for theological points).

On top of that, lines 124–5 are copied from elsewhere in the poem and appear to be either a gloss or an error in the mainline branch of the manuscripts, and are apparently not duplicated elsewhere (e.g. in Proklos); M. L. West notes that a "police force administering legal justice" is quite different from the Providential givers of all good things described by the rest of the lines; and the grammatical context changes from line to line, too, which seems suspicious (though maybe I'm just not familiar enough with Hesiod's Greek, which always feels rather crabbed to me, at least by comparison with Homer).

At any rate, the current scholarly text, by M. L. West, gives the same section as follows:

#	Greek	English
109 110 122 126	χρύσεον μὲν πρώτιστα γένος μερόπων ἀνθρώπων ἀθάνατοι ποίησαν Ὀλύμπια δώματ᾽ ἔχοντες. [...] τοὶ μὲν δαίμονες εἰσι Διὸς μεγάλου διὰ βουλάς ἐσθλοί, ἐπιχθόνιοι, φύλακες θνητῶν ἀνθρώπων, πλουτοδόται: καὶ τοῦτο γέρας βασιλήιον ἔσχον.	First of all, a golden race of humans with divided voice the deathless ones having homes on Olumpus made. [...] They are righteous daimons by the will of great Zeus, on the earth, guardians of mortal men, and givers of wealth (for they have this royal privilege also).

(Translation also my own.)

We see that the gist is the same, but the two differ in almost every detail. I did a pass previously over the doctrine of guardian angels, but noticing the differences in the modern accepted text, I thought I should do so again:

χρύσεον "golden:" incorruptible, hence never contaminated by material life. (This stands to reason; if material beings are granted guardians [#6, below] by Providence [#3, below] so that we have the potential for purification, then the guardians must themselves have never been material, since if they were, they would need their own guardians, who would need their own guardians, etc., which would be an infinite regress, which is absurd. So the guardians themselves must have never been material at any time.)
πρώτιστα "first of all:" that is, the race of not-gods that is closest to the gods.
τοὶ μὲν δαίμονες εἰσι Διὸς μεγάλου διὰ βουλάς "they are daimons by the will of great Zeus:" Providence, being good, always ensures that there is a pathway to good for all. Each soul's daimon (from δαίομαι "to distribute"), therefore, is the means by which Providence acts (e.g. is distributed to mortals).
ἐσθλοί "righteous:" morally good, virtuous, faithful; does not have the capacity for bad, because they act out the will of Zeus.
ἐπιχθόνιοι "on the earth:" as opposed to in heaven (where the gods live) or below the earth in Tartarus (where the dead live—that is, us), indicating their middle status.
φύλακες θνητῶν ἀνθρώπων "guardians of mortal men:" daimons protect mortals because mortals don't have the perceptive capacity or wisdom to protect themselves.
πλουτοδόται: καὶ τοῦτο γέρας βασιλήιον ἔσχον "givers of wealth (for they have this royal privilege also):" in archaic Greece, social status was not determined by how much you owned (as it is today), but how much and how freely you gave to others. Kings were kings because they had the greatest capacity to give. This same thread is taken up by Plotinos, who assigns higher position to those who are able give more freely of themselves (e.g. gods are gods because they can give without diminishment, and Zeus is king of the gods because Zeus is pre-eminent in doing so). Daimons are the agents by which the gods give: while the gods give universally, daimons give individually, mortals receive individually, once again demonstrating the middle rank of daimons.

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The Neverending Story

Thu, 10 Jul 2025 01:37:40 GMT

I've been studying the Egyptian mysteries of Isis, Osiris, and Horos; I have no idea where they came from, though it seems noteworthy that they are illustrated in the stars, focusing on the heliacal rising and setting of various constellations along the galactic plane. Many of the other mysteries we know about—Innana/Ishtar and Dumuzid, Astarte and Baal, Aphrodite and Adonis, the Eleusinian mysteries, the Dionusian mysteries, the Apolline mysteries, the house of Oikles and some other parts of the Thebaian myth (like Oidipous), the house of Tantalos, the house of Danaus, Atalante, and (I think, though I have not studied it carefully yet) the Argonautica—all seem to derive from these Egyptian mysteries, as they share the same structure and tell the same story.

While I haven't dug very deeply into them, there seem to also have been the Mesopotamian mysteries of Gilgamesh and Enkidu; I also have no idea where they came from, though it seems noteworthy that they are also illustrated in the stars, focusing (as far as I can tell) on the movement of the planets along the constellations of the ecliptic plane. Some others of the mysteries, most notably Herakles, seem to derive from these Mesopotamian mysteries, as they share the same structure and tell the same story.

It's interesting to me that we see a lot of crossover and interaction between these two mysteries: for example, Gilgamesh spurning Ishtar (noting that Taurus, the Bull of Heaven, marks the intersection of the ecliptic and galactic planes just as it marks the intersection of the two myths), Herakles besieging Thebai, Jason taking Herakles on his voyage, etc. I have no idea if these indicate two parts of one greater story, or if they indicate the priority of one set of mysteries over the other, or if they simply show conflict between the different mystery schools.

I suppose that the mysteries are simply a mystery.

Occasionally, at long intervals, we see that an individual takes up the mysteries and sets out to retell them in their own way. "Homer" gave us perhaps the classic version of them in the Odyssey. Virgil retold an explicitly civic Roman version of them in the Aeneid. Apuleius retold an explicitly Platonist version of them in Cupid and Psyche. I haven't yet read it myself, but I'm told that Dante has retold a Christian-Neoplatonist version of them in the Divine Comedy. Within their various contexts, these are praiseworthy works, worthy of respect and ripe for contemplation.

My daughter and I recently finished reading Michael Ende's The Neverending Story, which follows in the same tradition, telling an explicitly Western-occult-revival version of the mysteries. I don't know who Ende studied under, but he certainly mastered at least the Lesser Mysteries, as he has missed nothing and provides worthy commentary and color on each point. One could do far worse than spending a year meditating one's way through it.

It's also, of course, an engaging narrative: my daughter—who, of course, has not studied the mysteries at all—loved it. If you haven't read it (and especially if you've seen the film, which is to the book as lead is to gold), I highly recommend it. It's worthy of your time.

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On Ritual

Wed, 09 Jul 2025 03:19:46 GMT

Oh! I can't believe I missed this, it seems so obvious in hindsight.

In Porphurios's Life of Plotinos (§10), he writes that Plotinos's head student, Amelios, φιλοθύτου γεγονότος "grew ritualistic" and took to frequenting the temples on holy days and once invited his teacher along to the feasts of the gods. Plotinos answered him,

ἐκείνους δεῖ πρὸς ἐμὲ ἔρχεσθαι, οὐκ ἐμὲ πρὸς ἐκείνους.
It is necessary for them to come to me, not I to them.

(Translation mine.)

Amelios, Porphurios, and the rest of the students were apparently so flabbergasted by this that they couldn't bring themselves to ask what he meant.

Now, a lot of people have theories about this. Dodds (The Parmenides of Plato and the Origin of the Neoplatonic "One") figures Plotinos wasn't religious and was just trying to get Amelios to stop pestering him. Armstrong (footnote to his translation) figures that Plotinos considered that only daimons of the lower order go round the temples (as places of blood sacrifice) and thus were beneath him (intent, as he was, on the highest). Three years ago (almost to the day!) I myself made the similar case that Plotinos was after something greater than the mundane gods.

Looking at it again, I think it's much simpler than that (and think Plotinos was much humbler than Porphurios is making him out to be). Plotinos saw no point in going because the experience of divinity is a gift. There is no way a mortal can hope to chase and seize the god; the only way is for the god to look kindly on the mortal. So what would be the point in attending the sacrifices or observing the rituals? The best one can do is to patiently purify and prepare themselves in the hope the god chooses to illumine their efforts.

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The Doctrine of the Roots

Tue, 08 Jul 2025 16:56:09 GMT

Hmm. Herodotos says (Histories I §131) of the Persians,

They call the whole circle of heaven Zeus [e.g. Ahura-Mazda], and to him they offer sacrifice on the highest peaks of the mountains; they sacrifice also to the sun and moon and earth and fire and water and winds.⁠ These are the only gods to whom they have ever sacrificed from the beginning.

Of course we see Empedokles's four roots there. There's just one problem: Empeokles was contemporaneous with Herodotos, writing about the same time as him. (They both lived in what is now Italy, but in different regions: Empedokles in Sicily, and Herodotos in what is now Calabria.)

So here we have another source referencing the same doctrine at the same time as Empedokles. This is another argument in favor of my hypothesis that the four roots did not originate with him, but that he learned them from the Pythagoreans, who learned them from Pythagoras. Where did Pythagoras get them? I had made the case that he got them from the Egyptian mysteries on the basis of deific and symbolic associations, and that's plausible, but then—assuming Herodotos isn't misleading us—it suggests that the Egyptians similarly influenced the Zoroastrians.

On the other hand, Pythagoras is said to have studied with just about everyone (including the Persian magi, though how he had time for it after spending 20 years in Egypt is anyone's guess), and so it's possible that the Greek doctrine of the roots came from the Persians. But then it's a remarkable coincidence that these line up so nicely with the Egyptian teachings which apparently predate Zoroastrianism (or even Mazdaism) by at least a millennium.

Alternatively, it could be that the four roots were generally current in the spiritual milieu of the time, and Empedokles was simply the first to write it down. (This wouldn't be too surprising, since Empedokles was expelled from the Pythagoreans for doing so, meaning that it was a secret teaching.)

Whichever of the cases is true, I think we can be reasonably confident that the teaching didn't originate with Empedokles.

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There and Back Again

Sun, 06 Jul 2025 20:35:59 GMT

I wonder if we have a conflation of historical and mythological in the accounts of Hyperborea.

Diodoros of Sicily tells us (Library of History II xlvii) that Hyperborea is an island larger than Sicily north of Celtia, noting that Leto was born and Apollon peculiarly honored there. He says that the moon is much closer there, so much so that one can even see the mountains on it.

Bakkhulides (Ode 3) tells us that King Kroisos of Ludia, when his city was besieged, set a pyre for himself and his family, but that Apollon put out the pyre and took he and his family away to Hyperborea on account of his piety. Herodotos (Histories I §87) gives a more mundane account, recognizing the rescue of Apollon but simply saying that he became the slave of Kurus the Great.

We see in the contrast of Bakkhulides and Herodotos a sort of mundanizing of the mysterious: what to Bakkhulides is a spiriting away is merely the learning of a lesson to Herodotos. I wonder if we see the same in Diodoros: was Leto's Hyperborea originally a purely mythic place, which was later conflated with a more mundane "Hyperborea" by Diodoros? This would at least be no surprise, as Diodoros explicitly mentions his indebtedness "to those writers who have composed universal⁠ histories" (referring certainly to at least Herodotos), and thus he might be expected to follow Herodotos's historicizing tendency.

If this is so, it is perhaps mistaken to think that Apollon came to Greece from the literal, physical island of Britain; one might presume that the Hyperborea is "beyond the north wind" in a metaphysical sense, thus perhaps linking it with Ploutarkhos's middle world (related, as we are told, from people beyond Britain, who also describe the geography of the lunar surface); that is, the world where we go after the first death but before the second; that is, the world of Water.

This is all to perhaps lend weight to the arm of the scale which holds that Apollon simply came from beyond the sensible world to offer those of us poor mortals who cry for help in this dark world of Earth a faster way out than the usual should we require it.

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The Hero With a Thousand Faces

Mon, 30 Jun 2025 23:50:14 GMT

Digging through my folder of random pictures, I stumbled across this silly nonsense I made for my daughter a while back:

Saint George, his noble steed, and that dragon are all made out of the exact same origami model as that mob of birds I posted several years ago. In light of my recent studies, I award no points for guessing where our plucky hero seems to have originated...

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