THE |
|
a cache of usenet and other text files pertaining
to occult, mystical, and spiritual subjects. |
To: alt.magick,alt.magick.tyagi From: catherine yronwodeSubject: Re: Magical Men, Magical Women; don't forget to come rescue us! Date: Fri, 19 Sep 2003 22:22:49 GMT mika wrote: > I take that aspect of Jesus' story as a continuation of the story of > Abraham. God instructed Abraham to sacrifice a goat instead of his > son, which was the first 'religious evolution', from human sacrifice > to animal sacrifice. Then, with Jesus is the next stage of religious > evolution, from animal sacrifice to purely symbolic sacrifice (wine). Abraham found a lamb, not a goat kid. But more importantly, within the Jewish religion, the sacrifice made by Abraham was NOT "the first 'religious evolution', from human sacrifice to animal sacrifice." There is no record of human sacrifice being offered to YHVH among the early Jews at all. In fact, Jewish scripture expresses HORROR at the idea that human sacrifices were offered to other Middle Eastern gods. This is not to say that the forebears of the Jews Might not have practiced human sacrifice in prehistoric times, as some other Neolithic cultures did, but with no evidence in Jewish scripture that Jews, as Jews, did so, there is no reason to use their scriptures to account for a dubious social "evolutionary" theory that requires "'religious evolution', from human sacrifice to animal sacrifice." Whether you accept as factual the chronology of Jewish history as detailed in Jewish scripture or merely take that chronology as an expression of Jewish beliefs about Jewish history, you will see that Jews have a record of and/or a self concept of themselves as a culture that practiced animal sacrifice LONG before the days of Abraham. See Cain and Abel in the Book of Genesis. Abel sacrificed animals (lambs, burnt offerings) and Cain sacrificed vegetables and fruits and grain. The god YHVH chose the animal sacrifice, favouring Abel. This symbolizes an implied cultural decision and/or an explanation for the fact that the Jews were shepherds. They presumed that their god YHVH favoured the sacrifices made by nomadic shepherding people over those made by sedentary farming people. Cain the farmer, was, by the way, so angry that YHVH rejected his vegetable sacrifices that he killed his brother Abel, the shepherd. By identifying with the righteous victim of this injustice, the Jews presented in strong terms their choice of herding as a lifestyle. Then, further down the time stream, along came the shepherd Abraham -- and YHVH told him to sacrifice his son! This was entirely unexpected and rude of YHVH! He had been happily accepting lambs and kids as sacrifices and now he wanted a human boy! Bob Dylan (a Jew with a sense of humour) well expressed the shock and outrage that this untoward demand on YHVH's part has on the minds of Jews, in the song "Highway 61 Revisited": God said to Abraham, "Kill Me a son." Abe said, "Man, you must be putting me on." God said, "No." Abe said, "What?" God said, "You can do anything you want to, but... The next time you see me comin', you better run." Abe said, "Where do you want this killin' done?" And God said, "Down on Highway 61." (The reference to Highway 61, for non USA residents, is to a stretch of road in rural Mississippi. The title of this mid 1960s song is "Highway 61 *Revisited*" because there is a famous old blues song of the 1920s called "61 Highway" a.k.a. "Highway 61 Blues." During the 1960s civil rights movement, in which Bob Dylan participated, there was a voter registration drive in Mississippi and local Anglo Americans murdered a number of African American leaders and their Jewish supporters in that region. Dylan is analogizing the martyrdom of the slain Jewish and African American civil rights workers to a religious sacrifice ordained by God. This was before Dylan converted temporarily to Christianity, back when most of his religious allegories were Jewish.) In the original Biblical story, of course, it turns out that YHVH was only testing Abraham's loyalty. The boy, Isaac, was not killed because at the last moment, YHVH provided a lamb for the sacrifice. YHVH continued his practice of accepting lambs and kids as his preferred sacrifices. When the Jews were enslaved in Egypt and could not herd sheep and live nomadically, many of them turned to worship of local Egyptian deities. JHVH promised to grant them freedom, but as a down payment on this freedom, he asked each family to sacrifice a lamb, to mark their doorways with the blood, and to hold a feast indoors after their old nomadic customs while his angels killed the firstborn children of the Egyptians and passed over the homes of the faithful Jews. This was another test of faith -- and the Jews demonstrated their loyalty to YHVH, earned their freedom, and celebrate the event each year with the Passover (Pesach) festival, in which a leg of lamb is eaten in the home. When the Jews escaped from Egypt, where did they go? Back into "the wilderness," resuming their erstwhile nomadic herding life and living in tents for another 40 years. Eventually they did settle down in towns (by conquering them) but as long as they remained a tribal culture, they always sacrificed lambs and kids as if they were still desert nomads and they always wrestled with the concept of the test of loyalty and faith. In part, the importance of the test of loyalty and faith in Judaism is based in the fact that the Jews have no belief in reincarnation and very scant belief in an afterlife. Thus the workings of justice on Earth are of great importance in Jewish theology and there is a continual questioning of why, if, or how one should remain loyal and faithful to a deity who may not reward one or whose blessings may be fickle. The testing of Abraham's loyalty and faith is paralleled elsewhere in the Jewish scriptures in the Book of Job, whose faith is tested by YHVH and his helper Satan. They arrange for a series of tragedies to befall Job to see if he will keep worshipping YHVH. He does, thus also passing the test of faith. Neither the Jewish idea of animal sacrifice nor the Jewish emphasis on the testing of loyalty and faith were developed with reference to later Christian religious concepts of sacrifice, and most especially they are not "evolutionarily" connected to Christian concepts which were formed by borrowing elements of Jewish religious scripture in support of a new form of worship to a new deity. In fact, the breakdown of the Christian borrowing process from a strictly literary standpoint is quite evident when one compares the Christian story of the crucifixion of Jesus with the Jewish accounts of the testing of faith that occur in the stories of Abraham, the Passover, and Job. In all the Jewish stories, the persons being tested are granted an extension of mortal life and renewed happiness on Earth as a reward for demonstrating faithful loyalty to YHVH. Jesus, on the other hand, fails the test of faith, crying out, "My God, why hast thou forsaken me?" and then he dies ignobly. He is not faithful to JHVH and thus he is not rewarded with a happy life on Earth. The Christian authors explain away Jesus' failing the test of faith by recasting the story as a fable of HUMAN SACRIFICE -- even going so far as to call Jesus "The Lamb" as if he were incubated in Mary's womb simply to be fattened and eaten by YHVH. This is kind of a gross idea to people who raised sheep and then sacrificed lambs to their god, reserving the blood for the deity and eating the flesh themselves, after the manner of most tribal cultures' sacrificial customs. The idea of human sacrifice to JHVH certainly does not recommend Christianity to most Jews, i can tell you from experience. Cordially, cat yronwode Freemasonry for Women ------- http://www.luckymojo.com/comasonry.html
The Arcane Archive is copyright by the authors cited.
Send comments to the Arcane Archivist: tyaginator@arcane-archive.org. |
Did you like what you read here? Find it useful?
Then please click on the Paypal Secure Server logo and make a small donation to the site maintainer for the creation and upkeep of this site. |
The ARCANE ARCHIVE is a large domain,
organized into a number of sub-directories, each dealing with a different branch of religion, mysticism, occultism, or esoteric knowledge. Here are the major ARCANE ARCHIVE directories you can visit: |
|
interdisciplinary:
geometry, natural proportion, ratio, archaeoastronomy
mysticism: enlightenment, self-realization, trance, meditation, consciousness occultism: divination, hermeticism, amulets, sigils, magick, witchcraft, spells religion: buddhism, christianity, hinduism, islam, judaism, taoism, wicca, voodoo societies and fraternal orders: freemasonry, golden dawn, rosicrucians, etc. |
SEARCH THE ARCANE ARCHIVE
There are thousands of web pages at the ARCANE ARCHIVE. You can use ATOMZ.COM
to search for a single word (like witchcraft, hoodoo, pagan, or magic) or an
exact phrase (like Kwan Yin, golden ratio, or book of shadows):
OTHER ESOTERIC AND OCCULT SITES OF INTEREST
Southern
Spirits: 19th and 20th century accounts of hoodoo,
including slave narratives & interviews
|