- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Books
- Hits: 821
This took me way too long to read.
But, that said, it's a dense book that ties together vast realms of mythology and history and makes the argument that the original Goddesses were later supplanted by Patriarchal religions/myths, of which Christianity is just the final step.
He brings to the topic formidable learning, knowledge of mythology, religion, cultures, classics, and provides a scholarly, if speculative treatment of the subject.
I lack the basest rudiments of knowledge to even begin to question his Thesis, let alone conclusions, but I found intriguing his ideas that the history of humankind has been encoded in myth and folklore, a tradition brought to great heights by the bards of Wales and Ireland.
His interpretations are a gold mine of symbolic thought (as much so as a good reading of Dream Symbols, or Carl Jung).
And - even if he were wrong (and can you be wrong in this? I mean, I credit an informed and educated opinion - but some things - myth and history, for example - will perhaps always be somewhat obscure and impossible to untangle).
I imagine a version of it perhaps better laid out like a "Brewers Phrase and Fable", where you can word-golf around the entire volume and come to your own conclusions.
Ideas - of how the bards arranged and created symbols in trees, that a great many of our early myths evolved to mark the passage of seasons, hence the attention to trees, flowers, animals, every one not merely a tree or flower but marking a point of time and an usage to man. A whole list of associated meanings and implications. As well he touches upon the mythic beginnings of the alphabet, written language, and provides examples of the mnemonic devices poets used upon the finger joints of the hand - the dactyls, the symbolism of the forefinger, the pinkie finger - which, as we use to clean our ears is also known as "The Oracle Finger" as the muse might speak to you privately when you held the finger in your ear - fascinating, because - symbolically again in this we see the beginning of Palmistry. Nola, you should perhaps find a copy in the library and peruse pages 195-201, they might provide some fodder for you...(there's more in there too, but that saves you making any big reading commitments.)
And he provides an informed, impartial and intelligent/reasoned view of Christianity, done from without the Church, while a great many people are critical of Christianity (and for good reason), few have done the research he has. He covers the countless misinterpretations of ancient illustrations, myths and texts, that led to the Biblical Scriptures as we know them.
So - intriguing. Much to think about and a book to be revisited. Once again the right book at the right time. But my god a formidable read.
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Books
- Hits: 1104
Considerably simpler and much more readable than Jodorowski's treatment of the same.
Filled with Jungian references, the history of the Tarot, various incidental characters and metaphysicians, alchemists and other occultists both known and unknown, more obscure writers for me to trap down, these are all spurs to my curiosity.
He makes plain what you knew all along, the interpretations of the cards relatively straightforward and memorable - and - flipping back to Jodorowski; realize that it is possible to give a little too much information. His whole "If the Cards Could Speak" bit is a little over-the-top, if you ask me...
One recalls Bruhl-Levy and Primitive Mind, in which nothing occurs by chance, and so if you place your faith in the cards then so be it, but - JC and the Bible oppose; for you and you alone are the arbitrar of fate.
Nonetheless, the rich symbolism of the cards attracts, and the many ways to shuffle and approach the journey are intriguing to me. As was the information that Manly P. Hall and Knapp conspired to produce their own Tarot Deck, (Link: https://www.prs.org/store/p2910/The_Knapp-Hall_Tarot_Deck_--_Limited_Edition_Reprint.html) which, given Manly's stance on the Occult I suspect were more for meditative than divinatory purposes, although, as we know, in life more than two things, even entirely contradictory, can be true.
Anyways, enjoying this, a pleasant break from Henry James and the melancholy canals and churches of Venice.
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Books
- Hits: 947
Lured into this by his reputation, by the glowing references provided by Henry Miller, others, reading the French on the left (badly, out loud in my head) and then the English on the right (better), but I'm not smitten and my French is lousy so it's a slender book taking much longer than what it should take me to read; it's a palate cleanser of all the things I was enjoying reading. I get or understand his genius, but it's not at the moment to my taste, and the few pages remaining are proving an obstacle to my moving on and finding something else to enjoy...
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Books
- Hits: 1023
Alexandra David-Neel, in the tradition of Great White Explorers, journeys to Lhasa, Tibet, forbidden to all Western Women. This, in 1923, largely on foot, with her faithful companion and adopted son Tibetan Llama Yongden.
Now, a fine adventure, and the situations and people she encounters are so rustic it's hard to believe this took place a mere 100 years ago. There are the monks, medieval intrigues, robbers, fine accounts of the superstitions, customs, politics, there are the amusing 'vignettes' or portraits of domestic Tibetan life, bliss, or otherwise, stories told in the character of Chaucer.
There is, something I've noticed in these older lady explorer types, a certain style of narrative that they adhere to, it's as if they were telling you the stories themselves. In the first person, a very natural tone that other male authors try to distance themselves from.
Anyways that said she's as prone to telling her own romantic brand of Travelers tales as anyone, and while she professes Western Skepticism she as well buys into the Llama /Superstitious aspects of Buddhism as much as the next person- just not as much as your indoctrinated Tibetan. The occasional fantastic happening can't possibly hurt readership, can it?
And, there is something else that slightly annoyed me about it. This voyage, by necessity a deception (she impersonates a Tibetan Beggar Lady, the Holy City of Lhasa is off-limits to Western Women), yet she harps continually upon her cleverness, the near exposures, and somewhat paints the people who good-naturedly accept the deception as rubes. Perhaps they are, but - dependent as she is upon their hospitality, it would be kinder if she never mentioned it.
A fine read but not a great book, merely another view into a culture and way of life that's largely vanished.
You can read it online here: https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.40184, although it's not too hard to find in paperback - reprinted in 1986, maybe even again since.
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Books
- Hits: 1002
I'd read his "Arabian Sands", and, for want of anything better, picked this up to read. Interesting, a fine documentation of a way of life I suspect by now to be entirely extinct.
This, the Arabs that live in the Salt Marshes at the Mouth of the Euphrates - and his years amongst them. This - written in the early to late 50's, and he's seeing the changes that are already happening - his disparaging views of the Oil Industry, which (as he prophesized) entirely ruined their way of life. Which - to a casual reader - might not seem like such a big deal, they were pretty primitive - but we all lose with the dearth of diversity.
Of note, he mentions a legendary village in the Salt Marshes - Hufaidh - that is hidden by Djinn and addles the speech of any who come across it. He talks of the Arabs belief that there is hidden treasure, (not unsurprising, given the 5000+ years of occupation), a bit of the history of the area, of being a doctor to everyone he meets (he's a limited knowledge of medicine, and a chest filled with cures) - and he tells of him being recruited to perform circumcisions, and, as a result of his superior techniques and after-care ends up doing some days more than 100 - and - amongst the uncircumcised the "...was circumcised by an angel at birth" - to avoid the unwanted infections & mutilations, he tells of the blood feuds, and his bringing an air rifle - which is popular to shoot birds, and his observation: "You can usually get on terms with people by helping them to kill something". And there's mention of the people of the South Marshes, the Sabaeans - neither Muslim, Christian or Jew, something quite other entirely. Which, if true makes them something of an anachronism, as Wiki refers to the cult as dying out by 275 AD.
Anyways, a diversion in line with much of my current reading. Good.