A Discussion

I'm in the process of establishing morning and evening devotions as I don't particularly care for the ones I've found.  I'm trying to come up with a general invocation and was wondering if anyone had any ancient sources or ideas.  I was also trying to incorporate a little Greek.  So far I was thinking something along the lines of, "Hear, Theoi and Theai.  Join me here to witness this rite held in your honor."  Though I get an off feel from that for some reason.

There is no need for any elaborate invocation. One asks for one's prayers to be heard in good favor, but beyond that, it is for God to decide.

For worship, all you need do is establish ritual purity (by either bathing, washing, and/or aspersion), light a candle or lamp, affirm that you are going to engage in worship (asking that your prayers be heard favorably), pray (beginning always with Estia/Vesta), and give your offering in recognition/demonstration of your worship. That is the basic procedure of nearly any act of worship, no matter how great or small.

Something as simple as:
"Hear me, O ye Blessèd; I pray, look with favor on my words."

is quite sufficient to center your thoughts on what you are doing, to affirm that you will be worshipping, and to do your part to approach the Supernal Ones.

In contrast, closed ceremonies, such as those open only to initiates of Mystery cults, have begun always with the widely-recognizable (at least in Antiquity) injunction to "Depart from here, ye sinners; shut your doors, who who are profane!" quoted even in Plato — but that is a different kettle of fish from simple everyday worship.

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If you'd want to see the basic procedure written out in a more linear/instructional way, I have such posted here.

Erodius wrote:In contrast, closed ceremonies, such as those open only to initiates of Mystery cults, have begun always with the widely-recognizable (at least in Antiquity) injunction to "Depart from here, ye sinners; shut your doors, who who are profane!" quoted even in Plato — but that is a different kettle of fish from simple everyday worship.

Is that the "Eko, eko" or "Este, este" (I forget which) thing?  I've seen that used in other stuff and always thought it was odd to use it in that way.

Thank you, as always, for your help and thank you for the link.  I had a bunch of your stuff bookmarked but lost it when you moved to the new blog.

Is that the "Eko, eko" or "Este, este" (I forget which) thing?

I imagine you're thinking of a phrase something like 'ΕΚΑΣ ΕΣΤΕ ΒΕΒΗΛΟΙ' which I imagine is probably a modern reduction from the classical proclamation of Mystēria. That phrase just means 'the βέβηλοι be far away'.

Depending on the context, ΒΕΒΗΛΟΙ can mean 'public/common/secular', or, in the case of the Orphic use, 'unholy/polluted/sinful/uninitiated'. Some with only basic versing in Classical religion might certainly mistake the phrase for a dismissal of general ills, but it is, in reality, a literal dismissal of the profane non-initiates unfit to take part in the sacred liturgies.

The full line in Greek is:

"Θύρας δ' ἐπίθεσθε βέβηλοι, φεύγοντες δικαίων θεσμούς, θείοιο τεθέντος πᾶσι νόμου!"

Which is, roughly:

"Depart and shut the doors, you profane, who flee from the orders of righteousness, the Divine Law announced to all mankind."

Thank you, as always, for your help and thank you for the link. I had a bunch of your stuff bookmarked but lost it when you moved to the new blog.

You're certainly welcome. You must have been following me for quite a time then — I switched blogging platforms more than a year ago. I'm honored.  

I think we're talking about the same thing.  I've read it in Wiccan books where they're 'cleansing the space.'

Yeah, I've been following you for a while.  ...that didn't sound odd at all.  Speaking of which, did you have a Tumblr at one time?  I swear I saw a link to a blog called Eusebeis and thought it might be you, but the blog had been deleted.  

Back to topic kind of.  I had another question that didn't EXACTLY relate to my previous question but is kinda of similar.  I'm writing out personal prayers to some of the gods associated with night instead of using the Orphic hymns.  For instance, asking Hypnos for good sleep.  Now, would saying "As you will it, so shall it be", be okay?  I think I'm being uptight, but just want to check on these things.

Yeah, I've been following you for a while.  ...that didn't sound odd at all.  Speaking of which, did you have a Tumblr at one time?  I swear I saw a link to a blog called Eusebeis and thought it might be you, but the blog had been deleted.

I did once upon a time.  I shut it down a long time ago. Tumblr is a worse cesspool than YouTube.

Back to topic kind of.  I had another question that didn't EXACTLY relate to my previous question but is kinda of similar.  I'm writing out personal prayers to some of the gods associated with night instead of using the Orphic hymns.  For instance, asking Hypnos for good sleep.  Now, would saying "As you will it, so shall it be", be okay?  I think I'm being uptight, but just want to check on these things.

Well, that's a bit of a truistic sentence (and sounds to me like an overused cliché out of a DIY/Idiot's Guide series on "witchcraft"). Divine Necessity is just that, necessity. The will of god will transpire by virtue of its very nature as being divine volition. Instead, you can simply ask plainly for a safe and restful night. As basic as "Hear, O sibling Oneiroi (Sleep, Dream and Death — they are brothers), let me rest in safety and peace through the night."

Don't worry about being 'uptight.' It is not necessarily a bad thing — quite the contrary. 'Uptight' is relative; what is 'uptight' to one person may be 'careful and diligent' to another.

Yeah, Tumblr has its problems to put it lightly, but I stay for a sense of community.

Well, I was a Greek polytheist for a while and then drifted away to Wicca. Now I'm coming back and I'm trying to divest myself of that thinking, which is, I guess, why I'm asking so many questions.

I prefer the word diligent, so I'll be using that from now on.

There are stupid questions, but no *honest* question is ever, ever a stupid one.

If you want to know the answer to a question, you've gotta ask it – ideally, to somebody best equipped to help you. And here is a very good place to receive such help.

Well, I was a Greek polytheist for a while and then drifted away to Wicca. Now I'm coming back and I'm trying to divest myself of that thinking, which is, I guess, why I'm asking so many questions.

Cut your mind some slack. You aren't going to just miraculously get accustomed to a new religion overnight. Eager is good, but there is a reason that many religions have some sort of catechumency period prior to formal induction. It is to encourage thorough study and instruction in order to discern one's choice rightly before having to commit.

A religion is like a marriage. You wouldn't want to marry someone you've just met, even if you're initially infatuated with him/her. Get to know your S/O inside out and backwards first before you 'put a ring on it.'

Camable wrote:Is that the "Eko, eko" or "Este, este" (I forget which) thing?

Camable wrote:I think we're talking about the same thing.  I've read it in Wiccan books where they're 'cleansing the space.'.

You're confusing the two. There is a witches chant "Eko, Eko,..." but that's different from "Hekas, Hekas Este Bebeloi". the latter was borrowed by and is primarily used in Golden Dawn ceremonial magic rather than Wicca or witchcraft. THOUGH, subsequently some witches or Wiccans influenced by GD may use it as well. Golden Dawn uses it to signal the beginning of ritual among initiates.

Callisto wrote:

Camable wrote:Is that the "Eko, eko" or "Este, este" (I forget which) thing?

Camable wrote:I think we're talking about the same thing.  I've read it in Wiccan books where they're 'cleansing the space.'.

You're confusing the two. There is a witches chant "Eko, Eko,..." but that's different from "Hekas, Hekas Este Bebeloi". the latter was borrowed by and is primarily used in Golden Dawn ceremonial magic rather than Wicca or witchcraft. THOUGH, subsequently some witches or Wiccans influenced by GD may use it as well. Golden Dawn uses it to signal the beginning of ritual among initiates.

Thank you for the clarification, Callisto. I'm only tangentially familiar with either the original GD or its handful of quasi-successors following its dissolution. My background in ceremonial Hermetism comes from the OAS (whose name, incidentally, drives me nuts as a Latinist, because the Latin doesn't make sense. I imagine they wanted it to be 'Order of the Golden Sun' [Ordo Aurei Solis], but what they have [Ordo Aurum Solis] means 'Order, gold, of the Sun.' 'Ordo' is masculine and nominative, 'Solis' is masculine and genitive, 'Aurum' is neuter. They have a string of three nouns . . . but that is a Latinist's conniption.  

Callisto wrote:You're confusing the two. There is a witches chant "Eko, Eko,..." but that's different from "Hekas, Hekas Este Bebeloi". the latter was borrowed by and is primarily used in Golden Dawn ceremonial magic rather than Wicca or witchcraft. THOUGH, subsequently some witches or Wiccans influenced by GD may use it as well. Golden Dawn uses it to signal the beginning of ritual among initiates.

I actually think I was combining the two into some sort of unholy combo.   I'm familiar with the Eko, eko azarak, eko, eko zomelak and the ekas, ekas thing.  I've heard them both used in circle casting, the first to call the quarters and the second to cleanse the space.  But, yeah, I got everything figured out, so thanks for the help everyone.

This thread is good food for thought. It evokes something of our contemporary religious landscape. I am pleased to see earnest talk about how we should comport ourselves to the Gods. But I also see the possibility of error, which can come from New Ageism (I see the Golden Dawn, Wicca, etc. being mentioned here).

I wonder: what is the difference in attitude between traditional conceptions of prayer and New Age conceptions? The one praying may be earnest and the prayer may be heartfelt, but what kind of things does a particularly erroneous New Age use of prayer promote, that might mislead a newcomer to traditional forms of religion? Are New Age conceptions simply more egoistic, containing more fluff? Or is there something more subtle, like the kind of excessive sentimentality we see in much of Western Christianity pervading the maternal/protecting milieu of Wicca?

I ask these questions not simply to smear New Age spirituality, but to express some sincere curiosity over what I have seen as the overly therapeutic "neopagan" manifestations of traditional polytheisms. Jungianism, for example, often turns the tradition into a sort of implement or piece of equipment for modernity, and religion is nothing more but a kind of "lifestyle" or "identity," with the Gods as "life coaches" ready to convince you to hop on the exercise bike, etc. (I am not exaggerating, I have seen Jungian "Gnostics" say these kinds of things!).

Out of Phlegethon wrote:This thread is good food for thought.  It evokes something of our contemporary religious landscape.  I am pleased to see earnest talk about how we should comport ourselves to the Gods.  But I also see the possibility of error, which can come from New Ageism (I see the Golden Dawn, Wicca, etc. being mentioned here).  
 
I wonder: what is the difference in attitude between traditional conceptions of prayer and New Age conceptions?  The one praying may be earnest and the prayer may be heartfelt, but what kind of things does a particularly erroneous New Age use of prayer promote, that might mislead a newcomer to traditional forms of religion?  Are New Age conceptions simply more egoistic, containing more fluff?  Or is there something more subtle, like the kind of excessive sentimentality we see in much of Western Christianity pervading the maternal/protecting milieu of Wicca?  

You cannot imagine how happy I am to hear you say that. I have never made it a secret how dangerous and destructive I feel new-ageism can be to religion and culture in general. I would never advocate causing any harm to any innocent person, ever, but it is my conviction that the stereotypical new-age ideology is a very serious error. Certainly, at best new-ageism can manifest as a sort of inquisitive agnosticism, but at worst (and this is the direction I usually see it taking) it becomes a sacralization of everything wrong with contemporary Western culture, mixed up with a dollop of 19th century romanticism, and plenty of Gimbutiene's hogwash. It can easily become an anti-moral, culturally-insensitive, instant-gratification, everything's tulips and gumdrops, 'you're special and entitled to everything your heart desires without any effort on your part', historical-revisionist, anti-philosophical/intellectual, autolatric religious libertinism.

Stereotypically speaking, a new-age 'prayer', in my experience, is often either a trite 'ode to the beauty of the loving magical earth goddess moon mother', or one of any bewildering array of methods of summoning/dismissing/finding a lover, or money. If it's not an encomium of earth, it has something to do with sex or money — just like everything else in the contemporary popular culture of which new-ageism is a personification (now, neither sex nor money are inherently bad things; they are neutral. There is nothing wrong with enjoying either or both within reason. But turning sex and material happiness into the foundation of a religion is, as I consider it, a grave sacrilege).

New-ageism, as I have experienced it, makes the individual the supreme authority of the cosmos — a fundamentalist egoism in which gods are nothing more than edgy imaginary friends to tell you how special you are, or a spice cabinet of one-dimensional archetypes that can be mixed and matched like building blocks to help the individual grant her every fleeting whim and impulse. In many of these systems, as I've seen them, there is an energetic effort to obliterate any possible source of guilt, obligation to righteousness, or moral objectivity. Guilt is nullified by making it nearly impossible to do anything wrong, even if one tried to. It can become an irrational, anti-intellectual, hypersentimentality taken to the n-th degree; fluff soaked with egoism emitting vapors of whining sentimentality, sprinkled with purple glitter, fake fairy wings, and cat ears.

The possible misleading, as far as I see, is that individuals unfamiliar with the genuine religions may make the honest and understandable mistake — what with the vast ocean of nonsense that predominates the internet with regard to any subject — that such religions, in their actual being and form, have nearly any commonalities at all with new-agery other than those that result from being the sources from which new-agers transplant names of divinities. The danger is the equation of new-agery with classical and traditional religions — something I see happening all the time.

I ask these questions not simply to smear New Age spirituality, but to express some sincere curiosity over what I have seen as the overly therapeutic "neopagan" manifestations of traditional polytheisms. Jungianism, for example, often turns the tradition into a sort of implement or piece of equipment for modernity, and religion is nothing more but a kind of "lifestyle" or "identity," with the Gods as "life coaches" ready to convince you to hop on the exercise bike, etc. (I am not exaggerating, I have seen Jungian "Gnostics" say these kinds of things!).

A thousand ita est's.  

Erodius wrote:It can easily become an anti-moral, culturally-insensitive, instant-gratification, everything's tulips and gumdrops, 'you're special and entitled to everything your heart desires without any effort on your part', historical-revisionist, anti-philosophical/intellectual, autolatric religious libertinism.

Yes.  I see it as an unconsciously-embedded modernity with a totally legitimate spiritual thirst (considering our current climate of technological nihilism and spiritual impotence), whose modern desire for a John Stuart Mill-style permissive society (do what you want, as long as it harms no other) crystallizes into an all-encompassing "do what thou wilt."  So when people feel exhausted by the spiritual void at the core of modern society, rather than considering tradition,they go in for another of modernity's self-serving hallucinations.

Erodius wrote:
New-ageism, as I have experienced it, makes the individual the supreme authority of the cosmos — a fundamentalist egoism in which gods are nothing more than edgy imaginary friends to tell you how special you are, or a spice cabinet of one-dimensional archetypes that can be mixed and matched like building blocks to help the individual grant her every fleeting whim and impulse. In many of these systems, as I've seen them, there is an energetic effort to obliterate any possible source of guilt, obligation to righteousness, or moral objectivity. Guilt is nullified by making it nearly impossible to do anything wrong, even if one tried to. It can become an irrational, anti-intellectual, hypersentimentality taken to the n-th degree; fluff soaked with egoism emitting vapors of whining sentimentality, sprinkled with purple glitter, fake fairy wings, and cat ears.

I think it is important for us to underline these two insights here: (1) individualism, and (2) the nonjudgmental attitude ("any possible source of guilt" avoided; on others, and on oneself).  These two cultural phenomena are ultimately just unsublimated or unaltered dogmas embedded in the mind by modernity.  A permissive society, in which one can act out all one's fantasies, fetishes and lifestyles, must naturally be nonjudgmental, because guilt over a virtue that needs to be worked on-- or an attempt at moderation that gives way to impulsivity-- may be too "traumatic" or "insensitive."  It is basically a "no fly-zone" erected in our habits and customs by cultural relativism.  A person that judges one for one's acts becomes a kind of site of moral evil that needs to be extinguished, because virtues are ultimately just Eurocentric constructions, whereas we all know that values are totally subjective qualities, of course!  Do what thou wilt!

Yes.  I see it as an unconsciously-embedded modernity with a totally legitimate spiritual thirst (considering our current climate of technological nihilism and spiritual impotence), whose modern desire for a John Stuart Mill-style permissive society (do what you want, as long as it harms no other) crystallizes into an all-encompassing "do what thou wilt."  So when people feel exhausted by the spiritual void at the core of modern society, rather than considering tradition,they go in for another of modernity's self-serving hallucinations.

I concur 100%. The Religious Void, which I perceive as a consequence of a union of 'Enlightenment'-era empiricism-only reasoning with the rise and eventual centuries of predominance of dry, grey and lifeless forms of Protestantism over much of the more culturally-influential Western powers of the last two centuries, meets its sibling, Hyper-Relativism (itself, I think, a simultaneous child of and reaction against Hyper-Empiricism), and in their metaphysical incest they beget new-ageism. It is a dreadful shame, because I agree, the religious thirst of those who fall prey to new-ageism are very, very real and entirely understandable. And what's worse — once new-ageism takes over, it is neigh impossible, in my experience, for someone to overcome, because virtually every aspect and facet of popular culture actively encourages the mindsets and ideologies to flourish. Reinforcement of the hallucinations are around every corner, in every store, every restaurant ("Have it your way! Always!" *wink wink*), in a zillion and one self-help books, in instant-miracle diet fads, and so on. Everything in life becomes 'up to you!   ' and 'whatever makes you happy!'. Everything becomes a choice, and every choice becomes the right choice because there is no such thing as wrong. Can't have the potential for wrong choices can we, because wrong choices get one chastised, and when one is chastised, one feels guilt (which is not allowed!  ), and most horrifying of all, when one is chastised, one is typically informed why what one did is wrong, and admonished not to do it again. This, for stereotypical new-ageists, is the pinnacle of blasphemy because it is a serious faux-pas to ask anyone to change or improve anything at all about him/herself for any reason, because 'everyone is just so special and perfect just the way they are!', and if one criticizes anyone or any thing (how dare one!), or speaks against omnipresent relativism, one is instantly labeled a bigoted and intolerant maniac-hateful-chauvinist-Nazi-communist-Christian-fascist-etc. In the mindset I'm describing, the concept 'wrong' cannot be allowed to exist, unless it is applied to anyone who criticizes the egoistic, entitled relativism.

These two cultural phenomena are ultimately just unsublimated or unaltered dogmas embedded in the mind by modernity.  A permissive society, in which one can act out all one's fantasies, fetishes and lifestyles, must naturally be nonjudgmental, because guilt over a virtue that needs to be worked on-- or an attempt at moderation that gives way to impulsivity-- may be too "traumatic" or "insensitive."  It is basically a "no fly-zone" erected in our habits and customs by cultural relativism.  A person that judges one for one's acts becomes a kind of site of moral evil that needs to be extinguished, because virtues are ultimately just Eurocentric constructions, whereas we all know that values are totally subjective qualities, of course!  Do what thou wilt!

Amen, amen. Any improvement, reproach or moderation becomes unacceptable because, as I theorized above, the individual is enshrined as perfect and the measure of all things exactly as he/she is. As you say, any criticism is 'traumatic' and 'insensitive' and shows nothing, by their reckoning, other than that you are 'just a big fat meanie'.

I like your 'relativism-enforced no-fly-zone over habits and customs' analogy — I think that's brilliant and hits the nail on the head.

Erodius wrote:  The Religious Void, which I perceive as a consequence of a union of 'Enlightenment'-era empiricism-only reasoning with the rise and eventual centuries of predominance of dry, grey and lifeless forms of Protestantism over much of the more culturally-influential Western powers of the last two centuries, meets its sibling, Hyper-Relativism (itself, I think, a simultaneous child of and reaction against Hyper-Empiricism), and in their metaphysical incest they beget new-ageism.

Yes, precisely.  And it is crucial that you brought up Protestantism-- at least for me in my own territory of what Rene Guenon called the "Far West," viz. the United States-- because what is Protestantism anyway?  Catholicism and especially Orthodoxy have a long tradition of esoterism and serious, ingenious metaphysics, whereas Protestantism isjust this uber-monotheism fused with a noxious rationalism (which rebels against fantasies of polytheism by doing away with saints, etc.), a rebellion against tradition.  An amalgam of empty rites and abstract gestures and attitudes, it is almost solely exoteric.  Thus a hunger for an authentic spirituality and an anxiety is kindled in its followers, who are always breaking away in their own internalized Protestant fantasies to forge a new path, and play Abraham in a new exiled land, with a new cult following.  They are serious RPG players; one second they are pointing their fingers at the polytheistic Canaanites, the next they are crushing the Amalekites through a detached Lutheran perspective... And of course, for all their anti-papism, they love going on extended, abortive Crusades...

Erodius wrote: I like your 'relativism-enforced no-fly-zone over habits and customs' analogy — I think that's brilliant and hits the nail on the head.

Thanks.  What is most interesting about analyzing this kind of behavior-- which is extremely interesting to me in a kind of perverted sociological way-- is that it is to a great deal unconscious.  Whence my mention of habits and customs, that weird feeling everyone in a room gets when someone makes a moral judgment about a person's action-- Like, is this guy serious?  If there is one thing we can learn from the Marxists, it is that the ideology enforced by our institutions and social mores is to a great degree unconscious.  I mean, think of it this way: who really stands up and says, "Hey guys, I'm a cultural relativist!"  Who really identifies with it as a signifier, except some Nietzschean types?  I think many in the West have simply internalized it and reflect it in their words and deeds, rather than really affirming, say, the relativity of all values, as a norm.  In this sense, it is a really weird social phenomenon to examine, because you can get people that are almost like moral fanatics howling at you for critiquing one's deeds which is Eurocentric and thus relative, etc.  It is almost as if no one is confident of believing in anything anymore except that they don't believe in anything, in which case one immediately goes on a righteous Crusade.

Yes, precisely.  And it is crucial that you brought up Protestantism-- at least for me in my own territory of what Rene Guenon called the "Far West," viz. the United States-- because what is Protestantism anyway?  Catholicism and especially Orthodoxy have a long tradition of esoterism and serious, ingenious metaphysics, whereas Protestantism isjust this uber-monotheism fused with a noxious rationalism (which rebels against fantasies of polytheism by doing away with saints, etc.), a rebellion against tradition.  An amalgam of empty rites and abstract gestures and attitudes, it is almost solely exoteric.  Thus a hunger for an authentic spirituality and an anxiety is kindled in its followers, who are always breaking away in their own internalized Protestant fantasies to forge a new path, and play Abraham in a new exiled land, with a new cult following.  They are serious RPG players; one second they are pointing their fingers at the polytheistic Canaanites, the next they are crushing the Amalekites through a detached Lutheran perspective... And of course, for all their anti-papism, they love going on extended, abortive Crusades...

Absolutely. If there is such a thing as 100% purely exoteric religion, it is Protestantism; conversely, I think rather highly of the Catholic and Orthodox churches, after all, being only marginally divorced from their ancestral Graeco-Roman background, and abounding in rich and beautiful esoterisms and metaphysics. But in the Protestant system, devoid of religious spirit, members become passionate about their lack of passion. Taken to its n-th degree, this sort of hyper-Protestantism certainly does manifest as overtly opposed to any tradition whatever. They dispense with saints, with any holidays save Easter/Christmas (though I've known of Protestant churches that do not even observe these due to their lack of Biblical basis), and even, in my experience, with virtually all of the rite and ritual of Christianity itself. Some Protestant churches do not even observe the eucharist ritual, while others only do so sporadically. Everyone sits for an hour in an uninteresting and unadorned church (devoid of nearly any imagery at all) to sing hymns from the X-year edition of the X-church hymnal, listen to a dull sermon, give to the collection basket, and then leave until the following Sunday. It's little wonder, to me, what has been the result of this sort of Protestantism.

Thanks.  What is most interesting about analyzing this kind of behavior-- which is extremely interesting to me in a kind of perverted sociological way-- is that it is to a great deal unconscious.  Whence my mention of habits and customs, that weird feeling everyone in a room gets when someone makes a moral judgment about a person's action-- Like, is this guy serious?  If there is one thing we can learn from the Marxists, it is that the ideology enforced by our institutions and social mores is to a great degree unconscious.  I mean, think of it this way: who really stands up and says, "Hey guys, I'm a cultural relativist!"  Who really identifies with it as a signifier, except some Nietzschean types?  I think many in the West have simply internalized it and reflect it in their words and deeds, rather than really affirming, say, the relativity of all values, as a norm.  In this sense, it is a really weird social phenomenon to examine, because you can get people that are almost like moral fanatics howling at you for critiquing one's deeds which is Eurocentric and thus relative, etc.

Most definitely. I think it is almost entirely an unconscious phenomenon. The masses of moral and cultural relativists, as far as I see, as you say, have typically not consciously made a choice to be such. Those who would not simply reject the charge of relativism (and attempt do so, paradoxically, through relativistic reasoning), I think, would likely be very surprised to realize that they are relativists. It is a stealthy infection that, through its own character and ideology, tends to deny itself to even exist.

And when it is called out, indeed, you get individuals who, themselves, sacralizing the absolute relativity of all moral values, call down Jonathan Edwards-esque fire and brimstone on the 'fanatical moral deviant' who speaks for objective morality. It's a fascinating, mind-twisting, and unfortunately, dangerous paradox.

It is almost as if no one is confident of believing in anything anymore except that they don't believe in anything, in which case one immediately goes on a righteous Crusade.

I've said nearly the same thing myself once. Once the triumph of relativism has come to pass and nobody believes in anything, the void is filled by, what I would call, a bizarre, passionate and evangelistic 'Belief in Nothing!'

Reading through this discussion, I can't help but feel as if I've found long-lost siblings. If I had a nickel for every time I've been called an (forgive the language, but they're actual words used by others) "arsehole," or put on someone's "sh*t-list," simply because I have resolute views on morality and the like and refuse to cater to a person's softness simply to spare hurt feelings, I'd likely have more wealth than is good for me. This generation is spoiled, bratty and soft, whining about how terribly oppressed they are from behind a computer screen or an iPhone as they sip their fancy coffees in a Starbucks, and refuse to lend an ear and consider the words of anyone who dares to disagree with them about anything. Western culture has become so individualistic that it serves as the perfect nurse of an over-inflated ego, and that is regrettable. :/ If you dare to so much as hint at a criticism of the subjectivity/nihilism/etc. that pervades present day culture, they'll do everything in their power to try to shut you up, like a five-year-old throwing a tantrum on the floor when they don't get their way, or middle school children spreading rumors about the new kid because they don't like their clothes or hairstyle, then puff themselves up and pat themselves on the back for their immaturity. *eyeroll*

If I had a nickel for every time I've been called an (forgive the language, but they're actual words used by others) "arsehole," or put on someone's "sh*t-list," simply because I have resolute views on morality and the like and refuse to cater to a person's softness simply to spare hurt feelings, I'd likely have more wealth than is good for me.

Amen. I listened to a speech the other day that was an absolute gold mine of relevant quotes, but the one that stuck the most with me are these: "I must concern myself more with service to the Truth than with the frailties of human opinion.", and "One who speaks for Truth these days is seen as an eccentric at best, and as a bigoted, intolerant and closed-minded deviant at worst."

Honestly, I think the new-age delusion *has* to exist in a state of imagined oppression and self-victimization; I don't think the common mindset of new-agery would know what to do with itself if it did not perceive itself to be perpetually on the defensive against the 'bigoted and heartless world'. Because it is, in essence, a reactionary ideology, rather than an independently viable one, it is bound to the existence of the very things it decries — because the decrying of such things is its basic substance.

But I'm just a chauvinist-Nazi-fascist-Puritan-communist-Islamist-Christian-meanie.

A very beautiful quote on Truth.  The ways of men are as transitory and fleeting as smoke, as Empedocles tells us.  One thing after the next in a little sideshow of gleaming nullities.  And our mortality makes it more drawn out, spread and stretched out over time, as Homer says; like generations of leaves, the lives of men.  But the Truth of the divine spiritual reality that envelopes us-- which we do not care enough about to notice-- rescues us from the foolishness perpetuated by our "wise" fellow men and women who would have us marching glibly into all out nihilism.  It is a bit like what Holderlin says (though this absence is just an illusion):

But the father covers us with holy night,
So we may endure on earth, eyes wide open.
He loves nothing wild! Never will
Our broad powers overwhelm his heaven.

Nor is it good to know too much. He knows
Our gratitude. But the poet can’t keep
His knowledge to himself and likes to join
With others, who help him understand it.

But if he must, the poet remains fearless.
Alone with god, simplicity keeps him safe
And needs no weapons and no cunning,
As long as God’s absence comes to his aid.

Erodius wrote:But I'm just a chauvinist-Nazi-fascist-Puritan-communist-Islamist-Christian-meanie.

Yes, I think the kind of person that would say such a thing fits perfectly the fine neologism used by Roger Scruton: oikophobe. As in a phobia of oikos; fear of home. Of one's native customs and civilizational values.

And in a greater sense, when we encounter this kind of abject poverty of the intellect (in which all the eyes of the heart are pinched shut) we must think of Odysseus and his longing for home (oikos). We must make our own homecoming (nostos) one day, and sail-- as Proclus says-- past the distractions of the sea of Becoming (genesis), to our true home. And souls must use cunning (metis) "[...] so as not to allow themselves to be bewitched by Becoming" (Proclus). Not to be bewitched by this illusory world of flux! That is the best to remember, the sheer enchantment and parlor tricks of it.

The ways of men are as transitory and fleeting as smoke, as Empedocles tells us.  One thing after the next in a little sideshow of gleaming nullities.  And our mortality makes it more drawn out, spread and stretched out over time, as Homer says; like generations of leaves, the lives of men.  But the Truth of the divine spiritual reality that envelopes us — which we do not care enough about to notice — rescues us from the foolishness perpetuated by our "wise" fellow men and women who would have us marching glibly into all out nihilism.

Beautifully said.

And in a greater sense, when we encounter this kind of abject poverty of the intellect (in which all the eyes of the heart are pinched shut) we must think of Odysseus and his longing for home (oikos). We must make our own homecoming (nostos) one day, and sail — as Proclus says — past the distractions of the sea of Becoming (genesis), to our true home. And souls must use cunning (metis) "[...] so as not to allow themselves to be bewitched by Becoming" (Proclus). Not to be bewitched by this illusory world of flux! That is the best to remember, the sheer enchantment and parlor tricks of it.

   

Proclus is one of the most highly venerated saints of the Orphic bucoli  . Service to mētis as the key of salvation from the Sea of Becoming, (or Grievous Circle, as we often name it) leading to the ektheosis of nostos is, in essence, the heart and lungs of the Orphic faith — it is thus that we name Pallas the personification of mētis, arisen from the mind of God, who cuts off the heads of the hounds of infernal generation and vanquishes Gorgon-Ploutonē — regent of flux, enchanting phantoms, and capricious fate.

Out_of_Phlegethon, I think you and I shall be great friends. I regret only having never met you before.

Same. I'm just a beginner in the same tradition Erodius comes from, but so far I like what you're about, Out_of_Phlegethon

Thank you, my friends! Now let us don our witch hats and pour from our jack-o-lantern chalice a Jungian psycho-libation of purple and liquorice jelly-beans of "you can do it-ness!" to the Green Man, great Wiccan god of the song of the bamboo flute!