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TomBo 1629 posts |
Sep 24, 2003, 15:37
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"Not sure *all* cultures do or always have done. You are assuming a lot. Did they before fairly advanced language?" The motifs of Rock Art do kind of suggest a fairly abstract turn of mind. But then again many of the Paleolithic cave paintings are filled with human forms. I think that the human form is probably a more basic symbol than language - in fact, I think it's <i>the</i> most basic symbol. "You're honouring them, but not necessarily worshiping them." Interesting point, this. What's the difference between <i>honouring</i> and <i>worshipping</i>. I like to think that I honour my gods without worshipping them, because <i>worship</i> seems to somehow imply a loss of dignity on the part of the worshipper. I like to think its possible to honour without worship, and also that a deity can be a deity without worshippers, just honourers. "One sun god. One wind god. One water god. I'm saying one nymph at a well became top-nymph of the nymphs at the well, not of all nymphs everywhere." Fairy nuff, I take your point. Its perhaps a little more complicated than that, mind - a sky god could be thought of as a Sun god in some respects though remaining distinct from the deity that personifies the Sun itself. This was the case in Ancient Egypt where Ra was the solar disk itself but the Sun was also the eye of Horus, who had a special name (Harmakhis, if memory serves - Horus of the Horizon, it means) to refer to his solar aspect. I do basically take your point, though. I like your story about the cave. I'm not sure that fear is the only motive for leaving an offering, mind. You seem to be saying that in order for a spirit to become a god there needs to be a cult spring up around it, with more than one person making regular offerings. Isn't it true to say that the cave spirit meant the same thing to the man who first found the cave as it did to later "worshippers"? From the perspective of that one man's psychology the cave spirit was a (not the) deity, as far as I can see. "Spirit" and "deity" are vague terms and there's no clear dividing line between them. I get the feeling that this debate is just semantics - you call them "spirits" I call them "deities" but we mean the same thing. You say tomayto and I say tomahto. Perhaps you think I use the word deity innappropriately? We need definitions...
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Moth 5236 posts |
Sep 24, 2003, 15:47
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Could there not also be a stage (implied but not expanded on by 4W) where the respect, honour, offering whatever IS actually to the PLACE rather than any abstract power associated with the place? I'm thinking for example, that maybe (& I'm just musing) an offering to a spring to try to persuade it to keep flowing doesn't HAVE to include any '3rd party' sprite/god/whatever. love Moth
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morfe 2992 posts |
Sep 24, 2003, 15:51
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Not forgetting Shamans who regularly communed with other beings.
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FourWinds 10943 posts |
Sep 24, 2003, 15:57
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I do think this is down purely to semantics. I was not saying that it takes 'many' to make a god. One person can have their own god. I was just telling a story to give the idea of what I said. If I'd said the tribe arrived by camel, would you have asked if I really thought it took a camel to make a god? :-) You're being too picky on my details. I am (poorly) trying to give an impression of what I believe. I suppose if the offerings were never repeated or the person didn't go back to notice that the offering worked then it could be said that the 'thing in the cave' was a god for a moment, but then ceased to be, but I don't subscribe to that. If the noise had happened again on the re-visit several things could have happened. Someone could have said "That's just a flatulent bear" or "That's bill practicing his flugelhorn on the other side of the hill." If that had have happened then the mystery would be gone. But would the noise still have been from a god, albeit briefly? Personally I don't think so, but it was 'cave spirit' in the head of the beholder (behearer?)
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FourWinds 10943 posts |
Sep 24, 2003, 15:59
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I did say that I thought an offering could be to a place, no god/3rd party involved.
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FourWinds 10943 posts |
Sep 24, 2003, 16:04
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The oldest 'art' known is abstract - a geometric pattern 120,000 years old (or is it 180,000?) Geometric doodling must come to mind before drawing people. Does it? Anyone got good info on that? Does it occur to kids to 'draw mummy' until someone asks them to? Morfe, I have a feeling you'll know this one...
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nigelswift 8112 posts |
Sep 24, 2003, 16:07
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Since this is a modest little debate about the origin of God, can I put in my tuppenceworth. He was born from practicality, eg the sun, whose bounty prevented starvation. He was therefore appreciated, and loved, for what he was, as does a child a providing parent. To me, anything else - naming, praising, pacifying and personifying are later cultural add-ons that continue to this day.
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morfe 2992 posts |
Sep 24, 2003, 16:43
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Art is interpretive, in that I see primitive art as inherently spiritual, in that the interpretation is part of a process involving some level of ritual, animal spirit guides (totems) and lots and lots of time on their hands. The hand on the rock is a profound image, and means so much more to them at that time (or is it just my imagination?!) than a fingerprint taken today. The word 'communion' keeps cropping up when I think of this process. The patterns are part of the (human)perception of morphological processes within the felt/perceived universe. Aboriginal rock art springs to mind, and a clue to the process id described here: "When I look at my tjukurrpa [dreaming] paintings it makes me feel good - happy in kuturu (heart), spirit. Everything is there: all there in the caves, not lost. This is my secret side." (From the preface to Elaine Godden and Jutta Malnic, Rock Paintings of Aboriginal Australia) The 'secret' side is all important, because any artist knows that the work is part of them, it IS them, but more than that, it's part of their experience, and in that it is secret, not cossetted, but part of their dream world, which I believe the ancients understood as part of the mystery of creation and growth and death. It's easy for us to say "oh look, a deer!", but the clues to the meaning, the spirit, the power of a deer/animal in the lives of the ancients aren't to be found in modern culture we have to ask the records of Native Americans, Aboriginals, the people at Iryan Jaya etc. 'Doodling' is in it's most basic form, part of the process of freeing the mind and letting the 'muse' flow. We use another part of our mind, the less we think, the more we can feel, and this is interpreted on a scale of profundity (I believe) from a box or a circle right through to direct interpretive and symbolic forms inspired by the creative forces at work on other levels of consciousness, including deities and ancestral memory . "I have always been here before" strikes a deeply resonant chord here. Identity is also the key. Who am I? Who are my people? ...Here we are. The earliest petroglyphs were probably abraded grooves. I can't say what they meant! But we make grooves today. Just to *be* part of the material we are touching, just to make a mark? Life, death, birth, the weather, the seasons, all part of shape, all morphological processes which find their way through the mind and spirit onto another medium. I also believe certain geometric patterns can be utilised for ritual, for inducing OOBE or vision questing, dreamtime etc.
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morfe 2992 posts |
Sep 24, 2003, 16:54
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http://literature.cbel.com/art_movements/ I just remembered that program about the Nazca lines in Peru. Is it commonly thought now that the lines were pathways? I wonder how artists were viewed by the ancients? Think they said "bah, eez a pretentious facker, eez upizzown arse ee iz" and carried on deocrating their caves with MDF chewed by caribou and glued by megatherium spunk. I know I know!! When are we ever going to get out of our 'caveman' 'ugh' perception of humanity? I can't believe that there was ever a time when a human 'stood' somewhere and said for the first time: "wow look at that rock/bear" it must be a god! Evolution and development is so subtle, like lichen growing, it looks the same every day for 100's of years, I can only imagine human consciousness to be the same until we reached industrialization and it rocketed us up the arse. I agree we are still essentially paleolithic in a modern world. More correctly I would say we are still human in a mechanised world.
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FourWinds 10943 posts |
Sep 24, 2003, 17:05
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"The hand on the rock is a profound image, and means so much more to them at that time (or is it just my imagination?!) than a fingerprint taken today. " To me that image always said: "I am me. I am here." It really is the same as "Ug woz ere". The drawings of animals around them do not mean a sense of 'one' - they could still represent a sense of 'tribe' - but that hand goes so much further. Alternatively it could be the result of a practical joke. Artist one takes a fag break and leans against wall. Apprentice walks through and throws paint at him, misses and hits the wall.
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