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Witches’ Baptism
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Her eyes pierced his heart. She licked the tip of her finger and turned the page . Once upon a time, the inquisitor might have been overcome with lust, but no longer. He had no time for such mundane thoughts. He was immersed in the Goddess, drowning in her, fighting for his life, for his very soul.
Breathe.
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deeper than ever did plummet sound
I’ll drown my book.
- William Shakespeare
The Tempest Act V Scene I
until
at last
they subside into silence
as a new deep
voice is heard,
- Giorgio de Santillana and Hertha von Dechend
Hamlet’s Mill
I've known rivers ancient as the world
and older
than the flow of human blood in human veins.
My soul has grown deep
- Langston Hughes
The Negro Speaks of Rivers
Like a river
Shut your mouth and run
- Bishop Briggs
River
Jimmy: [Referring to "Heart of Darkness"]
Why does Marlow keep going up the river?
Why doesn't he turn back?
Hayes: There's a part of him that wants to, Jimmy.
A part deep inside himself that sounds a warning.
- King Kong (2005)
the spell was cast
- Etta James
At Last
At last
they saw water coming
running, big water.
- Ronald M. Berndt’s
The Speaking Land
I am
- H.P. Lovecraft
The Necronomicon
immersed in running water
- Ian Wilson
Lost World of the Kimberley
A long time ago, really long time
when the world was still freshly made,
Unktehi the water monster fought the people
and caused a great flood. Perhaps the Great Spirit,
Wakan Tanka, was angry with us for some reason.
Maybe he let Unktehi win out because
he wanted to make a better kind of human being.
- told by Lame Deer in Winner, South Dakota,
in 1969, and recorded by Richard Erdoes
Now he stands underneath the water.
Those others, they all drowned.
She ate them, that snake.
- Australian Aboriginal myth of Cycad Man
in Ronald M. Berndt’s
The Speaking Land
I know why – I know why
- Robert Plant
Ship of Fools
‘Every male shall be Cast into the river.’
For the river is The light of this book.
- The Zohar
It is also said that the name Baphomet was derived from Mahomet –
an old French corruption of the name of the prophet Mohammed.
Others claim that it comes from the Arabic word abufihamet,
which means ”Father of Understanding”.
In all likelihood, though, it comes from
baphe meaning to submerge
and mete meaning wisdom.
The Baphomet being a device for the Gnostic tradition
or belief of being “submerged” in “wisdom”
is associated with the concept of the Sophia
or wisdom goddess.
- Philip Gardiner
Secret Societies: Gardiner’s Forbidden Knowledge
Metis
Goddess of Wisdom. Greek.
The daughter of Okeanos
- Michael Jordan
Encyclopedia of Gods
medicine (n.)
c. 1200, "medical treatment, cure, remedy,"
also used figuratively, of spiritual remedies,
from Old French medecine (Modern French médicine)
"medicine, art of healing, cure, treatment, potion,"
from Latin medicina "the healing art, medicine; a remedy,"
also used figuratively, perhaps originally ars medicina "the medical art,"
from fem. of medicinus (adj.) "of a doctor," from medicus "a physician"
(from PIE root *med- "take appropriate measures");
though OED finds evidence for this is wanting.
Meaning "a medicinal potion or plaster" in English is mid-14c.
To take (one's) medicine "submit to something disagreeable" is first recorded 1865.
North American Indian medicine-man "shaman" is first attested 1801,
from American Indian adoption of the word medicine
in sense of "magical influence."
- www.etymonline.com/word/medicine
poison (n.)
c. 1200, "a deadly potion or substance," also figuratively,
from Old French poison, puison (12c., Modern French poison)
"a drink," especially a medical drink, later
"a (magic) potion, poisonous drink"
- www.etymonline.com/word/poison
REVEREND MOTHER:
originally, a proctor of the Bene Gesserit,
one who has transformed
an “illuminating poison” within her body,
raising herself to a higher state of awareness.
Title adopted by Fremen for their own religious leaders
who accomplished a similar “illumination.”
(See also Bene Geserrit and Water of Life.)
- Frank Herbert
Dune
Behold, the man is become as one of us
- Genesis 3:22
The King James Bible
‘the Old Woman’ travelled across the land
with a band of heroes and heroines...
She gave birth to men and women,
and by her ritual acts, caused natural species to appear...
The fertility-mother concept was probably an importation
into Arnhem Land from across the sea, as the myth suggest...
The mother-goddess or fertility-mother and serpent cult [predominated]
- Ian Wilson
Lost World of the Kimberley
A myth from the Northern Territory tells of how
a great mother arrives from the sea, travelling across Australia
and giving birth to the various Aboriginal tribes.
In some versions, the great mother is accompanied by the Rainbow Serpent
(or Lightning Snake), who brings the wet season of rains and floods.
Some Aboriginal in the Kimberley regions believe that
it was the Rainbow Serpent
who deposited spirit-children throughout pools
in which women become impregnated when they wade in the water.
This process is sometimes referred to as "netting a fish".
- en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainbow_Serpent
Kingdon has envisaged this people as having been
the world’s first to develop boats.
Probably they began them as floating platforms
on which to load the seafood they collected,
then gradually developed them
into proper sea-going craft in which
they could explore and exploit their environment
with far greater ease and safety
than by venturing into the thick forests covering the land.
He has also conceived them as big pioneers
in using fibres to make string, rope netting
and other basics.
- Ian Wilson
Lost World of the Kimberley
As we learnt not only from Warren,
but from more formal book sources,
the myth surrounding this Arnhem Land Great Mother
was that back in the creation time
she had arrived from the direction of Indonesia
at a period when the country was suffering great drought.
Her arrival coincided with the sea invading to reach its present level
and all the springs and waterholes becoming refilled.
She brought with her dilly bags full of yams
suspended from a head-ring, and
in the course of her journey southwards
she met up with a male partner,
from which encounter sprang children.
Thereupon she taught these offspring
how to plant yams and to prepare them as food,
and also instituted the totem cult.
- Ian Wilson
Lost World of the Kimberley
And Adam called his wife's name Eve;
because she was the mother of all living.
- Genesis 3:20
The King James Bible
There before him was her cult statue
- Philip Freeman
The Philosopher and the Druids
the ancient cult
statue of the Artemis of Ephesus.
There has been speculation
concerning the objects depicted hanging around her chest.
Could they have had their origin in dilly bags
as carried by the early Australian ‘Great Mother’
- Ian Wilson
Lost World of the Kimberley
This same great Fertility Mother
is known among a number of northern tribes,
a further name being Yamidj,
she who ‘calls to people towards the end of the wet season
that the anginjdjek, the round yams
that the Aborigines call “cheeky”,
are ready to be dug up and eaten.
- Ian Wilson
Lost World of the Kimberley
round yams are highly poisonous
when they are left unprocessed.
- Ian Wilson
Lost World of the Kimberley
It seems not unreasonable to suggest that,
while the food-technology component of the Kulama
ritual tamed wild yams for human consumption,
the initiatory component 'tamed' the wildness in youths
and made them ready for incorporation into the body politic.
In many parts of northern Australia
toxic yams are described in English as 'cheeky';
in keeping with this idiom we could say that
when they are detoxified by immersion in water
the 'cheekiness' is leached out of them.
By simultaneously immersing youths,
Tiwi elders were probably seeking a similar outcome.
Cleansing the lads of unruliness
made them ready to receive
the positive essence of the kulama yam.
Its hairiness, in conjunction perhaps with its gonadic shape,
apparently constituted for native medical thinkers
presumptive evidence of a property
capable of promoting desirable sexual characteristics
and, more generally, good physical condition.
- Lester Richard Hiatt
Arguments about Aborigines:
Australia and the Evolution of Social Anthropology
the successful detoxification of the yams
was celebrated by singing and dancing,
rites that are still observed.
- Ian Wilson
Lost World of the Kimberley
The origins of the classic motif can now be traced back to
- Toby Wilkinson
Genesis of the Pharoahs
the great Earth Mother
- Ian Wilson
Lost World of the Kimberley
In Mongolian, Umai means ‘womb’ or ‘uterus’.
The earth was considered a “mother” symbolically.
The Turkic root umay originally meant ‘placenta, afterbirth’,
and this word was used as the name for the goddess
whose function was to look after women and children,
possibly because the placenta was thought to have magic qualities.
Literally in the Mongolian language,
“eje” or “eej” means “mother,”
and in Old Turkic, the similar word ece
also means ‘mother.’
- en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umay
in the symbolism of the universal ritual
harvest is the same as the first labors of the Earth.
This solar-agricultural synthesis of the earth
is sacrificially offered in communion
or in transubstantiation to the mysteries as the first sacrifice,
and it is due to the importance of Christ
that the manger-yam is the ceremony
which opens the door
- Milo Rigaud
Secrets of Voodoo
Thus the houn’gan sacrifices the yam,
in order to sacrifice the first of the best harvest of the land,
exactly as the priest proceeds to the sacrifice of the mass
or the body of Christ (the Voodoo yam),
which is offered in transubstantiation,
and as Golgotha is concerned with the sacrifice of the Messiah.
The yam, as first and principal fruit of the land,
is therefore traditionally considered to be illuminated
- Milo Rigaud
Secrets of Voodoo
yam (yam) n.
1. Any of various chiefly tropical vines of the genus Dioscorea,
many of which have edible tuberous roots.
2. The starchy root of the yam, used in the tropics as food.
3. A sweet potato having reddish flesh.
[Port. inhame, poss. < Bantu nyama, meat < or Bambara nyana, wild yam.]
- The American Heritage Dictionary
Second College Edition
The Spanish naturalist G.F. de Oveido makes it clear
that yams were not native to America.
“Nname (pronounced ”nyam”) is a foreign fruit,”
writes Oveido, “and not native to these Indies,
having been brought to this Hispaniola (Haiti)
and to other parts of the Indies.
It came with the Negroes and it has taken well
and is profitable and good sustenance for the negroes...
these nnames look like ajes (the sweet potato)
but they are not and generally are larger than ajes.
They cut them in pieces and plant them
a hand’s distance from the ground and they grow.”
Yams were another of the cultigens found
preserved in the mummy packs of the Incas
in Peru. One of the problems that has arisen
in discussions of the yam is the confusion over its name.
Weiner says, “aje is the original name of the yam
and not of the sweet potato but throughout the world
the two were confused
and the same name often served for both.”
- Ivan Van Sertima
They Came Before Columbus
Yemoja
Goddess of water. Yoruba [Nigeria, West Africa].
The creator of all rivers in the area,
particularly the river Ogun.
She is chiefly worshipped by women
and the sacred river water is considered
a remedy for infertility.
She is propitiated with animal and vegetable sacrifices.
Attributes: cowrie shells.
- Michael Jordan
Encyclopedia of Gods
Nyame
Creator god.
Akan [Southern Ghana, West Africa].
An androgynous being
symbolized in his male aspect by the sun,
and in his female aspect as the moon.
He gave mankind its soul
and is the controller of destiny.
He enjoys a dedicated priesthood
and is worshipped in the form of a tree trunk.
- Michael Jordan
Encyclopedia of Gods
Nzambi
Creator god.
Bakongo [Zaire, central Africa].
He created the first mortal pair
or, in alternative tradition, an androgynous being
in the guise of a palm tree
called Muntu Walunga (the complete person).
He also endowed this being with intelligence.
In wooden sculptures the tree bears
a woman's head and breast on one side
and a bearded face on the other.
Eventually the tree divided into two separate sexes.
Also Nyambi; Nzambe; Yambe; Zambi.
- Michael Jordan
Encyclopedia of Gods
Inkanyamba
Storm god. Zulu [southern Africa].
The deity specifically responsible for tornados
and perceived as a huge snake
coiling down from heaven to earth.
According to some Zulu authorities,
Inkanyamba is a goddess of storms and water.
- Michael Jordan
Encyclopedia of Gods
Ataa Na Nyongmo
Creator god.
Gan [district around Accra, Ghana, West Africa].
He engendered the earth and also controls the sun and rain.
He causes disasters such as epidemics and earthquakes
if his laws and rites are disobeyed.
- Michael Jordan
Encyclopedia of Gods
In the Hebrew/Canaanite analogue
Lotan is also known as Yam (Sea) and the Leviathan.
He represents the mass destruction of floods, oceans, and winter.
He lives in a palace in the sea.
- en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lotan
Ladon was the serpent-like dragon
that twined and twisted around the tree
in the Garden of the Hespirades and guarded the golden apples.
- en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ladon_(mythology)
Ladon is the constellation Draco,
according to Hyginus’ Astronomy.
Ladon is the Greek version of the West Semitic serpent Lotan,
or the Hurrian serpent Illuyanka.
He might be given multiple heads, a hundred
in Aristophanes’ The Frogs (a passing remark in line 475),
which might speak with different voices.
- en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ladon_(mythology)
Yam is the deity of the primordial chaos
and represents the power of the sea, untamed and raging;
he is seen as ruling storms and the disasters they wreak.
The gods cast out Yam
from the heavenly mountain Sappan (modern Jebel Aqra);
Sappan is cognate to Tsephon.
The seven-headed dragon Lotan
is associated closely with him
and he is often described as the serpent.
He is the Canaanite equivalent of the Sumerian Tiamat,
the primordial mother goddess.
- en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yam_(god)
It is thought that female deities are older
than male ones in Mesopotamia
and Tiamat may have begun
as part of the cult of Nammu,
a female principle of a watery creative force,
with equally strong connections to the underworld,
which predates the appearance of Ea-Enki.
- en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiamat
Mami Wata, lexically derives from the English “mother of water”
or “grand-mother of water” in the Agni language from Cote d’Ivoire.
She is the water spirit of West Africa whose traces are also found
in Surinam and in the Caribbean. In Nigeria, among some Igbo peoples,
she represents Ogbwide, the female deity and spouse of the deity Urashi,
the two, a divine couple living in the Oguta River.
During the religious ceremonies in her honor,
her followers offer her sacrifices, sing, dance, eat, and drink.
The possession and the trance that Mami Wata causes
reproduce, as well, the life cycle of the deity
as they display her presence among living beings.
The procession of disciples on the river
often crown an initiation process
leading to the mastery of her knowledge
and its therapeutic power (Jell-Bahlsen 1991).
Mami Wata is recognized in various forms
all along the Guinea Coast as well as in certain Sahel areas
where there are significant lakes and rivers.
Her altars such as those in Ouidah, Dahomey, or in Accra, Ghana,
are splendidly decorated, and highlight the serpent, her symbol.
- T.K. Biaya
African Folklore: An Encyclopedia
Nammu is identified in various texts
as the goddess of the watery deeps.
As the consort of An she is the mother of Enki
and the power of the riverbed to produce water.
Alternatively Nammu is the progenitrix of An and Ki,
the archetypal deities of heaven and earth
- Michael Jordan
Encyclopedia of Gods
Nemausius
God of water.
Romano-Celtic (Gallic).
Associated locally with a sacred spring
at Nimes in France.
- Michael Jordan
Encyclopedia of Gods
We have established that
both the Egyptian and the Dogon words nu
refer to primordial waves of water –
waves that are explicitly defined
in both the Dogon and Egyptian systems
as the mythical source of being.
Likewise we know that the Egyptian word maa
means “to examine or perceive”.
So the combined word nu maa,
the likely Egyptian counterpart to the Dogon word nummo,
can be reasonably understood to refer to
primordial waves examined or perceived; in other words,
the initiating stage
- Marcel Griaule
The Pale Fox
The legacy of the Ha Qabala dates back
well beyond Adam and Eve, to whom its secrets were disclosed
by Enki (Samael) and Lilith, who were jointly defined as
the ‘Tree of Knowledge’.
The word Qabala relates to ‘tradition’
and to ‘how it was obtained’.
It emphasizes the intuitive grasp
of the absolute truth of the ancient Masters –
the great Archons who brought forth the world
out of primeval chaos.
One of these Archons (by whatever name) was Wisdom –
and Wisdom (the Holy Spirit) was always female,
moving ‘on the face of the waters’,
as related in the second verse of Genesis
at the very beginning of biblical time.
Wisdom was Tiamat, Sophia, Ashtoreth-Anath and, in general terms,
Wisdom was the Shekhina who embodied them all.
- Laurence Gardner
Genesis of the Grail Kings
It is the tree, once again,
that is used symbolically to explain how
we can be at one with the Shekinah.
The tree produces fruit through the water
that God provides.
God’s water is called hokmah, which means wisdom.
It is Sophia (or wisdom) that will enable the tree to bear fruit,
which is the soul of the righteous man.
Shekinah will only dwell with the righteous,
and only through hieros gamos or Holy Union
- Philip Gardiner
Gnosis
The "Shakinah",
or Bride of God
- Alan Butler & Stephen Dafoe
The Knights Templar Revealed
This was the beginning
of the Chaikhanas, the teahouses.
- Idries Shah
Tales of the Dervishes
coffee drinkers 'worshipping' this brand of coffee
represented by a potentially deadly, serpent-like goddess.
- www.unexplainable.net/info-theories/the-origins-of-starbucks-volatile-snake-goddess-logo.php
and no one seems to know why.
- www.northernstar-online.com/the-origins-of-the-starbucks-goddess-logo/
He, who tastes, knows.
He, who tastes not, knows not.
- Idries Shah
Tales of the Dervishes
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She closed the book. Looking into her eyes was like staring into a maelstrom that whirled and disappeared into total, unpulsating blackness. He felt himself falling. The ends of her smile curled like a crescent moon, the horns of certain bulls, or the upturned stern and prow of ancient sea-faring craft. Her whispered words swept him up and carried him away with her like the winds gather clouds from the waters of the seas.
“D’Agon fhtagn.”
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She tells a story
- The Interrupters
She's Kerosene
a history
- The Interrupters
She's Kerosene
We could not understand
because we were too far and could not
remember,
because we were traveling in
the night of first ages,
of those ages that are gone,
— leaving hardly a sign
and no memories.
- Joseph Conrad
The Heart of Darkness
the secret protects itself
- Idries Shah
The Sufis
You know
she's gonna burn down everything
- The Interrupters
She's Kerosene
Jimmy: [Referring to "Heart of Darkness"]
Why does Marlow keep going up the river?
Why doesn't he turn back?
Hayes: There's a part of him that wants to Jimmy.
A part deep inside himself that sounds a warning.
But there's another part that needs to know.
- King Kong (2005)
Jimmy: It's not an adventurous story,
is it, Mr. Hayes?
Hayes: No, Jimmy, it's not.
- King Kong (2005)
And the shadow ship started to emerge from its shadow.
- A.E. Von Vogt
Earth Factor X
don't get on that ship!
The rest of the book
To Serve Man,
it's... it's a cookbook!
- en.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_Serve_Man_(The_Twilight_Zone)
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