QuoteReplyTopic: Was there ever a Mother-Goddess society? Posted: 31-Aug-2013 at 01:18
First agricultural societies were all Great Mother societies.Ex. hunter&gatherers for the first time had been depended of Earth's mercy(we also!) so that they worshiped it as sa God&Goddess.
And I pointed out - and you of course simply ignored without replying - that all sorts of divinities in all sorts of religions are prayed too for intercession on behalf of the dead.
And? If it's a case, such a divinity could be called 'chthonic'.
Demeter's protection is for her initiates: she protects them insofar as she can everywhere. But she has to plead with Hades for them: she doesn't have any powers in the underworld.
But of course she has, even the mere fact that she can persuade Hades (though I for the moment I can't think of such a Greek text) is such a power.
Zeus has contact with the underworld: he can send people to Tartarus. I'd bet that any devotee of a particular figure would pray to that figure for intercession with Hades. Again, following your type of logic would lead to all divinities being associated with the underworld, if only because it is possible to mention them in the same sentence.
But there was a chthonic Zeus, there was a cult of this chthonic Zeus (sometimes identified with Hades himself)!
It's not about the same sentence, but about manifesting under earth. I know, for you is just too confusing ...
Somtimes I wonder if you can read. Those are definitions of the underworld.
You certainly can't read nor understand much of I write. The third definition was of 'chthonic'. True, the first two definitions were of the underworld and it was my choice to pick them because that dictionary gives of 'chthonic' = 'or and of related to the underworld' and 'chthonian' = 'having to do with the underworld', rather meaningless definitions if we don't know what underworld is. Therefore chthonic is something of that, related to that, having to do with that. Add "related to" in front of them and you have the exact definition, it's not really that complicated.
And they are very carefully selected. The commonplace understanding of 'underworld' is where the dead reside and where the powers over the dead and their servants and demons have their abode. SOME people see that as under the earth.
But the definition of 'chthonic' is not about whatever underworlds, but about a specific sub-terranean underworld. That some dictionaries are vague, it's not really my fault. You can anytime resort to scholarship which is from where the word was taken from and read about this concept in detail.
And so you casually dismiss yet another reputable dictionary (it's from Webster) because it doesn't agree with you. How do you justify this ssumption of superiority over the dictionary compilers?
With a heap of scholars (and I already did). While arguably most dictionary compilers have no competence in comparative religion. And I did not dismiss it, it has two meanings, one 'chthonian' (a link which you failed to follow) which pertains to underworld, and the second one, rather metaphorical (if you disagree, please quote a scholar using that term with this meaning for a god or a cult!)
That 'chthonic' has connotations of darkness and mystery (and similar moods) IS the point, it's not missing it.
This is a thread about mother goddesses and consequently comparative religion, not about how various people find ancient gods mysterious because they do not know much about them.
A mysterious sky god of lightning is chthonic???
We are discussing the appropriate use of 'chthonic' in modern English, not in ancient Greek (where it isn't even a word, in fact). That it originally derives from a Greek term meaning 'earth' is immaterial. It may surprise you, but the common English meaning of testes is not 'witnesses': you would, operatinig in your fashion be presumably embarrassed when being asked to produce your witnesses in court.
Paper is not papyrus; a table is not a board for writing things on; a skiff is not a ship; a demand is not a request. And so on and so on.
Why don't you learn to read? I'm not talking about Greek language, but about Greek mythology. Can you make the difference between the two?
And I explained the problem. I rest with the dictionaries: you yourself have provided several references showing the term has two disctinct meanings. I'm not going to scramble through the works of the likes of Stephen King or H.P.Lovecraft just looking for references for you.
You explained nothing. Some dictionaries hit the nail, some are rather vague. If you'd rest with the dictionaries, you'd have to deal with a heap of them claiming the word means 'related to the earth', 'living in the earth', etc.
Scholars give detailed accounts, which you, out of anti-intellectualism and cecity keep rejecting. That your ultimate source is fantasy literature only proves my point, that the meaning you want to enforce is moody, metaphorical (and for this topic a made-up and irrelevant one). This is a thread about religion, not about Lovecraft's fictional universe.
Common parlance has a lot more to do with the writings of popular novelists than it has to do with the essays of academics carried away with their little piece of esoteric knowledge of etymology.
For ignorants, yes (you testify to be one by calling the academic knowledge "esoteric", quite a hopeless one considering you also describe it with unjustified superiority as a "little piece"!).
However this is a thread about religion, not about modern literary fiction, and 'chthonic' is a technical term from comparative religion. The dictionary compilers did not fish for this term in the works of Lovecraft, but in the works of Rohde.
Demeter has no connection with the underworld at all, apart from losing her daughter to it half the time.
The problem is not only ignorance but also the unwillingness (or the inability) to learn. You were shown in this thread that Demeter was a protector of the dead in her own cult (therefore she's also connected with the underworld). Your unfamiliarity with Greek religion is no excuse.
And I pointed out - and you of course simply ignored without replying - that all sorts of divinities in all sorts of religions are prayed too for intercession on behalf of the dead. Demeter's protection is for her initiates: she protects them insofar as she can everywhere. But she has to plead with Hades for them: she doesn't have any powers in the underworld.
Zeus has contact with the underworld: he can send people to Tartarus. I'd bet that any devotee of a particular figure would pray to that figure for intercession with Hades. Again, following your type of logic would lead to all divinities being associated with the underworld, if only because it is possible to mention them in the same sentence.
Or you can just type definitions chthonic into google and see what you get.
But we already did, here are some picks from the thread:
- A region, realm, or dwelling place conceived to be below the surface of the earth. - Greek & Roman Mythology: The world of the dead, located below the world of the living; Hades - Dwelling in or under the earth. etc.
Somtimes I wonder if you can read. Those are definitions of the underworld. And they are very carefully selected. The commonplace understanding of 'underworld' is where the dead reside and where the powers over the dead and their servants and demons have their abode. SOME people see that as under the earth.
Insisting on some definitions which are vague or metaphorical (like that "dark, mysterious") is missing the point.
And so you casually dismiss yet another reputable dictionary (it's from Webster) because it doesn't agree with you. How do you justify this ssumption of superiority over the dictionary compilers? That 'chthonic' has connotations of darkness and mystery (and similar moods) IS the point, it's not missing it.
In ancient mythologies (in Greek one, too) most underworlds were under the earth. Harlequin is a chthonic character because he inherits other chthonic characters like Hercules. Not because he's dark, primitive or mysterious ...
We are discussing the appropriate use of 'chthonic' in modern English, not in ancient Greek (where it isn't even a word, in fact). That it originally derives from a Greek term meaning 'earth' is immaterial. It may surprise you, but the common English meaning of testes is not 'witnesses': you would, operatinig in your fashion be presumably embarrassed when being asked to produce your witnesses in court.
Paper is not papyrus; a table is not a board for writing things on; a skiff is not a ship; a demand is not a request. And so on and so on.
And about what 'common parlance' are you talking about? I provided a large number of texts where 'chthonic' is used with the meaning I claim, you failed to provide a single text to illustrate this usage you claim. I asked you few times already to provide a reference for a 'chthonic' heavenly underworld.
And I explained the problem. I rest with the dictionaries: you yourself have provided several references showing the term has two disctinct meanings. I'm not going to scramble through the works of the likes of Stephen King or H.P.Lovecraft just looking for references for you.
Common parlance has a lot more to do with the writings of popular novelists than it has to do with the essays of academics carried away with their little piece of esoteric knowledge of etymology.
Don't be silly. You asked me to guess, so I guessed. What do you think a 'guess' is?
You're the silly one. I asked you to guess, not to expose your ignorance. A "I don't know" is a good enough answer.
And Plato is well after the emergence of the Roman pantheon.
A ridiculous claim, the Roman pantheon was in the making even in the late Empire.
However you erroneously claimed it was a Roman mix up ....
I note incidentally, which you of course failed to point out, that I was right about the origin of Hades (more accurately, Plato agrees with what I said).
No, you weren't. You said "The Romans mixed up their existing god of mines with the Greek god of the underworld", but Plato testifies for no mix up, but for two names of the same god, of which one was preferred for obvious reasons.
No quibble. Why is it important? You misspelt Persephone and got very uptight because I mentioned it.
I mispelled it (ph and f encode the same sound!) in English because of the other languages I know and read. You misused the word in Greek because of your ignorance on this language. And it is important because in dictionaries you find "go" not "went", you find "dog" not "dogs" or "dog's" (it's hard to show this in English, in inflectional languages it's quite clear if one has clues about that language or if he reproduces verbatim whatever he found in Wikipedias or other similar unthoughtful resources)
Reading too much into the relationships and attributes of the Greek mythological figures is a confusing pastime, êven for the obsessive collector of such things.
On the contrary, my ignorant companion, it's not at all confusing (again, it's only your confusion!), it helps understanding. You may seek visual reprsentations (usually vases) of Ploutos and Plouton, you may want to read Greek authors (for Ploutos, Aristophanes would be a good start) and understand this topic you are so stubborn to disturb, even though you're rather illiterate in it.
Incidentally I was browsing some dialogues of Plato researching for some other thing and I ran into it (Cratylus, for our discussion 403-404 are most relevant):
Pluto gives wealth (Ploutos), and his name means the giver of wealth, which comes out of the earth beneath. People in general appear to imagine that the term Hades is connected with the invisible (aeides) and so they are led by their fears to call the God Pluto instead.
So here you have a coordinate for Hades as god of wealth: Greece (probably Athens), early-mid 4th century BC
And looking more carefully at Graham's claims I found he said "Romans mixed up...". He's mixed up, if anything
Don't be silly. You asked me to guess, so I guessed. What do you think a 'guess' is?
And Plato is well after the emergence of the Roman pantheon.
I note incidentally, which you of course failed to point out, that I was right about the origin of Hades (more accurately, Plato agrees with what I said).
And if I'm at re-reading carefully, the Greek word for wealth should be given as ploutos, not plouton (check Liddell Scott and Greek grammar).
No quibble. Why is it important? You misspelt Persephone and got very uptight because I mentioned it.
And by misreading I also over-estimated him when I said he noticed Plouton to be an epithet of the Greek god, because he actually didn't.
And one more edit: perhaps it should be also mentioned that Ploutos was another Greek god of (agricultural) wealth, a son of Demeter
That makes sense.
And another Pluto (however spelt) was in fact a goddess, mother of Tantalus and offspring of Chronus and Rhea (however spelt) or of Oceanus (however spelt) and Tethys (however spelt). Reading too much into the relationships and attributes of the Greek mythological figures is a confusing pastime, êven for the obsessive collector of such things.
Demeter has no connection with the underworld at all, apart from losing her daughter to it half the time.
The problem is not only ignorance but also the unwillingness (or the inability) to learn. You were shown in this thread that Demeter was a protector of the dead in her own cult (therefore she's also connected with the underworld). Your unfamiliarity with Greek religion is no excuse.
Or you can just type definitions chthonic into google and see what you get.
But we already did, here are some picks from the thread:
- A region, realm, or dwelling place conceived to be below the surface of the earth. - Greek & Roman Mythology: The world of the dead, located below the world of the living; Hades - Dwelling in or under the earth. etc.
Insisting on some definitions which are vague or metaphorical (like that "dark, mysterious") is missing the point. In ancient mythologies (in Greek one, too) most underworlds were under the earth. Harlequin is a chthonic character because he inherits other chthonic characters like Hercules. Not because he's dark, primitive or mysterious ...
And about what 'common parlance' are you talking about? I provided a large number of texts where 'chthonic' is used with the meaning I claim, you failed to provide a single text to illustrate this usage you claim. I asked you few times already to provide a reference for a 'chthonic' heavenly underworld.
My point is that if 'chthonic' is used both to mean 'associated with the earth' and 'associated with the underworld' it is a confusing usage that masks an important distinction. A word that can refer to both Satan and Demeter is pretty useless from the point of view of religious study, particularly taxonomy.
But Satan isn't really chthonic - the Christian Hell isn't underground, it's just a debased (and therefore lower) existance.
But again you're taking 'chthonic' as though it necessarily related to underground. It refers in common parlance to the underworld, which as you yourself say here is a 'debased (and therefore lower) existence'. Hence Satan is chthonic.
: of or relating to the underworld :infernal<chthonic deities>
Or you can just type definitions chthonic into google and see what you get.
The gods that gave rise to the Christian concept of Satan may have been chthonic, but they're not really taxonomically incompatible with Demeter and the rest.
I'm not sure what gods you believe gave rise to Satan, but a contender must be Ahriman, and he is most definitely incompatible with Demeter. Demeter has no connection with the underworld at all, apart from losing her daughter to it half the time.
Another contender is probably Baal (or the family of Baals) but there again Satan's main role is as the antagonist: he is only relegated to the underworld once monotheism becomes established, at which point he loses the control over fertility that distinguishes Demeter.
Incidentally I was browsing some dialogues of Plato researching for some other thing and I ran into it (Cratylus, for our discussion 403-404 are most relevant):
Pluto gives wealth (Ploutos), and his name means the giver of wealth, which comes out of the earth beneath. People in general appear to imagine that the term Hades is connected with the invisible (aeides) and so they are led by their fears to call the God Pluto instead.
So here you have a coordinate for Hades as god of wealth: Greece (probably Athens), early-mid 4th century BC
And looking more carefully at Graham's claims I found he said "Romans mixed up...". He's mixed up, if anything
And if I'm at re-reading carefully, the Greek word for wealth should be given as ploutos, not plouton (check Liddell Scott and Greek grammar). And by misreading I also over-estimated him when I said he noticed Plouton to be an epithet of the Greek god, because he actually didn't.
And one more edit: perhaps it should be also mentioned that Ploutos was another Greek god of (agricultural) wealth, a son of Demeter
Hades insofar as etymology is relevant, comes from 'unseen', 'invisible'. The 'underworld' is the hidden, unseen world. (Because we quite literally cannot see it.)
Hidden under the ground.
If Hades is connected with aides, then let's note that in Greek aidoia are the genitals (the hidden parts, for both men and women) and aidomai is "to be ashamed" (probably covering the meaning "to hide")
Are you bothering to follow this thread at all? I said Demeter DID live in the earth but not in the UNDERWORLD. And therefore she was not 'chthonic' because she is not particularly associated with the UNDERWORLD, which is what 'chthonic' MEANS. Of COURSE she is an EARTH goddess, and if you'd simply call her that it would be fine.
If you keep coming up with ridiculously erroneous versions of what I'm sayingm, there's not much point in my saying anything.
I was about to miss this reply of yours because for some reason you decided to edit my post and not to reply to it. Whatever ...
Yes I'm following the thread quite closely. But you don't and you also don't seem to have a good memory. But no worries, scripta manent:
Originally posted by gcle2003
I don't see any reason to say Demeter 'lives' under the earth. In that case, how does snatching Persephone away to live under the earth make any difference to Demeter? In all the versions I've seen, Demeter lives on the earth or on Olympus.
Perhaps in Grahamian "lives on the earth" should be read as "lives in the earth" ...
But not routine run of the mill silver miners. You're avoiding the point again, since it's so obvious you were wrong.
I already asked half-jokingly if should I write to you only simple SOV sentences but this time I am dead serious: do you have the ability to read and understand a simple text? My text was formed from two sentences (I can't prove it now, because you edited it). The first sentence was a digression, showing that living creatures can inhabit the sub-terranean world, even travel to the underworld. However, the second sentence addressed your point, it was about mining. If the first sentence was uninteresting why didn't you move directly to the second one? And if you can't follow my posts why do you even bother to reply (for other reason than disrupting the discussion)?
The Romans mixed up their existing god of mines with the Greek god of the underworld, maybe partly because the Greek word for 'wealth' is Plouton, and because they didn't originally have a god of the underworld themselves?
Leaving your speculations aside (but as you noticed Plouton was a Greek name of Hades!), the fact is that a god of the underworld was also the god of mining. Which should answer many questions about those miners ...
Like I pointed out, Poseidon is the god of the sea and also of earthquakes. Care to guess why?
Similarity between waves and earthquakes. What are the similarities between mining and dying?
We're discussing - or at least I am - the appropriate use of the word 'chthonic' in modern English, in which it was first recorded late in the 19th century. I think your claim that the Greeks though the uinderworld and the underground were part of the same realm is false, but even if true it misses my point, which is not how the ancient Greeks used the word, but how we should. We have a hell of a lot more religions to take into account that the Greeks did.
But is very important how the ancient Greeks used the word, because this is how we understand their 'chthonic' gods and cults, and this is how the modern word was born. From scholars studying Greek mythology, Greek religion. They eventually expanded it to other religions and mythologies because they found it useful, operative, helpful in creating a narrative and understanding (there are a lot of materials about 'chthonic' dimension in religion). For how we should use the words I provided a load of definitions from scholars and dictionaries. You provided some yourself. Almost all referred to Greek mythology and absolutely none denied the earth relation (on the contrary, some of them affirmed it explicitely).
What do you mean by 'semantically' there?
Of coure 'mort' in French includes the meaning of dead body. In my Larousse the very first meaning given to 'mort' is 'cadaver, corpse, dead body'. In fact if 'mort' didn't mean a body there's be no need for the phrase 'les morts vivants'.
'La mort' (feminine) means 'Death' as an abstract concept, and canniot be plural. What we have here is 'le mort' (masculine) which primarily means a dead body; 'la morte' (feminine) similarly primarily means a dead female body.
I mean the text (in Greek and in French) does not enforce nor suggest we should read 'dead body'. And you're wrong, 'dead body' is not the primary meaning of 'mort' (in your link the first meaning is 'personne qui a cessé de vivre'). 'Fête des morts' is a celebration of the dead or of the dead bodies? And let's not forget our text is not about fertilizers in agriculture, but about the wealth of the earth (which in Greek mythology is also the home of the dead) and the influence the dead have (like I said, it is a text about dreams).
In the Greek text there's an active participle. In text you'll find the aorist, in dictionaries you should look for "apothnesko" which means basically "to die" (Liddell-Scott: to die, to die off, to die away, to be dying). Long story short: the English word should be 'dead'.
However, your response would be cleverer if you had said they also find bodies on battlefields.
Considering what I know of you, I certainly don't want to be called 'clever', but 'blind' or 'silly'. Only then I'll know I'm on the right track
You make exactly my point for me. That is EXACTLY what I have been saying all along and you steadfastly denied. The word is used to refer to beings dwelling in or under the earth AND to beings reklated to the underworld and evil spirits.
That is what I am complaining about. It's very irritating that you don't even read what I write. But once and for all
'CHTHONIC' IS USED IN TWO SENSES - TO REFER TO BEINGS RELATED TO THE EARTH AND TO BEINGS RELATED TO THE UNDERWORLD AND EVIL - 'DARK POWERS'. THIS IS BAD AND CONFUSING.
Now unless you can come up with something that relates to that point, instead of chasing all around the houses making me reiterate the same point again and again I give up.
No point in talking to someone who doesn't listen.
Chthonic is used in two senses only by this dictionary (which is not making the point that the underworld in those ancient mythologies was under the earth), not by the scholars or dictionaries quoted before (which held either 'underworld' or 'under the earth').
Moreover, you denied all along that this word can mean 'under the earth', you said it fails to distinguish, you said it is confusing and all this started with an idiotic criticism from your side which claimed "chthonic does not pertain to the earth".
My point is that if 'chthonic' is used both to mean 'associated with the earth' and 'associated with the underworld' it is a confusing usage that masks an important distinction. A word that can refer to both Satan and Demeter is pretty useless from the point of view of religious study, particularly taxonomy.
But Satan isn't really chthonic - the Christian Hell isn't underground, it's just a debased (and therefore lower) existance. The gods that gave rise to the Christian concept of Satan may have been chthonic, but they're not really taxonomically incompatible with Demeter and the rest.
Meaning:1. Dwelling in or under the earth. 2. Related to the underworld of ancient gods and spirits who tend to be evil.
You make exactly my point for me. That is EXACTLY what I have been saying all along and you steadfastly denied. The word is used to refer to beings dwelling in or under the earth AND to beings reklated to the underworld and evil spirits.
That is what I am complaining about. It's very irritating that you don't even read what I write. But once and for all
'CHTHONIC' IS USED IN TWO SENSES - TO REFER TO BEINGS RELATED TO THE EARTH AND TO BEINGS RELATED TO THE UNDERWORLD AND EVIL - 'DARK POWERS'. THIS IS BAD AND CONFUSING.
Now unless you can come up with something that relates to that point, instead of chasing all around the houses making me reiterate the same point again and again I give up.
No point in talking to someone who doesn't listen.
If the underworld was simply the underground, why would it need special entrances?
Who said it was simply the underground? Its an underground otherworld, not just any old subterranean place. The underworld is a mythological abstraction of the underground;
No it isn't. It's the place dead souls go to. Even in Greek mythology it has mountains and sky and birds flying around (pecking livers if nothing else). Some people locate it under the earth some people don't, but 'under the earth' is NOT part of the meaning of 'underworld'. 'World' does not mean 'earth' and 'under' doesn't always mean the same thing either - check undercoat, underclass, underprivileged, underwritten, undersold.
it is under the ground, but you can't merely burrow into the earth to get there. It is a realm of sacred mystery, not a mundane realm.
That's true. And that's one reason it is totally different from the earth.
The dead don't actually live in any kind of soil. Dead bodies may lie in soil, but dead bodies don't go to the underworld.
That does very little to address the quote of Strabo. Hades was directly associated with "soil", specifically "contrary" soil.
Hades insofar as etymology is relevant, comes from 'unseen', 'invisible'. The 'underworld' is the hidden, unseen world. (Because we quite literally cannot see it.)
I could point to alot of other traditions: for instance, the myths of Ireland, which associate the Aos Si or Sidhe (otherworlders, essentially a race that had 'crossed over') with a subterranean existance in passage tombs. Or the wuya kachinas of Hopi myth, who dwell beneath mountains - sometimes in an underground "Lake of the Dead" - and provide the waters for crops:
There are many others, worldwide.
There's no more point in doing that than in my pointing to traditions like the 'Isles of the Blessed' or the 'Pure Land' or the Egyptians seeing the underworld as across the western desert. Or indeed Christianity and Islam.
Certainly some people believe the underworld lies beneath the world of the living, which is then associated with the surface of the earth and its tillable, mineable or just habitable understructure. Other people believe it doesn't.
My point is that if 'chthonic' is used both to mean 'associated with the earth' and 'associated with the underworld' it is a confusing usage that masks an important distinction. A word that can refer to both Satan and Demeter is pretty useless from the point of view of religious study, particularly taxonomy.
Meaning:1. Dwelling in or under the earth. 2. Related to the underworld of ancient gods and spirits who tend to be evil.
In Play: You can find many places in conversations for the literal sense of today's Good Word: "Since my workshop is in the basement, I remain in close contact with several little chthonic creatures that co-inhabit my house." Its metaphorical undertones require a bit more subtlety: "Mickey is an affable enough fellow but I sense a chthonic layer in his humor that makes me uneasy."
Then provide the text. The bit you quoted is quite obviously talking about dead bodies. It's a poetic conceit common to many cultures to dwell on the way new life comes from dead flesh. But all that happens in the world of the living, not the world of dead souls.
Certainly I won't provide the text, and that is for three reasons. One is that the text is ridiculously easy to be found (you just copy from here and paste in Google!). Two is that you argued without knowing, just to maintain your view. Three is that by the time you wrote this reply I already hinted that is a text about dreams (and not about agriculture, fertilizers or whatever you unknowingly assume).
And the bit I quoted it doesn't obviously "talk about dead bodies". On the contary, for one familiar with mythologies, it talks about the wealth coming from earth which is also home of the dead.
I guess someone might also way a little poetic about how intellectual sophistication grows from the thoughts of people now dead - Newton standing on the shoulders of giants. But you still can't cook and eat dead souls, or use them as fertilisers.
The "shoulders of giants" were a syntagm used by many intellectuals along centuries and referred to the ancient Greek and Roman scholars whose knowledge was highly regarded. What Newton held was a paraphrase altered by time of Bernard of Chartres's saying (reported by John of Salisbury) "we are dwarves sitting on shoulders of giants, and that's why we can see further than the ancients". It's a metaphor not related to dead bodies in any way.
Then it's a useless word, whihc was my point originally. There's no significant connection between Aeolus and, say, Chiron, just because they both lived in caves. Even the fact that they are both male is probably more significant.
Of course it is not useless like I already proved with many enough scholarly references. If it's useless for you, then speak only for yourself!
Mythical and religious figures are important because of the role they play in the life of believers, not because of their incidental attributes: using 'chthonic' the way you are doing meakes no more sense than talking about gods being 'bearded' or 'blond' or 'one-eyed'. What use is a classification or categorisation to which everyone belongs - from Hades to Demeter to Poseidon to Zeus to Artemis and on and on?
But that's what 'chthonic' shows, the role they play in the life of the believers. In Greek religion the chthonic gods had chthonic cults. Why do you argue ad nauseam without reading the materials I provided?
Death and rebirth are part of the cycle of life. This is fundamental to Frazer: as the corn dies and returns so must the Corn King. The shades in Hades are not reborn: the individual is not reborn. That's why the earth, where the cycle of death and rebirth takes place, is different from the underworld where there is no rebirth.
But you miss the point, it's not the death and the rebirth of the same thing, of the same entity. Some die, some others get born. Hades also is a protector of agriculture (some scholars even argued that Hades is behind the 'chthonic Zeus' invoked by farmers for their crops).
What I'm arguing is that if you refer to both functions as 'chthonic' then you are losing an important distinction, even if it is sometimes a distinction between different roles of the same divinity.
I already refuted that, 'chthonic' does not address this distinction. Even if you need one word, nothing really stops to use 'agrarian' and 'funeral' (or whatever other synonyms).
You'll never prove your points by repeating them.
I know it's about mother earth - that's why I objected to the use of 'chthonic' in the first place because it brings in concepts of the underworld.
Underworld which is in the earth. I already justified by choice of meaning. You have no justification whatsoever but your own preferences and stubborness (not to call it otherwise).
That would make the Greeks insane. Of course the Greeks knew the difference between dead bodies and 'dead' souls. If you kill someone his body stays where it is - it doesn't go off somewhere. Even the death-obsessed Egyptians with their mummifications knew that the bodies didn't go anywhere, any more than the ornaments they packed around them never went anywhere.
You are barking at the wrong tree. I haven't denied such a difference, I was discussing the nature of the dead in the underworld.
You don't seem to have any idea of how people actually think
I guess I know better than you ... , after all you fail repeatedly in figuring out what I think and keep accusing me in every reply of things I don't believe in or say.
You don't think the Greeks thought the actual physical coin was taken doe to the Styx do you? They were quite capable of digging up a body and observing the coin still there. Again it's much the same as tomb robbing in Egypt: the robbers knew what they were stealing hadn't gone anywhere, and so did the rest of the populaton including the priesthood - otherwise tomb-robbing wouldn't have been a crime.
Again you seem unable to feel for how people actually think.
Oh noes, it was a shadowy coin in a shadowy mouth. Again, I guess I'm much more able than you.
Yes the Greeks believed that dead souls could suffer much the way humans do while alive. So do Christians and Muslims. Like Christians and Muslims the Greeks could still tell the difference between a dead body and a freed soul though.
You don't reply to my text. Do shadows push rocks? Do they need water to drink (Tantalus was standing in a pool of water, not in a pool of shadowy water)?
Of course. We already talked abouit Persephone.
I also talked about Hermes, about which you unknowingly claimed he's not connected with the underworld. Aeneas, Odysseus, Hercules, Orpheus, there are so many ....
However you were claiming that the Greeks believed that crops grew from dead souls. Where you got the idea from that they used souls as fertilizer I have no idea.
I'm not claiming such a thing. Again, you don't seem to have any idea of how people actually think.
What I said was that underground and the underworld are a part of the same realm. From the same realm the crops grew, in the same realm the underworld was. This realm was 'chthonic', it was the interior of the earth.
The corn comes from dead bodies, not the souls of the dead. Surely that at least is a distinction you can see?
I can see the distinction, but you don't know the text (in the aforementioned edition the Greek text is at p. 658, the French translation at p. 659). It is not about corpses, but about the dead.
Then provide the text. The bit you quoted is quite obviously talking about dead bodies. It's a poetic conceit common to many cultures to dwell on the way new life comes from dead flesh. But all that happens in the world of the living, not the world of dead souls.
I guess someone might also way a little poetic about how intellectual sophistication grows from the thoughts of people now dead - Newton standing on the shoulders of giants. But you still can't cook and eat dead souls, or use them as fertilisers.
And as I pointed out almost all deities had some connection with the earth. Even Aeolus lived in a cave.
Which is their chthonic aspect.
Then it's a useless word, whihc was my point originally. There's no significant connection between Aeolus and, say, Chiron, just because they both lived in caves. Even the fact that they are both male is probably more significant.
Mythical and religious figures are important because of the role they play in the life of believers, not because of their incidental attributes: using 'chthonic' the way you are doing meakes no more sense than talking about gods being 'bearded' or 'blond' or 'one-eyed'. What use is a classification or categorisation to which everyone belongs - from Hades to Demeter to Poseidon to Zeus to Artemis and on and on?
Many deities in most religious systems have varying and mixed attributes, especially over time and space. Osiris is a figure with both fertiliy and underworld aspects. Poseidon controls not only the sea, but earthquakes and horses.
However, of the multiple purposes of magic and religion, controlling the fertility of the earth is one, and dealing with personal after-death survival is a different one. So earth fertility divinities have a very different role to those of underworld divinities.
Not really. As illustrated by several of my references, some gods had both functions (in relatively the same moment of time and place in space). The death and the (re)birth were closely related in many mythologies.
Death and rebirth are part of the cycle of life. This is fundamental to Frazer: as the corn dies and returns so must the Corn King. The shades in Hades are not reborn: the individual is not reborn. That's why the earth, where the cycle of death and rebirth takes place, is different from the underworld where there is no rebirth.
I grant you readily, in fact I already referred to some examples, that the same nominal figure can be given a role in more than one magico-religious function: this in fact is how monotheism evolves. I'm not arguing that a god cannot be both 'of the underworld' and 'of the earth': Osiris is: Ameratsu is sun goddess, but also locks herself in a cave, and also is sometimes water-born; in addition she invented the cultivation of rice and wheat.
What I'm arguing is that if you refer to both functions as 'chthonic' then you are losing an important distinction, even if it is sometimes a distinction between different roles of the same divinity.
Depends what you mean by 'entire earth'. And 'fertile' I suppose. I'd like to see a quote that the 'entire earth' is 'fertile' to get some idea of what you mean. Even to the ancient Greeks the idea must have been nonsense.
I provided plenty of references for that from Jung to various scholars of comparative religion. Let's not forget this thread is about Mother-Earth, the gendered concept of fertile divine earth in entirety (not just in the garden, or in the shallow strata).
I know it's about mother earth - that's why I objected to the use of 'chthonic' in the first place because it brings in concepts of the underworld.
You still seem unable to distinguish between 'world' and 'earth'.
I can only point out again, in some despair, that a dead body is not the living dead. The underworld is where the shades of the dead live, not their bodies. Can you really not tell the difference between a dead body and an immortal soul?
Dead bodies exist in the world of the living not the world of the dead. Nobody would have been more familiar with that than the Greeks.
Dead bodies rot in the world of the living, but in some mythologies (including the Greek one) they continue their existence in a somehow embodied form though they otherwise have a shadowy existence.
That would make the Greeks insane. Of course the Greeks knew the difference between dead bodies and 'dead' souls. If you kill someone his body stays where it is - it doesn't go off somewhere. Even the death-obsessed Egyptians with their mummifications knew that the bodies didn't go anywhere, any more than the ornaments they packed around them never went anywhere.
You don't seem to have any idea of how people actually think.
In Greek mythology they are ocassionaly described as shadows, but they perform physical actions like holding the coin in their mouth to be taken by Charon,
You don't think the Greeks thought the actual physical coin was taken doe to the Styx do you? They were quite capable of digging up a body and observing the coin still there. Again it's much the same as tomb robbing in Egypt: the robbers knew what they were stealing hadn't gone anywhere, and so did the rest of the populaton including the priesthood - otherwise tomb-robbing wouldn't have been a crime.
Again you seem unable to feel for how people actually think.
they suffer physical torments - Tantalus enduring endless hunger and thirst, Ixion on a burning wheel bitten by poisonous snakes, Sisyphus working in vain to roll a rock on a steep hill.
Yes the Greeks believed that dead souls could suffer much the way humans do while alive. So do Christians and Muslims. Like Christians and Muslims the Greeks could still tell the difference between a dead body and a freed soul though.
There are also several mythical episodes involving arguably physical actions between those from the world of the living and those from the world of the dead.
Of course. We already talked abouit Persephone.
However you were claiming that the Greeks believed that crops grew from dead souls. Where you got the idea from that they used souls as fertilizer I have no idea.
If the underworld was simply the underground, why would it need special entrances?
Who said it was simply the underground? Its an underground otherworld, not just any old subterranean place. The underworld is a mythological abstraction of the underground; it is under the ground, but you can't merely burrow into the earth to get there. It is a realm of sacred mystery, not a mundane realm.
The dead don't actually live in any kind of soil. Dead bodies may lie in soil, but dead bodies don't go to the underworld.
That does very little to address the quote of Strabo. Hades was directly associated with "soil", specifically "contrary" soil.
I could point to alot of other traditions: for instance, the myths of Ireland, which associate the Aos Si or Sidhe (otherworlders, essentially a race that had 'crossed over') with a subterranean existance in passage tombs. Or the wuya kachinas of Hopi myth, who dwell beneath mountains - sometimes in an underground "Lake of the Dead" - and provide the waters for crops:
So? What has that to do with the underworld? You don't get fruits and gifts from the underworld?
It has to do with an earlier erroneus claim that Demeter was not "living" in the earth, that Demeter is not chthonic.
[/QUOTE]
Are you bothering to follow this thread at all? I said Demeter DID live in the earth but not in the UNDERWORLD. And therefore she was not 'chthonic' because she is not particularly associated with the UNDERWORLD, which is what 'chthonic' MEANS. Of COURSE she is an EARTH goddess, and if you'd simply call her that it would be fine.
If you keep coming up with ridiculously erroneous versions of what I'm sayingm, there's not much point in my saying anything.
Don't you think that the Greeks were perfectly familiar with the idea that, e.g., silver miners 'sent up' what they dug up?
Living creatures can enter the underworld, sometimes go even beyond Cerberus.
But not routine run of the mill silver miners. You're avoiding the point again, since it's so obvious you were wrong.
Incidentally Hades (more accurately Pluto, I'm not sure if in the older myths the original Hades was) was also the god of mining (he was also generally a god of wealth - be it from crops, mining or whatever else "goods of the earth"). Care to guess why?
The Romans mixed up their existing god of mines with the Greek god of the underworld, maybe partly because the Greek word for 'wealth' is Plouton, and because they didn't originally have a god of the underworld themselves?
Like I pointed out, Poseidon is the god of the sea and also of earthquakes. Care to guess why?
You can go down without going into the underworld and you can go up without coming from the underworld.
The Underworld is not the Underground.
In Greek mythology yes, the underworld and the underground were part of the same realm (for us today, having access to different mythological underworlds, no, it is not). Both the gods of the dead, and the gods raising vegetation and plants from the ground were called explicitely by the Greeks 'chthonoi'.
We're discussing - or at least I am - the appropriate use of the word 'chthonic' in modern English, in which it was first recorded late in the 19th century. I think your claim that the Greeks though the uinderworld and the underground were part of the same realm is false, but even if true it misses my point, which is not how the ancient Greeks used the word, but how we should. We have a hell of a lot more religions to take into account that the Greeks did.
Again I have to make the same point again and again and again... nourishment comes from dead bodies, not their souls. Souls live in the underworld. Dead bodies don't. Dead bodies whether they get burnt or buried contribute their elements to the nitrogen cycle and so on.
You make an erroneous point (and making it again won't make it right), because neither the Greek word, nor the French one do not semantically suggest it's about bodies.
What do you mean by 'semantically' there?
Of coure 'mort' in French includes the meaning of dead body. In my Larousse the very first meaning given to 'mort' is 'cadaver, corpse, dead body'. In fact if 'mort' didn't mean a body there's be no need for the phrase 'les morts vivants'.
'La mort' (feminine) means 'Death' as an abstract concept, and canniot be plural. What we have here is 'le mort' (masculine) which primarily means a dead body; 'la morte' (feminine) similarly primarily means a dead female body.
I recommend you to read the entire text (which is about dreams, by the way). And also Walter Burkert's account on chthonic gods.
You find their bodies in cemeteries.
If the body was burnt you find ashes. If the body was buried (and not embalmed) some years ago you find bones. Well, if you look for fresh inhumations, maybe you have a chance
Somewhere else I said buried or burned. However, your response would be cleverer if you had said they also find bodies on battlefields. Of course you find bodies in cemeteries. You may also find beercans and all sorts of unmentionable objects, but you certainly find bodies.
The corn comes from dead bodies, not the souls of the dead. Surely that at least is a distinction you can see?
I can see the distinction, but you don't know the text (in the aforementioned edition the Greek text is at p. 658, the French translation at p. 659). It is not about corpses, but about the dead.
And as I pointed out almost all deities had some connection with the earth. Even Aeolus lived in a cave.
Which is their chthonic aspect.
Many deities in most religious systems have varying and mixed attributes, especially over time and space. Osiris is a figure with both fertiliy and underworld aspects. Poseidon controls not only the sea, but earthquakes and horses.
However, of the multiple purposes of magic and religion, controlling the fertility of the earth is one, and dealing with personal after-death survival is a different one. So earth fertility divinities have a very different role to those of underworld divinities.
Not really. As illustrated by several of my references, some gods had both functions (in relatively the same moment of time and place in space). The death and the (re)birth were closely related in many mythologies.
Depends what you mean by 'entire earth'. And 'fertile' I suppose. I'd like to see a quote that the 'entire earth' is 'fertile' to get some idea of what you mean. Even to the ancient Greeks the idea must have been nonsense.
I provided plenty of references for that from Jung to various scholars of comparative religion. Let's not forget this thread is about Mother-Earth, the gendered concept of fertile divine earth in entirety (not just in the garden, or in the shallow strata).
I can only point out again, in some despair, that a dead body is not the living dead. The underworld is where the shades of the dead live, not their bodies. Can you really not tell the difference between a dead body and an immortal soul?
Dead bodies exist in the world of the living not the world of the dead. Nobody would have been more familiar with that than the Greeks.
Dead bodies rot in the world of the living, but in some mythologies (including the Greek one) they continue their existence in a somehow embodied form though they otherwise have a shadowy existence. In Greek mythology they are ocassionaly described as shadows, but they perform physical actions like holding the coin in their mouth to be taken by Charon, they suffer physical torments - Tantalus enduring endless hunger and thirst, Ixion on a burning wheel bitten by poisonous snakes, Sisyphus working in vain to roll a rock on a steep hill. There are also several mythical episodes involving arguably physical actions between those from the world of the living and those from the world of the dead.
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