The power of life causes the snake to shed its skin, just as the moon sheds its shadow.
The serpent sheds its skin to be born again, as the moon its shadow to be born again. They are
equivalent symbols. Sometimes the serpent is represented as a circle eating its own tail. That's an
image of life. Life sheds one generation after another, to be born again. There is something
tremendously terrifying about life when you look at it that way. And so the serpent carries in
itself the sense of both fascination and the terror of life.
Furthermore, the serpent represents the primary function of life, mainly eating. Life
consists in eating other creatures. The serpent is a traveling alimentary canal, that's about all it is.
And it gives you that primary sense of shock, of life in its most primal quality. There is not
arguing with that animal at all. Life lives by killing and eating itself, casting off death and being
reborn, like the moon.
[Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myths with Bill Moyers. New York, Doubleday, 1988 pdf]
This was then.
And this is now:
If indefinite lifespan is on the cusp, would people really want to live forever?
And if they do, what would that mean for the world?
"Time and the pure essence of Heaven, the moisture of the Earth, the powers of the Sun and the Moon all worked upon a certain rock, old as creation. And it became magically fertile. That first egg was named "Thought"...Elemental forces caused the egg to hatch. From it came a stone monkey. The nature of Monkey was irrepressible!"
---Saiyuki [1]
[1] Saiyuki is a 2006 Japanese historical TV drama based on the 16th Century Chinese story Journey to the West [2]. It is a successor to the popular 1970's TV show Saiyuki, known outside Japan as Monkey.
[2] Originally published anonymously in the 1590s during the Ming Dynasty, part of the novel's enduring popularity comes from the fact that it works on multiple levels: it is a first-rate adventure story, a dispenser of spiritual insight, and an extended allegory in which the group of pilgrims journeying toward India stands for the individual journeying toward enlightenment. More >
17 May 2008 @ 22:46 "Finally the day arrived! When the boy received the Sea-Monkey kit, he tore into the package with the humanoid characters on the front of the box. Sadly he was disappointed to find that inside the Sea-Monkey kingdom was really only a tiny plastic tank and a package of brine shrimp. No castle, no humanoids, no races, no tricks, no evolving colony. You really couldn’t interact with them in any meaningful way. You could only peep through the little magnifying glass spots on the side of the tank and watch them twitch. This was not at all what was advertised. How disappointing!"
The Sea Monkeys were spoofed on an episode in the sixth season of South Park called The Simpsons Already Did It. Cartman's sea people built a little underwater civilization and even a statue to him. More >
The Holy Mount Athos has always been a "barrier against which the waves of heresies would break"[1]. From ancient times this sublime institution, the domain of the Mother of God, which lived in accordance with Divine principles, has been the stronghold of Orthodoxy. In guarding the faith of the Holy Fathers, Athonites (hagiorites), for centuries, have been an example of piety to all... Having renounced the world and entirely dedicated himself to serving God, "a true monk fears neither the imperial purple, nor the mitre of a patriarch, and is prepared to endure anything joyfully and happily for the love of the Orthodox faith, which is his greatest treasure . ... Monastic hood does not bow before any masters who disdain the Divine Law and the Sacred Tradition, and who subject the Faith to sinful people desirous of worldly things, to people obedient to Satan." [2]
[1] Athonite monk-zealot Theoklitis Germanos, "Confession of Faith", in the collection Protestations Orthodoxes... , p. 62.
19 May 2008 @ 22:57
