Mircea Eliade: Myth and Reality

well hello

everyone um yeah today we're talking

about Mera El hopefully I got that right

um the book is myth and reality I think

is that right Judith I think that's the

name of the book myth and reality no I'm

not really sure sorry but this is

obviously a chapter in it it's the chap

mythologies of yeah myth a memory and

forgetting yes and just quickly I was

really I'd never heard of eliad

and that's what we were just discussing

now prior of this um that some of you

had Judith had um me and line were kind

of uh it's new to us but it was cool um

basically aliade had fluent command of

five languages that's amazing Romanian

French German Italian English and a

reading knowledge of fre others Hebrew

Persian and

Sanskrit uh that's pretty amazing

so obviously a very brilliant person

historian of religion who's a fiction

writer philosopher and professor at the

University of Chicago one of the most

influential Scholars of religion of the

20th century and interpreter of

religious experience he established

paradigms in religious studies that

persist to this day wow what a um what a

giant just reading this one chapter too

I I

I'll say something about it first I

loved

it and it's right up my alley because

for

me I I I really enjoy the kind of uh

that kind of um I don't know how would

you put it it's not like dry Academia at

all is it there's a lot of um weaving

together different narratives and and

and different

mythologies it's a lovely beautiful

blend I find of um philosophy and

mythology and kind of um some of the

more interesting aspects of um esoteric

religions in particular or the esoteric

parts of the religions so fascinating

yeah loved it I'm definitely going to

read more of this what did you think

Judith yeah well I mean you you're right

that he um he Blends a lot of different

cultural Traditions together and and one

of the amazing things about him was that

he actually went and studied in India uh

under Indian academics and and uh you

know it's not just that he was in an

armchair in Europe kind of pontificating

about uh Eastern Traditions he actually

went there and learned them from and the

languages such as Sanskrit from uh

Scholars uh working in India at the time

which was pretty um must have been

pretty revolutionary in the

30s uh and and demonstrating a real

commitment to exploring other traditions

awesome what did you think line just is

a um well when I first set off I thought

oh I'm not sure I like this then I got

halfway through and then I thought oh I

think I do like this and so the further

I went on the more I enjoyed

it and it's such

an Innovative voice isn't it like it's a

very it's a unique take and when I was

younger I used to read a lot of um Milan

cond and he plays around with these

myths as well in his fictional his

fiction so he for example he even wrote

a book called um laughter and forgetting

I think I think that was called and his

very famous book The what is it the

unbearable likeness of being which got

turned into a movie but that starts out

with a um in the first section of the

book with a description of Nature's

Eternal Rec

and the story captures that theme of

memory and forgetting and return and uh

I just find that such an evocative theme

because I don't know about you guys but

it's something that I actually do

reflect on like noticing these kind of

cycles of return and um I don't know

like I don't want to sound like a madman

but it it there's it's almost like these

kind of um I I can see a place for this

esoteric symbology that sort of creeps

into your life when significant moments

kind of creep back into your life that

have been you know that have been there

before and maybe it's like oh this is a

second chance to have a look at it it's

kind of um I find that quite a

fascinating phenomenon do you guys know

what I'm talking about or am I just

weird yeah I I think you're absolutely

right I think and just reflecting on

this this chapter you know I've

been thinking about the the importance

of memory and and forgetting in in

culture right so in a sense you can't

have culture without memory um you can't

have just to refer back to our recent

session on

AI I'll start to think that AI is a you

know this is like a kind of a new

touring test right the the AIS are

approaching Humanity if they um if they

for instance you know decide to

immigrate from Austin Texas to the

ancestral home in Silicon Valley because

they remember the Traditions from so

basically you know remembering tradition

culture history all these things are

impossible without memory and and this

is why it's so uh Central to well it's

Central to personal identity right you

know none of us is who we are without

our having memory of who we were uh and

and one of the tragedies of of uh

dementia and and aging can be the loss

of personal identity through memory um

and and the sort of the um the

recurrence that has to take place every

minute of of a day you know so so yeah

memory is so Central to both individual

and cultural identity um yeah it's no

surprise that it's formed such a a sort

of an invocative part of all these myth

Traditions yeah

beautiful and also the idea of and I

think this will come into it uh

recollection and the kind of themes that

surround it like

recognition and uh and um I don't know

there there's these ideas of um how

memory actually works is it through

recognition or is it through resemblance

of something that we already knew in the

past like yeah so well why don't we jump

in at the um right at the start um he's

telling this Indian story right the

Amnesia of Matt

sandr Matt

sendr and and the story is about a yogi

Who falls in love with the queen and

forgets his

identity yep so once enslaved he's

destined to die but his disciple goes to

rescue him and in the process he

disguises himself as a dancing girl and

he sings enigmatic songs through which

the master begins to remember

himself and uh he the master understands

that the way of the flesh leads to death

that his Oblivion was basically

forgetfulness of his true and Immortal

nature and that the CH charms of kadali

which is the place he he ended up in

represent the mirages of profane

life um the the Master's forgetfulness

tells us is assimilated to death and

vice versa his Awakening his anamnesis

anamnesis is a prerequisite for

immortality you know in this too I was

really taken back to the

Symposium um did you draw that those

sort of connections

Judith yeah 100% it's such a well as as

he as El draws out later on such a key

idea in in ploh but just to to make a um

connection where it's it's the songs of

the um the servant disguise the dancing

girl which bring uh bring the master

back to some remembrance and and it just

struck me that's a really interesting um

highlight as well because talking about

people affected by um

dementia often it's through music that

they're um that they do make connections

it's funny that it's that kind of uh

that kind some something about those um

those parts of the brain I suppose or or

those parts of the identity somehow the

music manages to trigger it but yeah so

there's this idea around um well

obviously the the forgetfulness is is

identified with a kind of a death um

because yeah it's a kind of a death of

an identity but but um yeah it was

really interesting I think how eliad

singled out the key elements of this

kind of Tale

um the state of Amnesia and the the sort

of the coming back and The

Awakening um and so he makes the link

with um Gnostic kind of uh

Traditions uh I suppose to to to say

from the outset though you know

this there are questions I suppose

around method in terms of you know well

this is what we find in Indian tradition

this is what we find in gostic Tradition

and making it

you know bringing them together in

certain ways and and this was kind of I

suppose a a way that um comparative

mythology was done um I would say

towards the end of the 19th century and

the first half of the 20th century now I

guess this there's always got to be

methodological questions about whether

that's that's um whether that's a really

sound way of proceeding and I think

perhaps um earlier ways of doing this

kind of things so for

instance I understand one of the works

that was influential on El was um Sir

James Fraser's very influential work the

golden bow from the 1890s which again

tried to you know bring a lot of

mythological Traditions together and

find um

commonalities uh and but that was

already a bit of a quick sotic project

and and we can see that in um uh the

novel middl March which came out in the

1870s by George Elliot and and in that

there's a scholar who whose project is

the key to all the mythology

um and and yeah it's it's presented as a

quick sotic project that has no end and

it's got no boundaries and it's kind of

uh it consumes people so I I guess what

I'm saying is I suppose we've got to be

a little bit careful around the

methodology that that IIA brings

here um I mean he's obviously very

knowledgeable but but um and I think he

identifies himself later on what is kind

of key here is it's it's a search for

the origins right it's a search for all

these things come from and where they

all connect um so I guess as long as we

have a little bit of caution around some

of the connections that he makes uh

that's all yeah that's all the point I

want to make there yeah um he doesn't

mention it but I I was obviously looking

at this from with a contrasting eye to

say stoicism you know couldn't help

myself but um and and it was a good

contrast it made me realize that at

least the Indian mythology and the

um the the Gnostic mythology as it's

presented here is has a similarity in

that the ultimate self somehow the soul

or the Atman or whatever is

um is transformed into a material body

through some sort of um desire to

experience the Flesh and then as a

result forgets its ultimate nature so I

I saw that as the way he kind of groups

those as opposed to other kinds of

mythologies I don't think Indian

mythology is um well religion is

dualistic so I wouldn't say that but

there's that theme of the self

forgetting itself through

Incarnation um I think but to go back to

the Symposium link it's because the yogi

like the soul forgets itself because he

falls in

love and and so um I think that's the

same with the way Plato plays around

with Socrates in in the Symposium

because it's about love and the people

who are presumably asleep in the story

are the ones who don't understand love

and the one who's awake is the master

who understands the true nature of love

and then he plays around with the

concept of love in order to wake them up

just as the dancer is probably playing

around with the concept of love in a

similar way but probably using esoteric

words and movements and things like that

because it's a different

tradition um that's what I thought was

an interesting connection looks like

Sam's just

arriving um but you're right it he then

quickly introduces that Gnostic

connection um I found it interesting I

mean I went of a complete different

tangent to you two but I mean for me it

seemed like physical love or at least uh

love with a woman uh was corrupting of

the sell that was almost underneath it

which reminded me a little bit of Adam

and Eve this corrupting woman who uses

sort of charms she's almost a snake um

and and then you had this the snake

charming dancer to bring him back but

what I found interesting was the this

notion of a loss of self so in that

connection there's a loss of self but

that in of itself implies that there was

a self that was known before in order to

lose

it and I'm not certain that there was a

self

before a known self for you to have

amesia of the loss of self so I find

that an interesting kind of

um

circular contradiction in it that that's

the way I went with that bit anyway well

that is very interesting I presume in

these mythologies there's this idea or

religions that prior to birth you do

know yourself to be what you actually

are like whatever it is the Divine mind

or a soul or or in Plato right it's the

um it's the soul that um has knowledge

of the the um real world you know the

world of forms um

and that's what apparently we the the

the the religion is telling us that

there's a spiritual Dimension to life

prior to birth and that when we're born

um we somehow forget it yeah I think

they say that later on that there's

almost this wiped self as though um

memory is is lost either on death or

through the process of rebirth I think

they go on to sa so it's through either

one of those which I found quite

convenient

to

explain um yeah yeah

memory that well with

me

yeah oh he's gone um yeah and I think

you're right L because I I think there's

a lot of ambiguity around this idea of

the self and I think a lot of there's a

lot of

um well there's certainly a huge

literature in the GRE or Roman context

around around well when did an idea of

the self emerge did senica discover the

self that's one

idea or is it completely anachronistic

and that we're imposing a a a category

on the Ancients that they actually

didn't have so yeah I think I think

you're right to be cautious around

statements around the self and and

consciousness of self I think I think we

do well to be to be a little cautious

around that so Sam are you here we saw

you come we saw you

go I think you still

connecting but you know this idea of

self I think Eli is um not talking about

what we normally mean by self so like he

says here he's talking about the pan

Indian motive of the fall of the spirit

into the circle of existences and as a

consequence loss of consciousness of the

self so it's a Cosmic Self isn't it it's

not an ego self um and yeah so

and then that he says there's these um

these metaphors of binding chaining and

captivity which are interchanged with

those of forgetting knowing and sleep to

signify The Human Condition yeah yeah

it's a strange idea yeah it is and that

idea of a Cosmic Self once again I I get

trapped in that because uh it suggests a

singularity the

self whereas Cosmic imp by something way

bigger and much more

Universal um so I I kind of went how do

we separate those two out as a spirit

entity that is a self contained in and

of

itself um but it's part of a cosmic

thing but it's not the cosmic it's uh so

so I kind of wonder what does he mean by

that that's a very interesting point we

could unpack that because he gives us a

clue here he says in this um Indian text

that

banika I don't know that the gods fall

from Heaven when their memory fails and

they are of confused memory on the

contrary those Gods who do not forget

are immutable Eternal of a nature that

knows no change my understanding of that

is there seems to be parts of the

cosmos that get sucked into becoming and

they and they enter the world of change

the temporal world and so they take on a

self but there are some parts of the

cosmos these other gods that never enter

that process of becoming and only exist

as being and so they always remain

immutable and eternal and never have any

problems with forgetting what they

are it's a I mean that's how I read that

it's very complex would you like to try

and unpack that a bit Judith do you see

where I'm going with that um yeah that's

that seems quite plausible to me um

again we've got to take eliad on trust I

think here because we're not familiar

with the original text he was so yeah

we've kind of got to go with his

interpretation but yeah I I think you're

right Courtney in so far as you you're

um uh yeah making the connection that um

it's the it's the the gods who are

um who who are immutable and again that

recalls a little bit stoicism right it's

it's the the per the sage who is

immutable constant in every respect he

he's the perfect one um so yes it uh

forgetting is one of the aspects in

which the non- Godlike um are fallible

and therefore um liable to to yeah fall

into error or or fall into some kind of

trouble now I think that makes makes a

lot of sense there was some talk about

this sort of stuff in nus Bam's book not

not exactly this but along similar lines

when she's talking about the different

schools and she talks about how the gods

relate to man so you know there's that

famous line in in epicus where he says

there's five different types of God you

know according to the Traditions can't

remember what they all were but they

basically the Aristotelian one the the

epicurian one the skeptic one and the

one that he agrees with which he says

something like and I can't even move

without going not without God knowing

everything that I'm doing basically but

the other idea is that the epicurian god

may be one of these remote kind of

immutable gods that has no interest in

in humans whatsoever and but again

that's a slightly different story from

the one he's telling us here because

what he's telling us here is that

according to gnosticism in this Indian

kind of way of looking at things human

beings our own

Consciousness is um is a God you know

that's forgotten itself and it's a do

you remember was it Joseph Campbell did

that dodgy book called hero with a

thousand faces and I think people like

Alan Watts used the same idea that what

if reality was God just playing a game

of hide and seek with himself you know

he kind of incarnates himself and

forgets so that he can have fun

I don't know why you want to have fun

but you know basically kind of go

through the drama of being a an ignorant

human being because knowing everything

being God all the time must get pretty

boring and stale I don't know it's very

anthropomorphic but you get the idea

right yeah so I think we we're starting

to see kind of elad's um drawing

parallels between uh remembering being

conscious uh

being uh being cited because he draws

the contrast with um the

Blindfolded um so yeah these are all

kind of uh different ways of

understanding the same condition I guess

uh or the same uh the same uh contrast

between the the cited and the blind the

uh the dead and the living the the um

getting and the

remembering hey Sam you finally got

through you've got two windows up now

some

reason it's because I'm on my phone the

the computer's very unstable ah you

going what did you think of does anyone

remember how to say it

elad I I think that analogy on

falling sorry he takes it in he takes a

few different paradigms the initial one

where the living fall into death and

dissolve and then that is a type of

bondage a type of blocking or a type of

a if it's a loss of identity or a

VI I I think that's coherent I think I

think it's the same really they just

talk about the same it's it's like if

you're describing your shoes

as you're marching compared to

describing where you're going you know

it it they two analogies that are the

same

process okay cool yeah we were sort of

just unpacking that um the how cryptic

it is I did like that story that you

were just mentioning Judith um from the

chandogya

upanishad and the commentary of that man

who got blindfolded and he got lost

apparently uh in trying to find his way

back to the The Village as some sort of

metaphor of uh um trying to ReDiscover

him himself as this Divine thing and

luckily some master comes along or

someone who knows and um gives him

directions which we supposed to take it

as a kind of uh instruction on how to

find himself where he needs to go and it

made me think at least in the commentary

that's presented it had at least in in

some in this respect a strong similarity

with stoicism in particular the causes

of error and ongoing misunderstanding so

to quote it it says the thieves are the

false ideas of Merit and demerit you

know we could call that what is

choiceworthy desirable and um and things

to be averse to so

um yeah I thought that was kind of

interesting because the text talks about

he's he's bound down to his cattle and

his and his sons and daughters and wife

and things like that rather than you

know so external things rather than this

kind of similar approach of looking for

something deeper you know this and it

seems like I know like you're saying we

should be careful about this and I guess

maybe we've got we can also see this

attempt you were talking about of um um

finding a unifying mythology we see it

in Alis hux's perennial philosophy too

you know this idea that um there's a lot

of similarity here and maybe we make

connection maybe I make connections

where they're not so should be careful

about that well I think everyone does qu

that's the thing that's why didn't the

um I mean you you know what but I don't

I know nothing about this you know about

this this is

the um wasn't a lot of the Hermetic

tradition around finding common ground

between the biblical traditions and the

Greek Traditions right you know it was

It was supposed that they really all had

a common kind of basis and and and I

think I think naturally we gravitate to

trying to find um structures that that

make sense and that are coherent across

these different systems but I think

you're absolutely right in specifically

in relation to this because he

specifically says the um the the

Blindfolded man who's completely

confused he he he doesn't he doesn't

know if he's happy or unhappy or

intelligent or stupid he he knows

nothing um he doesn't know how to live

and then he needs the Brahman Atman who

is free from slavery happy and in

addition full of sity for others so

that's an element of the um the Brahman

at's wisdom is that he has this this

sympathy and this understanding you know

he he's he his part of his knowledge and

his wisdom is his fellow feeling for

other people which I thought was

beautiful and as you say Courtney quite

quite reminiscent of

stoicism yeah and it kind of got me

thinking more about

um the differences as I was going along

reading this and so I read this quote on

the same page I think I believe that I

suffer apparently this is a quote from I

don't know he doesn't really say where

exactly maybe it's from some yoga text

or something it says I believe that I

suffer I believe that I'm bound I desire

Liberation at the moment when having

awakened I understand that this I is a

product of matter I at the same time

understand that all existence has been

only a chain of moments of suffering and

that true Spirit impassively

contemplated the drama of

Personality it made me think about how

miserable again this reminds me of

schopenhauer now the these philosophies

are because nostic ism is pretty

miserable too and and it's this this

idea that we've born we've been born

into or our souls or whatever have made

a mistake in being incarnated

and as a result um we have to suffer as

as a result of it um but in stoicism you

don't see that you see a similar

interest in finding yourself or whatever

but you you don't see it as a form of

suffering and I just jotted some quick

notes to explain that there seems to be

yeah in this Indian one and the Gnostic

one there seems to be no interest in a

rational view that we're governed by our

commitment to

beliefs um

if we eradicate incorrect beliefs I.E

the ones that support the view that you

can be constrained oppressed or harmed

and then you will not experience

suffering so no Awakening of the Cosmic

Self is necessary in the rational view

as the human life has all the order and

Perfection required for happiness but

because they don't have this rational

kind of um uh perspective in in the

Indian and the Gnostic versions that

were presented with here the solution is

the world is [ __ ] it's it's just a

place of suffering as opposed to it

being well it's because you have beliefs

about the the world that that support

that particular view I think that's a

really interesting

distinction because it basically cuts

out the need to come up with a cosmic

cell a separate Cosmic Self that exists

without the world or something that you

need need to kind of get back to

desperately in order to become happy

rather you can say well no I have a part

of the Divine whole in me and that is

the part in reason that allows me to

change my alter my beliefs so that they

align with nature in such a way that I

no longer suffer you don't have to

become God you just have to use reason

properly well I think that's really

interesting where where he then goes

back into the um platonist tradition uh

because obviously the the Gnostic

tradition owed a lot to the platonist

tradition one way or another in kind of

combination with um Christianity as it

was in its kind of first 150 years or

120 years or something so um in a sense

what he's done today is a bit uh

anachronistic really you know because he

hasn't given us the backstory but here

he is about to with the pl platonism or

some of it

yeah he says um he quotes plotus right

memory is for those who have

forgotten and that remembering is a

virtue and you already mentioned it but

it reminded me of the sage right um a

perfect he says a perfect memory is

superior to the ability to recollect and

we know that in the in the stok sage

having attained virtue he cannot

experience a loss of virtue there's no

element of forgetting in in the sage

which is quite interesting because

virtue is an unforgettable

experience the sage cannot forget but we

can but we can and this is where I'm

kind of interested in drawing a very

strange connection that may or may not

be appropriate that you know we we

forget the sage doesn't but we do so we

need methods of recollection which are

the techniques the techn name you know

and there's this idea then that possibly

if it's appropriate to draw this

connection that um in

stoicism there's a constant

ongoing need for recollection through

pedagogy um that some things are up to

us and some things are not that's what's

constantly being told to us and we

constantly need to remember

it I think probably elad um assumes that

all his readers are going to be 100%

familiar with the platonist background

but just to to kind of reiterate that um

in the dialogue the

Mino

Socrates

shows to his own and his listen

satisfaction through an experiment which

is uh a slave who isn't isn't educated

he's just a young boy he's brought

forward and Socrates shows him how to

come to a a conclusion about a

geometrical problem and from this

Socrates concludes that there was no way

no way that this that the young boy

could have known all this other than

that it was a form a kind of

recollection and so um I can't remember

if he actually goes into the mechanism

in the Mino but he certainly goes into

it in the Fido and later

dialogues uh where the mechanism is in

fact that in a previous incarnation

that's where the soul has learned some

of these things and um and and therefore

that's how we come to be able to uh

carry out geometrical or or sort of

arithmetical calculations where we we

might have had no knowledge of them

before so um so memory plays that

absolutely critical role in pla's theory

about understanding learning

recognition and um yeah I it's just

worth noting that that's how fundamental

memory is to to all the cognitive

operations in

platonism yeah and more than just

mathematical right and geometrical it's

truth beauty and goodness too are the

kinds of forms that apparently the soul

knows or has known and then

recollects which reminds me I wanted to

ask you is it

that the soul re say when a person see

sees a beautiful woman or a flower or

something like that the idea is that

that thing is beautiful because it

partakes in the form of beauty does that

mean that the recollection happens

because Beauty well that thing partakes

in the form of beauty so it's more of a

kind of recognition or is it that the

soul already knew it and this thing has

the appearance of something that the

soul already

had I like think it's in the

world yeah I think the former of what

you said there courney is more is more

my understanding of it but

yeah I think that and and the Symposium

is where the the sort of theory of

beauty is most elaborated I I would say

so I think

that uh it's it's a

participation uh in in the form of

beauty I think and and but yeah the the

process of

recognition uh is is is key and of

course yeah that that implies some kind

of original

familiarity uh so yeah yeah but more I

guess I asked that question because

importantly these things in the world

all around us partake in truth beauty

and goodness they

actually um have that in them somehow um

as opposed to they just somehow stand in

for and remind us of something because

that would be too in a sense that would

yeah that's right and you'd have an

infinite regress of of replicas I

suppose and we don't want an infinite

regress of replicas so I would say

participation is more than model yeah

and we want to make sure that the human

being is interacting with the world in

order to discover the truth right yeah

rather than just a recognition of the

beautiful form inside recognizing the

abstract beautiful form yeah that's

mediated between the Sun and myself the

sunet and myself yeah

yeah all right so so then he goes into

the myth of N I actually had to look

that one up too

MOS mother of the muses who's omniscient

or omniscient depending on how you

pronounce it and The

Poets when they're possessed by the

musers draw directly from n's store of

knowledge especially from the knowledge

of origins of beginnings and of

genealogies and this is really important

for what elad's elad is going to talk

yeah yeah and I've just realized that's

that's the kind of the theoretical and

poetic way of saying what I said before

that that um you can't have culture

without memory as Eli has put it it that

NEOS being the um the mother of the

muses is exactly the kind of the poetic

way of saying exactly that yeah and I

really like what he does here uh I can

see why in that book the philosophy of

Madness the GU interested in Eli for

this particular stuff because reading

between the lines it's pretty

interesting because he says um the past

thus revealed is much more than the

antecedent of the present more than just

a temporal frame it is its source it

reaches so in another word it reaches

the depths of

being there's this idea that to discover

the original the primordial reality from

which the cosmos issued and which makes

it possible to understand becoming as a

whole so the poet has access to the

original realities mythical times of the

beginning no longer perceivable in

current experience now this is really

cryptic and I think it's really

interesting um so it can resemble a

contact with the other world the past

appears as a dimension of the

Beyond that's really cool righty the

past appears is a dimension of the

Beyond because it it exists in a

Time be because if we're interested in

Origins to find the meaning of things in

the now it means because these things

existed in some sort of primordial

reality they no longer have to bear any

kind of direct representation to what we

we see or experience now that they could

be otherworldly in a sense they could be

myths or symbols or they could be the

world of the Dead U or the world of

madness and obviously that's why the guy

in Madness is interested mystical states

of of experiencing and things like that

I think this is really there's a lot

going on in the background yeah I think

that's why it says it's no longer an

anteed it's not like a mechanical

causality or like just one step right

before the next that had caused it is

more like an an upspring a Welling

that's really sourced from something

deep and to understand the character of

that is to also understand the force

that that all of that pressure from that

origin has and emerges throughout your

life yeah and I think again here's me

doing things I shouldn't be doing

drawing connections from stoicism to

this I think this is really interesting

if this if this is the case then no

wonder the stoics are so interested in

physics you know fusus they're

interested in this idea of fate and

causality and things like that

and

maybe that's the idea that if they can

get back to understanding this

primordial time the way the cosmos was

formed and the way Zeus penetrated all

of matter with his numer or whatever and

to know that is to explain exactly

what's going on in the present moment

you know that's very

interesting yeah absolutely and there's

a reason why he uses the expression here

umus inferos The Descent to to the

underworld because that's an absolutely

key process it's a key process um in in

Homer um it's a key process uh in the

anad the great uh Latin epic um

senica has his moments where he refers a

bit obliquely to a descent to the

underworld so yes I think you're

absolutely right Courtney I think

um cult you know broader culturally it

certainly was a Wellspring of of

knowledge or again this this penetration

to um

other uh other mediated ways of

knowing and there was this idea in

cisero I'm pretty sure I remember

reading it and I'm sure it's repeated

elsewhere that we tend to trust or those

guys tended to trust like Pythagoras in

that because they were closer to the

beginning of the cause of time so the

the philosophy that they had was more

Pure or more perfect and less watered

down and less problematic senica says

the same things right in um in in a

different way when he's because if we

take like no spam recommends that um

stoicism kind of draws on a medical

analogy well do you remember that one it

must be in I can't remember you'll

remember maybe letter 91 or something

where sen is talking about um back in

the old days when before before men were

corrupted by external things cures were

much simpler you know there's this idea

of anyway it's slightly different thing

but it's just again that idea of getting

back to the the the the point in which

history

begins um there's a golden age and

people were more perfect and anyway

slightly different

subject that that's why origin of Cosmos

matches origin of geneologies because as

you stretch your memory back into the

past

your identity and how you UND how you've

inherited your

identity um becomes more it's less

focused you don't know the exact

definitions like like which which is why

every time you look into the past

geneology and Cosmos it uh it becomes a

more generalized like Universal story

rather than you know recording your

great great

grandparents like like I I related that

to myself recently in a kind of Tower of

Babble analogy that

my grand great-grandfather didn't speak

a language than any any of us spoke so

we cannot have a genealogy going before

that and it even and that's even exists

in a kind of uh like in

a in inside the British Empire of like a

totalizing you know all in one

language so it's sort of so you use the

analogy out of Babel you know sort of

comes my the line of fathers that I

understand an identity that I understand

from a br Mythic

story yeah that's an interesting point

because you're getting past Beyond where

the the story of History starts yeah and

which brings us to the second part right

so this idea of genealogy and Origins um

the other one the second version of this

is the myth of memory and forgetting

change he says becomes enriched by the

es

eschatological there you go try and say

that 10 times fast eschatological

meaning when a doctrine of

transmigration takes place so

um es catological that's how you

pronounce it don't es catological

meaning which has to do with the the end

of things doesn't it yeah the end of

humanity or the end of one's life Soul

Destiny of the

Soul so in this the function of Le have

we have we introduced the concept of Le

am I jumping ahead here Le is the he

says it's a fountain but I I Googled it

and it said it's a river in

Hades you would know Judith is it a

river or a fountain um in my

understanding it's a

river uh but yeah that could just be a

you know a turn of phrase I wouldn't put

too much weight on that so apparently if

you drink from Le or have you pronounce

it you forget everything you forget your

life that your life of Earthly existence

but in this second uh SE second type of

um

forgetting um the function of Le is

reversed he says it has it no longer

finds forgetfulness of Earthly life but

blots out the memory of the celestial

World

um of the Soul returning to Earth to be

reincarnated I don't know basically

instead of

um merely causing us to forget our

Earthly life that we just lived it it

now in this second

formulation blots out the memory of the

celestial World once the soul returns to

the Earth as an incarnated thing

I thought that was quite interesting

because it made me think of and here's

me getting all symbolic again this the

Paradox of this um way of seeing life

and death and and forgetting and

remembering and it's this idea you know

like the serpent eating its tail is a

kind of it's a kind of paradox because

on the one hand you got life is the

forget life is the forgetting of the

soul the life of the Soul um and so in

becoming alive we lose our immortality

so we experience a kind of death but on

the other hand death is the forgetting

of Earthly existence so there's this

interesting kind of paradox at work

within it that I thought would be really

cool to probably eat a lot of magic

mushrooms and think

about the second formulation makes sense

in that once you enter the river of time

of of Chronos of continuity of to moment

you the moment to M contingency means

you forget whatever is the Eternal

good

yeah um we're up to part three if anyone

has anything else to say about that

section do you want to add anything

about leth Judith I don't know much

about any of that Marine so you're

raring to go I don't know much about it

at all Le you'll have to ask your mad

patience about it J in in the Odyssey

when adus is asked to cut the cut the um

like to make a pool of the blood of the

sheep so the shades remember is it the

opposite to Le sorry the opposite of

what um the opposite of drinking of of

drinking of the river of Le of drinking

maybe it is actually so I think you

might be might be right I think it maybe

it is I can't think wh eles would be

because sense it's almost so once they

once ads adds the material back in the

shades then recognize adicus again they

recognize his face brother did not

recognize him before that material was

added back to

theal yeah but it's also the corporeal

being added back as well it kind of

triggers something obviously yeah yeah

which is why it's blood and and breaking

down matter yeah exactly oh here car hi

Kyle did you read this

one uh no not really oh there you go but

I thought I thought you might I was

interested yeah you've been missing a

lot of interesting waffle about life and

death how do you say his name again is

it I've already forgotten um anyone

remember ma elard there you go so we're

at part three primordial and his

historical memory so this got me waxing

lyrical again so Le is powerless in the

case of certain privileged persons he

tells us who inspired there's like two

cases right the ones who are inspired by

the musers or by virtue so there's a

second cause or by virtue of a power of

Prophecy in Reverse which is that

referring back to Origins again a really

interesting point now I I thought it was

was really interesting because do you

remember in therapy of Desire I I really

got wound up on this idea that nbam

thought that um all of the helenistic

schools in one form or another she she

says um were interested in this kind of

concept of liberating man

from taii Tui which is the goddess of

luck um so she kind of sets it up is

Tech versus tii you know if we could

only come up with a um a a a technique a

a system of philosophy a use of Reason

logos in order to liberate man from the

um minations of luck you know and

Misfortune but here we've got a

different formulation because here it's

sort of

um Le or forgetfulness is

powerless in the case

of people who have this particular

virtue of of a power of Prophecy in

Reverse so

knowing this is an interesting and a

different way of of saying a similar

thing instead of being focused on um

um um

Tech well I think it still gets to that

but we're we're looking Instead at um

this way of knowing the origins of

things in such a way that it gives gives

us power

over um TA in a different way you know

what I

mean does anyone think that's an

interesting connection or am I just

ranting and raving

again otherwise because I think that's

so interesting right like man or woman

you know human beings go about their

lives in ancient times totally you know

like in the homeric tradition they're

plucked up by the gods and their rashed

around and they're driven mad and all

these terrible things happen to them

until they invent you know philosophy

like this is this is what they're trying

to do they're trying to uh give man an

Escape Route you know away from um the

vicissitudes of of what it's like to be

this incarnated thing but anyway the

other option is uh let Le what is

it Le is powerless um but those who

recollect their former lives that's the

other version right the ones who so in

the Symposium or in many tradition which

one are they using are they using a

recognition of love like the musers or a

or an alliance

with with noble

character with ideal character I I think

PL I think sometimes they're doing both

yeah yeah well I think he says he he

Plato he says something like Plato is

aware of this and he he kind of changes

it to suit his particular philosophy but

he's using kind of a bit of a

mixture but yeah the one's knowledge of

Origins and the second one's knowledge

of history or transmigrations yeah sorry

yeah oh that's okay so he so this is on

page

um page

124 and I did have a bit of trouble with

this I suppose he says we've already had

occasion to compare Plato's philosophy

with what could be termed archaic

ontology we must show that show in what

sense Plato's theory of ideas and the

platonic anamnesis can be compared with

the attitude and behavior of man in

archaic and traditional

societies uh the man in those societies

finds in myths the exemplary models for

all his acts the myths tell him that

everything he does or intends to do has

already been done at the beginning of

time um sorry just going up to the top

of the next in OT which means in in that

time hence misson the sum of useful

knowledge um and so in the next

paragraph he um he summarizes for Plato

living intelligently that is learning to

know and knowing the true the beautiful

and the good is above all remembering a

discarnate purely spiritual existence so

I guess he's what elad is doing here is

is

aligning a view of of the platonist view

um Viewpoint with one particular kind of

you know what he likes to refer as um

archaic onology or or what we might

imagine to be the

traditional I guess

preliterate uh

understanding although you know it's

hard to be sure about what a preliterate

understanding will be like because by

definition we don't know what that

is

um yeah and it kind of goes back to what

we were trying to get out before that

this

idea of these archaic models being

interested not in personal history but

in um in the former version which is

access to um knowledge of the origins

and that those mythological stories

provide everything

for the Primitive man in the now to

understand how to conduct himself

without recourse to Great Men great

Deeds great events or anything like that

which I thought makes sense that

primitive man is about a continuance

They Don't Really perceive a future they

perceive life as it is and should be and

only when it the bottom falls out like

yeah and it's more imp personal right

like I when I was reading this I don't

know much about indigenous myths but

like for example the rainbow serpent

right like and I'm going to butcher this

but basically instead of say our normal

well not normal that's the wrong word

instead of say our Greek myths where

there's some great hero that we're

supposed to emulate for example maybe or

learn lessons from instead there's these

Cosmic forces that carve up the land and

and um they make rivers and then human

beings are given like um well they just

happened to accidentally be there

probably and but now they've taken on as

their role to to um look after those

sacred places left by these ancient cos

beings or what you know what I mean so

it has a it's quite different but it it

in a different way it tells it tells the

group what their duties and roles are in

relation to the environment and things

like

that um oh by the way Judith I looked

that up because I don't speak Latin in

ILO Ino tempor and guess what the

internet said it said used by to denite

the time before recorded history so

apparently it's specific to to him and

it's well it's not specific to him

because you know it's kind of like a but

anyway it's interesting that that he's

the kind of the Paradigm usage of it

well it's but but just a sense it's

technical right he's saying the time

history Yeah well yeah well yeah in that

I mean literally all it means is in that

time but he by that he means a

particular and uh not very well defined

mind um period but um so just going back

to this idea of

um uh yeah

so yeah it's really hard I suppose what

um is really hard to understand is this

this

um what what the what all the

observances of the so-called

pre-literate person might be or what

what it might mean and and just to

observe that even in historical times so

for instance

in Herodotus or in PL plutar or in um

penus they record uh myths and uh

ceremonial activities in different

locations that nobody understands nobody

knows why they do this but they just do

it so in a sense um myth is also

reinforced and enacted by

ritual without necessarily understanding

what the origins or the um the basis of

of the observance might be so that's

another aspect of um and and maybe

that's an example of forgetting right

you know it's just people going through

the

motions uh and and and and that's what's

so mysterious about ILO tempor in that

time that mysterious pre pre-literate

pre-recorded um ancestral

environment uh is is kind of a blur

really and yeah

but but in some ways it's forgetting

yourself or your individual self

forgetting your own personal continuity

to then fall back into your cultures

like like sort of Welling the core

that's unidentified that's before your

specificity that gets in the way of your

culture so then you're you're forgetting

that to stop fighting it to say the

Americans pledge allegiance to the flag

like they're busy mythologizing and

ritualizing their origin story all the

time yeah it's prior to history in that

sense yeah so and then he says in Plato

we find not a forgetting of personal

experiences this is how Plato apparently

changes and shapes these two ideas so

he's not forgetting personal experiences

of reincarnation that's not what it's

about but instead it's a forgetting of

transpersonal and eternal truth that's

going on then he goes on to say that

philosophical

anamnesis does not recover the mean the

memory of events but belonging to

previous lives but of truths that is the

structures of the real thought that was

really

interesting because of course it makes

me think of

stoics and this idea of discovering the

truth the the structures of the real you

know and instead of doing you know they

see themselves obviously as the proper

um followers of Socrates

but rather than doing what Plato does

and talking about um you know this

journey of the soul from the world of

wherever to here and the forgetting and

all that they're nonetheless concerned

with um a different formulation of that

one that definitely employs a lot of the

knowledge of Origins but that

understanding of origin achieves the

same sort of things which is um a kind

of philosophical in amnis but and again

it's exactly towards the same goal to

discover the truths the structures of

the real

yeah well that's what um again what yeah

what Marcus Marcus really is doing when

he enjoins us to strip back everything

to its elements because that's the only

way we understand or we Vis we um can

see what something actually is and to uh

yeah it's a form of um yeah a form of

approaching the real absolutely and he

says for example do not make yourself a

tumor on the cosmos and the way I

understand that is to create this

fantasy bubble around yourself that's

completely disconnected with the real

you know yeah so we're at part four

sleep and death that's what I I plan to

do

tonight just to come back to the though

the I get uh sort of hung up on this

structures of the real because what does

that allude to I mean we've kind of said

uh not the material so we sort of did

away with matter earlier on uh so what

is the real is it the spiritual that

there's something and and that holds

true content and so uh is it just in

Words Words true content is it that

definitely in broken into existence yeah

well definitely in Plato right well

forget about the stoics for a second

obviously but in Plato right like that's

what Judith and I were sort of trying to

work out before she she was um but it's

the idea that um the real is a kind of

spiritual Dimension and the real is this

idea that um the world itself is um

partaking in the spiritual World in such

a way

that um say for example you see

something that moves you and it's

beautiful it's because that object

partakes in the Eternal form of the

beautiful for example which doesn't

itself exist as a as a thing that the

incarnated human being

can experience but it somehow uses

objects as a kind of doorway through

which it discloses es itself to us to

use those sort of phenomenological words

and through that disclosure we reminded

or we recollect the fact that Ah that's

right I'm actually not from

here yeah and there's there's a

gradation and and um in in the

Symposium why don't we read the

Symposium again I think we've done it

twice now we're going always do it again

but um basically there's a gradation so

we start off appreciating beautiful

bodies then we then we appreciate

beautiful souls and

ultimately uh should we proceed

further uh we we're appreciating the

forms of the beautiful and so

it's um the platonist view is is is a

view that most most people most of the

time aren't actually

accessing the real in a sense so and

that's why it's called an

idealist uh

worldview that the it it maintains that

the most real and true things are

actually

um yeah some somehow Beyond or somehow

above uh and it's it's through a through

a process that that ultimately we be in

contact with them or that or or that we

recognize as Courtney says that what

we're perceiving is is participating or

replicating to some extent the forms of

these um these things but but but what

we're experiencing on a day-to-day basis

are not uh are not actually the real PL

kind of yeah it's it's pretty it's

pretty out there yeah it is but it's

really important for the the history of

Western thought really isn't it because

we have after Plato you know basically

he says once you're in a body the

senses um obscure the reality of things

and so I think the translation in one of

in the jet anyway he says it's as if we

see through a glass half Darkly I think

that I think that's quite a famous

phrase isn't it and but anyway the idea

is that we can do certain things like

whatever it is maybe it's rituals or

philosophy or something that that causes

us to clear away the cobwebs over our

eyes so there's all this myth ology and

symbolism like El gets into it a little

bit about curing blindness for example

and it's kind of um symbolic of the idea

that if only you could see the truth you

know you would see the Divine world and

it would be shining through through

flowers and beautiful bodies and through

our institutions and through the

kindness that strangers show to one

another you would see the mark of the

Divine so the idea is that you know

Plato is talking like this but then the

neoplatonists take it up in a much more

serious way and they come up with all

this kind of mysticism you know that

there are certain things that you can do

in order to get closer to the Divine and

then you end up with all these things

like theurgy I think they might have

already existed much before that but

then you get Christianity like if you

read St Augustine which we once read

remember the confessions he talks about

Augustine talks about going through a

process with his understanding of

platonism where he made it all the way

up to the you know the top echelons at

the rational level and and he he still

could not transcend himself and find the

realm of the Divine and so he gave

himself over to God and he said he then

he lost himself and he became whatever

you know had this experience that he

thinks that Plato is trying to talk

about but only through Christianity was

he able to achieve it so you get this

whole tradition of this mystical um

abnegation of the self and this um kind

of self- sacrifice to to God basically

in well it definitely takes on that kind

of um Tanner as it goes on through the

Traditions right yeah that's right and

and it um and obviously Christianity

took up this this platonist idea and

kind of ran with it such that um there

was this rejection of the body so it's

kind of the the polar opposite so you

know it's so interesting that the stoics

also thought they were inheriting

platonism but they um quite I would say

originally and and practically embraced

the corpor as as the real whereas this

other strand which the Christians ran

with um you know disregarded or or um

denigrated the Corporal the body and and

that's the the Gnostic tradition that um

eliad started

with and that so yeah there were these

two twin um kind of strands coming out

of platonism that uh that were quite

diametrically opposed but but in a sense

the um the idealist strand had was

completely influential and completely

compatible with Christian thought yeah

and Judith how nice is it that those two

strands reflect hypnos and fitos like

dissol dissolving of the body SL the

dream of the

ideal very well very well put Sam

yes and if you read nature because we

know you love your

existentialist um he talks about the

despises of the body and he's really

talking about this whole tradition isn't

he so yeah sorry part four sleep in

death hypnosis brother to Thanatos I I

forgot that that's cool great

connection and here

as well oh are they well there you go um

he says Awakening has taken on a

serological meaning it's been a while

since we've used that word in this group

serological I know it's Kyle's favorite

word go on Kyle remind us what it

is he's

forgotten um s salvific yes cific nicely

done so Socrates awakens those I love

this bit Socrates awakens those who talk

with him even though against their will

eliad says which I think's interesting

we could argue about that no doubt um

but it's definitely his intention and

his technique right because I was

thinking about his method he has the

ppic and the alenas and then the stoics

add dogma and the reason they do of

course is they see logos as causative

they can use it as a kind of power in

itself I guess in in well is a former

argument but I guess the other other

thing you can say about that too is that

um yeah it forces the witness to

confront themselves and to see their own

inconsistencies and um that's definitely

go if a person is at least opening open

to listening they're going to be pushed

against their will to to some degree

whether they like it or not do you kind

of Follow That Judith or you change it

up yeah no I I totally agree with that

um PE people are yeah Socrates does

uh kind of compel people doesn't he he

um his his

procedure uh brings them against their

will to to recognize their own

contradictions or contradictions in what

they believe so yes um he the or

yeah that's right it's it's the form of

Awakening but not necessarily a pleasant

one

yeah um did you want to say any more

about Socrates there because I kind of

skipped ahead here to the hym of the

Pearl yeah no that was really

interesting because um I looked up the

hymn of the Pearl and uh it was a

beautiful little sort of narrative uh

poem uh and he kind of gives the story

here but but it could have been written

written by someone whose name I scap but

I did write it in the Facebook group who

was a a holy man active in adessa in

Syria which of course was the location

of our reading of um about hel galbis so

and this this writer may have met with

Indian holy men who all came as a

deputation to visit Elia gas so it was a

kind of an amazing coincidence um but

obviously this is a a very kind of um

symbolic

poem about the prince who goes away goes

to another country goes to another

culture of course it's Egypt which is

the location of ancient ancestral wisdom

uh and then he forgets he he forgets

what he came for he forgets his mission

he forgets what it was he was tasked

with

doing and we were having a conversation

the other night Judith and I with a

stoic group that were talking about how

just and appropriate it would be to be

angry because you're being oppressed and

there's a line in this that captures it

entirely he says because of the burden

of their oppression I lay in a deep

sleep so yeah there's no excuse you know

not in this Tradition at least yeah sure

it's Gnostic but but I think all these

sort of traditions are kind of making

very similar claims especially around um

what belongs to you what's what's more

important um and what's less important

and obviously in all these stories the

world of becoming the external world is

is not um is not the kind of thing that

one makes more important than their own

whatever you know the their own self

their own agency their own heart and

reason whatever it is I I was also going

to suggest that since the gnostics have

inherited a Moses

story that in that Jewish and chrisan

tradition they consider both they

consider Egypt both bondage and like a

passage into like under the earth into a

world that's like more Bound by the

forces of man and therefore more Bound

by death and they also so they've

inherited a parallel between death and

bondage in going being taken to Egypt

taken that's why the song goes Moses

goes down to

Egypt cool and um he gives us a bunch of

examples from the

gnostics and we mentioned this earlier

on about how the soul burns with desire

to experience the body and that's how it

gets into trouble in the first place and

we have the Apocrypha of John he quotes

let him who hears wake from a heavy

sleep and again the messenger who wakes

man from his sleep brings him both life

and

salvation I am the I love this bit I am

the call of Awakening from sleep in the

Aon of the night mate if I was Batman

that's what I'd be saying right before I

beat up a b and guess what it was by

some guy called hippolytus and it's from

the um reputation of the heresies which

I ended up downloading a PDF of it's

pretty long but it's awesome and turns

out hippolas May in fact be origin and

it might be a book early an early book

by origin have you ever looked at it

Judith it's it's really really

interesting it's

like it's a blowby blow account of every

heresy according to this

hippolas and it goes through all the

Greek well not all of them but the Greek

Traditions epicurus the stoics and it

start it's sort of in chronological

order it goes through astrology it goes

through various Christian heresies it's

incredible but it's a couple hundred

pages is long but I reckon it would be I

don't know like it would be a hard one

to discuss though it just be like oh it

wasn't chapter 7even great you know

because that each chapter is just a

chunk of text it's like paragraph

paragraph paragraph You' love it

Kyle oh just I've just got to I mean and

I think yes I think hpus is one of these

sources for the stoics right he's a late

source for um what a hostile is he a

hostile Source or is a a sympathetic

Source hostile I think hostile okay but

yeah so he's a source yeah and and

because we we can't be choosy about our

sources we've got to go with the Hostile

ones um so just to make a point about um

Aon well Aon is Greek for uh eternity

era it it's a word that occurs

constantly in maxelus so yeah it's it's

a preoccupation what you know this this

idea about um about

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time yeah it's cool isn't it I am the

call of Awakening from sleep in the Aon

of the night mate that's awesome Sam

remember that one next time you're on a

date pull that one

out and then he says on page 130

another it is significant here that

overcoming sleep and remaining awake for

a long period is typical is is typical

of initiatory

ordeals and again I was drawing

connections that I probably shouldn't

draw maybe think

about staying awake in that

psychological sense cuz the stoics are

all about vigilance about not falling

asleep on your watch you know that

you're constantly on guard constantly

watchful not letting any sneaky

impression steal its way inside and and

take over your power of

reasoning so that's a kind of

wakefulness and I think there he does in

this section he does get a bit you know

like and here we find this and here we

find that it's it's kind of a bit like

that you know he he mentions North

American my of the or orice and idy type

well you know maybe but without without

being able to verify these things

ourselves we're kind of um yeah I as I

say we've just got to be a little bit

careful about this kind of you're right

that style really reminded me of phases

golden bow because I read that when I

was a kid and it was just like like and

then this and then this tribe and then

that tribe and then that tribe yeah it's

a it's yeah but then he says remaining

awake means being fully conscious being

present in the world of the spirit and

again I thought about stoics and thought

well yeah and also you you could reframe

it as remaining awake PR means being

fully conscious being present in the in

the

world in our world yeah

so then we get more into this uh we got

to a point where I started cooking

dinner at this point and this was my

second read through but the kids were

coming home soon and they they expected

their spaghetti on the table and I

remember it kind of deteriorates into a

bit more nostic ISM and Indian stuff so

you guys will have to tell me what

happened

next well again we we have a bit of this

kind of you know

random quotes plucked out of context and

this is where I start to think yeah it's

a bit it's a bit kind

of it's a bit you know key to all the

mythologies kind of stuff and and and

there's no parameters

um and and yeah we're at we're at so for

instance top of page 133 as we have seen

Indian philosophical speculation

especially some Kia yoga takes a similar

position well it's like okay we have to

take your word for it because we don't

know that text we don't know the context

and so it's a bit like uh how how are we

to know whether how to evaluate these

claims

um but anyway he kind of summarizes and

and he says for the purpose of our

investigation the importance of the

Gnostic myth as also the importance of

Indian philosophical speculation and

this is a big statement to to you know

find the significance of the whole of

Indian philosophical speculation lies

primarily in the fact that they

reinterpret mans ation of the primordial

drama that brought him into

being

so as in the archaic religion studied in

the preceding chapters for the Gnostic 2

it is essential to know or rather to

recollect the drama that took place in

mythical times in

OT but but unlike a man of the archaic

societies who learning the myth assumes

the consequences that follow from the

primordial events

the Gnostic learns the myth in order to

dis disassociate himself from its

results so that's interesting if if he's

accurate about that um maybe uh once

wake from his mortal sleep the Gnostic

like the disciple of s yoga understands

that he Bears no responsibility from the

primordial catastrophe that the myth

narrates for him and that hence he has

no real relation with life the world and

history so um what that kind of kind of

seems though it might be accurate I

guess because again I'm not

really uh you know I haven't read much

about narcism but what I have read is is

this kind of radical rejection of the

world rejection of everything that uh

most people think is um is actually

going on it's a kind of a it's almost a

radical conspiracy theory about about

reality that um somehow or rather we

have to transcend

uh the world that we find ourselves in

and that's the only way it's very

similar to manism isn't it because my

understanding I could be completely

wrong and there probably different

versions anyway but there's this idea

that there's a there's a God that

created I think I can't remember created

the Demi urge or something who's this

sort of um Satan figure I guess and that

creature is it that creature that then

decided to create the world and it

created a reality but that reality being

that it wasn't God who created it

created it imperfectly so the material

world that we inhabit um is basically

corrupt and evil and we live in a

corrupt and evil place that that's kind

of the the Gnostic idea and so some of

the gnostics

Apparently um so was so stink on on

living in the world and and being alive

that they'd starved themselves to death

because they saw eating food as a form

of maintaining the corruption of of of

the body and obviously they resisted

sexual intercourse and things like that

so not a bunch of happy chappies and

there's a mythological structure that

they sometimes use that this Demi

creating the material world therefore

means a snake in their origin story is

actually a Christlike figure not

necessarily A tempter but a someone to

tell you someone to tell you wisely oh

look you're trapped in bondage you're

trapped in this material world and

you're being prevented from taking the

abstract from taking the forbidden fruit

from taking the higher more idealized

things you should take it it belongs to

you and they put you in

here yeah interesting point yeah we

should look into gnosticism one day you

know I've got Pierre H's book on

platinus one day we've got to read that

but

anyway um so what is is that the end no

annesis and historiography I thought

this is really interesting actually and

and it's

um interesting partly

because uh Herodotus being the sort of

the first Greek historian we know about

he was also someone who liked to pluck

you know mist from over here from Persia

or whatever from egyp Egypt and bring it

all together in in Al you know alignment

with what the Greeks are saying and so

this this impulse to align and

coordinate and see resemblances goes

right back to Herodotus in the western

tradition um but yeah as as as elad says

he Herodotus wishes to preserve the

memory of what the Greeks and barbarians

did and so yeah that's what we're doing

right that's what we're we're looking at

the Greeks and The Barbarians um

and so uh as he says it is not within

the scope of this essay to examine the

various philosophies of history from

Augustine and jaako D never heard of

that person Deo Hegel Marx and the

Contemporary historicists all these

systems set out to discover the meaning

and direction of universal history but

that is not our problem what is of

interest to our investigation is not the

meaning that history may have but

historiography itself in other words the

Endeavor to preserve the memory of

contemporary events and the desire to

know the past of humanity as accurately

as possible and as he points out this

kind of curiosity has developed over

time

um and he says from the 19th century on

that historiography has been led to play

a role of primary

importance uh and as he acknowledg this

we are witnessing a vertiginous widening

of the historical Horizon so we're not

not only looking at a kind of a linear

progression of History we're looking

outwards and we're looking across the

whole world

nowadays uh

so

uh but that is not all through the this

historiographic anamnesis man enters

deep into himself if we succeed in

understanding a contemporary Australian

I think he meant a Aboriginal

contemporary Australian or or his

homologue a p we have succeeded in

Awakening in the depths of our being the

existential situation and the resultant

behavior of a prehistoric Humanity so

that's what his project is ult

ultimately to understand people even

preliterate people or or precultures

that we have a a kind of a resemblance

to but doesn't he say he's sort of

taking that former one isn't he he's

saying he we want to understand the

origin story you know that this

genealogy the his the not the personal

history but the Wellspring of the

Wellspring yeah ex yes I think it's an

interesting point I mean I've often

wondered and you know I don't think

there's an answer to it but I've often

wondered why stoicism so interesting now

and yeah you're right it's had

resurgences in previous times like

Enlightenment and in the establishment

of America and things like that I guess

but but like now you know PE people seem

to be really interested in these things

and I've of in my weird way of thinking

I thought well something about the

Zeitgeist you know like it's uh it's

it's alive again because we need it we

need to broaden our historical Horizons

to go back to the beginning of our

cultural Roots so that we hopefully

don't well we we've become too decadent

or whatever you know what I mean and we

need to refresh the spirit of the West

again or something like that you

know and I see that project spread out

further than recognizes in the

you know through a historic through

histographic memory now if he lived 20

more years would also go into

evolutionary biology and evolutionary

psychology what is the mind and the

forming of the mind that belongs to the

like Preity

people that that all that all people you

know develop through why are we like

this such that we build cities such that

we build our cultures what shaped us

that that's another modern source that

people are looking

at can I just say I really don't think

we should read the selfish Gene because

I'm trying to read at the moment and

it's really

bad so so let's not go um too much

further with evolutionary biology please

I can't do that either

sorry so what's next sorry we we

derailed you again Judith we're nearly

there we're nearly at the end it's been

I like this length of text it's kind of

manageable so how does he conclude he

says his the historiographic analis of

the western world is only beginning at

least several Generations must pass

before its cultural repercussions can be

gauged but we may say that though on a

different plane this anamnesis continues

the religious evaluation of memory and

forgetfulness to be sure neither Miss

nor religious practices are any longer

involved but there is this common

element the importance of precise and

total recollection of the past so I

think you're absolutely right Sam I

think if he if he' continued for another

20 years he would have taken that the

whole evolutionary um perspective on

board it's actually a little bit

surprising that he that he is without

any kind of um consciousness of of any

evolutionary persec it's he's a he's a

professor of religion and mythology you

know maybe he's more biased to yeah the

idea of the spirits but um but you know

what you just read there really kind of

makes me double down in a way and and I

really

think imagine

if this is a total imagine imaginary

thing no one could ever know but imagine

if the ancient stoics could see what

we're doing here now with stoicism

you know they'd probably have a heart

attack

but but on the other hand it's

incredible what modern researchers have

done from a bunch of fragments you know

it's incredible and that's anamnesis

right really it's a massive effort to to

to recollect or to remember something

from the past and there's a lot of

filling in the gaps and reading between

the lines I think it's fascinating

well I think that's what we're doing all

the time when we do any historical

research or any attempt to um

reconstruct anything that's what we're

doing we we're kind of doing an annesis

of using the The Limited materials that

we

have but but that's also just true of

how we remember history how you remember

the character of your grandparents you

know you remember these fragments and

you remember these stories and then

almost like children

even through the fragments as sign poost

you play out a game you dance you know

you you play house like you've seen it

play before but by an observation of the

fragments but they heart memories that

let you dance through them in a

ritual but then is that memory or

construction you know so this is the

thing right and this is what we're

getting at like for example if we're

talking

about historical anamnesis to

reconstruct something like stoicism

we would hope that what we're doing is a

is a um what's the word like an accurate

recollection as opposed to a

reconstruction you know that is

completely different from from what they

meant in the first

place but that's where these things get

really interesting you know uh if you go

to Pompei um the whole Amphitheater has

been reconstructed in fact it was done

under mus musolini so and yet you go

there and you think oh this is how it

would have looked in Roman times well

maybe um so so yeah anamnesis

recollection memory and reconstruction

are all interwined I

think yeah it's an interesting problem

that's what I was saying before is it is

it is is recollection the same thing as

recognition or is it reconstruction you

know there's there's blurring of of the

real in a sense what is the real like

Lorraine you really I think that was the

theme for you like there's this

certainty around the real but it's

actually not that certain at all is it

yeah doesn't that have a pragmatic

answer the real is what lets you persist

what what lets you recombine through the

you know construction through the

changes if the real

persist the real is you tomorrow after

you die and sleep

tonight I thought the real was a

spiritual dimension men where the form

of beauty the truth and the good exist

and it could be experienced

directly that's the

question well is that

it that's it it's been a wonderful

discussion actually it's it's such a um

fruitful and multivalent kind of

theme I really liked it too I just want

to say because I think this is the kind

of thing

where you can have really fruitful

discussion it's uh I don't think there's

any real like right or wrong with it you

know sometimes it's like well that's a

fact well this is obviously a lot of uh

there's a creative element here too you

know there's a putting together of of

various stories and um trying to find

some common themes and the common themes

are themes I'm really interested in I'm

really interested in the kind of

existential theme of of um the getting

and recollection and and the the return

cycle and stuff like that and I think

Eli is interested in in that return

cycle too because I was reading about it

in another book so I look forward to

reading more about

in and other people do you want to have

say something in

closing I agree with Judith that there's

a very nicely sized text that is dense

enough and fruitful and flavored enough

to have a lot of directions to go with a

thread it's very digestible yeah I need

to find some more short ones I was

looking at Alis huxley's doors of

perception but it's 200 pages so

probably

not thean any final thoughts words

file uh no not really uh I enjoyed it

and yes I agree I think it's um a good

siiz text

um so that you can sort of get into some

detail because otherwise if it's too

long I I find that I can't

um get into the nitty-gritty

bits you know so yeah I enjoyed it oh

wonderful and that's really you've

you've helped me to recollect how

important it is

to choose appropriately when it comes to

text for the reading group so we'll be

on the hunt for some more good

ones maybe senica next next

time well I was lovely talking to you

guys I actually really look forward to

it and I really enjoy our conversations

means a lot to me so enjoy your

weekend thank you bye thanks all bye bye