Seth, you are the devil now? Perhaps metaphorically, but the history of daemons is not as seedy as it commonly seems. The figure Eros from Greek mythology was a daemon.
I recall that Socrates had a daemon. Daemon, yes. He would not have used the term demon, and the thoughts around it were very different. The genius was a daemon, for example a genius loci, the spirit of a place.
A muse? Ah, the muses were a bit higher than daemons in the hierarchy. A daemon was a being between the level of the gods and mortals, where as demi gods were initially mortal.
So, a mediator? Yes.
It’s where our cat Daemon got his name. A spirit between mortals and gods.
And a noble name it is, for sure and a noble cat. And Kami is our other spirit (cat).
Even the symbolism of the skull didn’t originally mean what it commonly does now. They were originally for the most part sacred, symbols of the spirit. The relics of a saint were not considered morbid, but rather points of contact between humanity and one who stood close to the divine. When Tibetan monks drink from a skull, of one of the predecessors of their lineage, they are not mocking that predecessor, who was seen as synonymous with an ancestor really, they were honouring them and seeking to share in the wisdom of that spirit.
I recently saw a photo online of Islamic women weeping when a small portion of Mohamed’s beard was displayed before them — a relic.
Really if any culture is intensely morbid, it’s our own.
But doesn’t cannibalism sometimes have the similar significance? Eating the courage or power of the deceased? Cannibalism took on two forms, as a funereal practice, or a wartime rite of passage. The implications of each are rather different don’t you think?
I prefer to be eaten by the earth and its recycling creatures.
When hardship was common enough, the idea that your tribe would survive because of what you shared with them in passing would be a powerful comfort. Same as a matter of spiritual principle, seek to disregard and disassociate themselves from their remains.
Are we now too good to be apes? We are too different to be apes, even to the point of being dependant on cooking.
Seth Haalan
Dragon Intuitive
~science,mysticism,spirituality~