Tag: Shamanism
Thousands of rock paintings dating back to the Ice Age discovered in the Amazon
Tens of thousands of paintings in red ocher dating to the last Ice Age, discovered in Colombia on a rock face that stretches for 13 km, shed light on the inhabitants of the Amazon and its incredible megafauna of more than 12.000 years ago. The "Lost Civilization" theorized by Colonel Percy H. Fawcett, which until a century ago seemed like science fiction, seems more and more real.
Terence McKenna and the "food of the gods"
Exactly 20 years ago, on April 3, 2000, Terence McKenna took off towards Hyperspace: for the occasion we review his book "Food of the Gods", recently republished in the Italian translation by Piano B editions, focused on the relationship of humanity through the millennia with the so-called "master plants", but which also critically dwells on the relationship of dependence of modern man with various drugs, legal and illegal, among which McKenna also includes television.
Mircea Eliade: "Science, idealism and paranormal phenomena"
Paranormal powers are not encountered exclusively with primitives, but also with yogis, fakiri, saints of all kinds, belonging to all sorts of civilizations. The necessities of the historicist argument forced de Martino to limit his comparisons to the paranormal powers of primitives and those of modern mediums. But the authenticity of the yogis' powers, for example, raises another problem: that of the lucid and rational conquest of these paranormal powers. It is therefore not necessary to consider only a "historical magical world" (the primitives) and a spontaneous but historically inauthentic regression in this world (the mediums): it is necessary to consider another world accessible, in principle, to everyone and at any historical moment.
Apollo the Destroyer: "coincidentia oppositorum" in hyperborean mysticism and eschatology
Although mostly considered in his "luminous" and "uranic" meaning, in the archaic tradition Apollo combines the most extreme dichotomies in his mystical and eschatology: the bow and the lyre, wisdom and "mania", depth and elevation, the catabasis and the journey in spirit to the White Island, the "Fall" of Being and the return of the Golden Age. Starting from ancient sources, we can find similar concepts not only to those of North Asian shamanism and Celtic spirituality, but even to the sacred vision of some modern poets β like Blake, Shelley and Yeats - whose Apollonian chrism will appear clearer to us if we analyze their βWeltanschauungβ in the light of the Platonic and Heraclitean doctrines.
Auras and inner lights
Since the perception of a light characterizes the apparition of the divine, the luminous has always been associated with the numinous. The great dilemma that Walter Benjamin proposes is whether the visual impression is determined exclusively by the biology of the human eye or is also characterized by cultural and historical specificities. This contribution seeks to reconstruct how the experience of light in the West has changed over the centuries in intensity and suddenness and how its modes of manifestation have changed.
Towards βTimeWave Zeroβ: Psychedelia and Eschatology in Terence McKenna
In addition to being one of the "prophets" of the psychedelic Counterculture of the second half of the last century, Terence McKenna was able to build, in the course of thirty years of studies and experiments, a real eschatological system for the Third Millennium, in view of final explosion, based on the recovery of shamanic practices, on a new interpretation of the Sacred as "Mysterium Tremendum" and on the vision, beyond the ordinary dichotomy between life and death, of what he called an "Ecology of Souls".
Fairies, witches and goddesses: "subtle nourishment" and "bone renewal"
An analysis of some beliefs concerning the "subtle nourishment" of witches and fairy beings will lead us to the discovery of a recurring mythology through the millennia, from the archaic times of the shamanic cultures of hunters to the era of inquisitorial processes: that of the so-called "renewal of the bones ".
The possible connections between "Twin Peaks" and Germanic mythology
Already previously we had analyzed the esoteric elements of the successful television series by David Lynch & Mark Frost: in this new appointment we will focus specifically on the influences, identifiable in βTwin Peaksβ, deriving from the Norse and Celtic tradition.
The Deer Man of the Castelnuovo Carnival and the regeneration of spring
Second article dedicated to the Carnival of Castelnuovo al Volturno, on the Molise Apennines, and to the main figures of the pantomime: βGl'Ciervβ, Martino and the Hunter.
βTrue Detectiveβ: Rust Cohle's Final Ascension
In view of the release, scheduled for January 14, of the third season of "True Detective", we propose to our readers the cycle of articles we curated for YAWP on the esoteric elements of the successful television series.
Folklore, shamanism and βwitchcraftβ among the Inuit of the Arctic
Journey to discover the mythical tradition, folklore beliefs and animistic-shamanic practices of the native populations of the Arctic area.
Fragments of a forgotten shamanism: the Piedmontese Masche
The study of "magical" practices and folkloric beliefs regarding the Piedmontese Masche opens us some glimpses (not too unexpected) onΒ Cosmic-agrarian cults of ancient Eurasia.
The magic of the Mainarde: on the trail of the Janare and the Deer Man
A visit to Castelnuovo al Volturno, in Molise, allows us to give a face to the characters of local folklore, the Janare and "Gl'Cierv", and to resume some central mythical-traditional aspects ofΒ Cosmic-agrarian cults of ancient Eurasia.
On possession in Hinduism
Brief excursus - corroborated by the author's experience in the field - on the phenomenon of possession in Hinduism (both devotional and yogic-tantric) and in related Shamanism
Shamanic elements in the religions of the Himalayan area and in the Indian sub-continent
An overview of rites and beliefs of shamanic origin in the Indo-Buddhist macro-area of ββCentral Asia and sub-continental India
From Siberian Shamanism to Yungdrung BΓΆn: a hypothesis on the Prehistoric BΓΆn of Eurasia
Retrospective on the shamanism of Central and Northern Asia, starting with Mircea Eliade, and on its 'correspondences' with the ancient cult complex of the Prehistoric Bon of Eurasia, not to be confused with theΒ Yungdrung BΓΆn from the XNUMXth century
It is not terrestrial (and it does not claim to be)
Traditional criticism of the so-called hypotheses of the βAncient Astronautsβ and of the βAlien Genesisβ, cleared in recent decades by the Azerbaijani 'Sumerologist' Zecharia Sitchin and his increasingly numerous followers.
Journey to Mongolia: the confessions of Bolod the Buryat
Our second travel report, for friends of de The sign, on Mongolia: from shamanic cults to the Empire of Genghis Khan, from Buddhist Lamaism to Soviet domination
Cimmerians, Scythians and Sarmatians: the Iranian peoples of ancient Eurasia
Journey to discover the ancient Indo-European populations of warrior knights who occupied, during the Iron Age, the vast territory between Eastern Europe, the Caucasus and the steppes of Central Asia
