thegoodfellas/blogset-br huggingface dataset:
raze?As though the daemons had a mixed and inconsistent nature and disposition. For which reason Plato attributes to the Olympian gods all things ingenious and extraordinary; but the opposite of these to daemons; and Xenocrates thinks that the unlucky days of the month, and whatever festivals are accompanied with stripes and blows, abusive or obscene language, have nothing to do with honoring the gods or good daemons: but that there are certain Powers of Nature existing in the circumambient air, great and strong indeed, but malignant and ill-tempered, who take delight in such things, and if they obtain them, betake themselves to nothing worse. But the good ones, on the contrary, Hesiod styles pure daemons, and guardians of men;Givers of wealth; and with such royal power.And Plato terms this species Hermeneutic and Daemonean, a middle class between gods and men, conveying up thither vows and prayers from mankind, and bringing down from thence to earth prophesies and gifts of things good. Empedocles even asserts that daemons suffer punishment for their sins both of commission and omission:Celestial wrath pursues them down to sea;Sea spits them out on earth: earth to the raysOf Sol unwearied: he to the eddying airSends back the culprits; each receives in turn,And all alike reject the hateful crew:until having been thus chastened and purified, they obtain once more their natural place and position.XXVII. Akin to these and suchlike stories are, they say, the legends told concerning Typhon; how that he committed dreadful crimes out of envy and spite, and by throwing all things into confusion he filled with evils all the land and sea as well, and finally was punished for it. But the avenger of Osiris, his Sister and Wife, who extinguished and put a stop to the madness and fury of Typhon, did not forget the contests and struggles she had gone through, nor yet her own wanderings, nor did she suffer oblivion and silence to envelope her many deeds of wisdom, many feats of courage, but by intermingling with the most sacred ceremonies, images, hints, and representations of her sufferings of yore, she consecrated at one and the same time, both lessons of piety and consolation in suffering for men and women when overtaken by misfortune. And she, together with Osiris, having been translated from the rank of good daemons up to that of gods, by means of their virtue (as later was done with Hercules and Bacchus) receive, not inappropriately, the unitedhonors of gods and of daemons everywhere, both in the regions above earth, and in those under ground, possessing the supreme power, for they say that Serapis is no other than Pluto, and Isis Proserpine, as Archemoros of Euboea has asserted; as also Heraclitus of Pontas, when he supposes the Oracle at Canopas to belong to Pluto.XXVIII. Ptolemy Soter beheld in a dream the Colossus of Pluto at Sinope, (though he had not before known nor seen what it was in appearance,) ordering him to bring it as soon as possible to Alexandria; and when he was ignorant and at a loss as to
where the statue then stood, and was relating the vision to his friends, there was found a man, a great traveller, by name Sosibius, that declared he had seen at Sinope just such a Colossus as the king had dreamt he saw. He therefore despatched Soteles and Dionysius, who after much time and with difficulty (not, however, without divine aid) stole and brought away the statue. And when it was brought and seen, then Timotheus, the interpreter, and Manetho, the Sebennite, and their fellows, conjecturingthat it was a figure of Pluto (drawing this conclusion from the Cerberus and the Serpent), made Ptolemy believe that it is of no other god, but of Serapis, for it did not come bearing such a name from the other place, but after it had been brought to Alexandria, it got the name that Pluto bears amongst the Egyptians, namely, Serapis. And seeing that Heraclitus, the natural philosopher, asserts that Hades and Dionysos are the same person, when they are infuriated and rave, they (the Egyptians) slip unconsciously into the same belief. For such as explain that Hades means the Body, because the Soul is as it were out of its senses, and drunken, [The doctrine of the Alexandrian Platonists, as is fully set forth by Macrobius in his description of the descent of the Soul.] when confined therein, such people are too far fetched in their interpretation. It is better, therefore, to connect Osiris with Bacchus, and Serapis with Osiris, for the latter obtained this appellation after he had changed his nature, [The name being compounded of Osiris and Apis, expresses that his soul, after death, had passed unto the sacred bull.] inasmuch as Serapis is common [Probably meaning, universal god, not a mere local Egyptian divinity.] to all, in the same way as such as have partaken of the sacred rites know that Osiris is.XXIX. For it is not worth while paying any attention to the Phrygian sacred books, wherein it is said that Serapis was the daughter of Hercules, and Typhon, son of Isaicus, son of. . . . , nor yet to avoid treating Phylarchus with contempt for saying that Bacchus first brought two oxen out of India to Egypt; the name of one of which was Apis, of the other Osiris. For Serapis is the name of Him who puts in order the universe (), joined to sairein which some say means to beautify and arrange. [This preposterous etymology is evidently that of Phylarchus.] For these remarks of Phylarchus are absurd; yet far more absurd the opinion of such as say Serapis is no god at all, but the coffin of Apis is so called: (they also talk of certain brazen doors at Memphis, named the Doors of Oblivion and Wailing, which when they bury Apis utter a deep and harsh sound, for which reason [we are forbidden] to touch any sounding vessel of brass.) More endurable is the explanation of such as derive it from stimulating () the motion of the universe. But the most part of the priests say that
Osiris and Apis are united into the same word, for they explain and inform us that we ought to consider the Apis as a beautiful image of the soul of Osiris. But for my part, if the name of Serapis is really Egyptian, and I think it signifies Cheerfulness and Rejoicing, founding my conjecture on the fact that the Egyptians call the festival of Rejoicing, Sai rei, in fact Plato says that Hades [= .] is so named as the Son of Respectfulness, and a god benevolent to such as dwell with him; and amongst the Egyptians many other of the names (of gods) are significant words; also that subterraneous place whither they believe the souls go after death, they call Amenthen, the name signifying that which gives and takes. But whether this be one of the names carried out of Greece in ancient times, and brought back again, we will consider further on; at present it is our business to go through the remaining parts of this belief.XXX. Osiris and Isis passed from the rank of good daemons to that of deities; but the power of Typhon although dimmed and crushed, and still, as it were, in the last agony and convulsions, they nevertheless propitiate and soothe by means of certain sacrifices: but occasionally they humiliate and insult him at certain festivals, when they abuse red haired men and tumble an ass down a precipice; for example this is done by the people of Memphis, because Typhon was red haired, and like an ass in complexion. The people of Busiris and Lycopolis do not use trumpets at all because they make a sound like the ass: and altogether, they regard the ass as an unclean and daemon-like animal on account of his resemblance to that personage: they make cakes also at the sacrifice of the month Payni and of Phaophi, and print upon them for device an ass tied. And at the sacrifice to the Sun, they enjoin those that worship this god, not to wear upon the person ornaments of gold, [Hence the Mohammedan rule of taking off all gold ornaments before saying prayers.] nor to give food to an ass. The Pythagoreans, too, prove that they regard Typhon as a daemonic Power, for they say in perfect measure that Typhon was born on the fifty-sixth; and again that the (figure) of the Triangle belongs to Pluto, Bacchus and Mars; that of the Tetragon to Rhea, Venus, Ceres, Vesta, and Juno; that of the Dodecagon to Jove; but that of the Fifty-six sided figure to Typhonas Eudoxus hath related.XXXI. The Egyptians, believing that Typhon was born with red hair, dedicate to sacrifice the red colored oxen, and make the scrutiny so close that if the beast should have even a single black or white hair, they consider it unfit for sacrifice; because such beast, offered for sacrifice, is not acceptable to the gods, but the contrary (as is) whatsoever has received the souls of unholy and unjust men, that have migrated into other bodies. For which reason they heap curses
on the head of the victim, cut it off, and formerly used to throw it into the River, but nowadays they sell it to foreigners. But the ox intended for sacrifice, those of the priests entitled Sealers used to seal: the signet bearing (as Castor relates) an engraving of a man forced down on his knees, with hands twisted round upon his back, having a sword placed against his throat. [Showing that the primitive human victim was commuted thus.] The ass has got the credit of this resemblance [to Typhon] as they think, on account of his stupidity and unruliness, as well as his color; for which reason as they detest Ochus especially of f he Persian Kings, as sacrilegious and polluted, they surnamed him the Ass, and he replying, The Ass shall feast upon your Bull, he slaughtered the Apis, as Dinon tells us. But those who say that Typhon made his flight out of the battle during seven days upon an ass; and after escaping begot Hierosolymus and Judaeusthese are discovered by that very fact to be lugging the Jewish history into the legend.XXXII. These things, then, afford grounds for the explanations above advanced. Let us start afresh, and consider the most straightforward expositions; that is to say, those who are reputed to treat the subject in a more philosophic manner. These are such as pretend, like the Greeks, that Saturn symbolizes Time, Juno the Air, the birth of Vulcan, the change of Air into Fire; and similarly amongst the Egyptians, that Osiris is the Nile, copulating with Isis the Earth; Typhon, the Sea, into which the Nile flowing vanishes and is dispersed, except as much part as the earth has taken from him and received, and becomes productive thereby. There is, too, a religious lament made over Saturn, and it laments him that is born in the left region, and that dies in the right. For the Egyptians hold that the Eastern parts are the face of the World, the Northern its right hand, the Southern its left. The Nile, therefore, flowing from the North, and in the South swallowed up by the sea, is as reasonably said to have his birth in the left hand region, and his death in the right. On which account the priests abominate the sea, and call salt the foam of Typhon, and it is one of their prohibitions, Not to put salt upon the table, and they do not speak to mariners, nor make use of the sea, and they keep the ox away from the sea, and from this cause principally do they reject fish, and write up Hate fish. At any rate, at Sais, in the forecourt of the temple of Minerva, there was sculptured a child, an old man, after this a hawk, next, a fish, and at the end of all, a river-horse, and it signifies symbolically, O ye that are coming into life, and ye that are going out of it [The Deity abhors impudence] [Some words are here lost, but their sense appears from the context
to have been what I supply in the translation.]. . . for the reason [they put the] old man. . . By the hawk they mean God, by the fish, hatred, on account of the sea, as has been above stated; by the river horse,impudence, for that beast is reported to kill its sire, and copulates forcibly with its dam: and the saying of the Pythagoreans that the sea is Saturns tears, seed, may seem to imply the impurity and unsociable nature of the same element.XXXIII. Let these stories then be told by foreigners, since they offer an explanation within everybodys reach; but the more learned among the priests do not only call the Nile, Osiris, and the sea, Typhon, but give the name of Osiris generally to every Principle and Power productive of moisture; regarding this as the cause of generation and the essence of seed. Typhon they call everything dry, fiery, dessicative, and antagonistic to moisture; for which reason as they believe him to have been red skinned and yellowish in person, they do not very willingly meet, or converse with pleasure with people having such a complexion; on the other hand they fable that Osiris was black-colored because all water blackens earth, clouds, and garments, when mingled therewith; and in young people the presence of moisture renders the hair black, whereas greyness is, as it were, a growing pale, that by reason of dessication, comes upon them who are past their prime. The Spring too is flourishing, generative, and agreeable; but Autumn through the deficiency of moisture is both injurious to plants, and pestilential to animals. And the Ox that is kept at Heliopolis, which they call Mnevis (sacred to Osiris, and which some believe to be the sire of the Apis) [The Bull that was kept at Memphis.] is black, and receives secondary honors to those paid to Apis. Besides, Egypt which is of a black soil to the highest degree, as well as the black part of the eye, they call Chemia, [Is this the long sought for root of Cameo? The Nicolo was distinguished by the Romans as AEgyptila, and compared by them to the eye.] and compare it to a heart, for it is hot and moist, and is chiefly enclosed and annexed to the southern parts of the habitable world, in the same manner as the heart is in the left hand parts of man.XXXIV. The Sun and the Moon they symbolize as using not chariots but boats for vehicles in performing their courses, expressing allegorically their nourishment and origin from moisture: and they think that Homer, like Thales, had learnt from the Egyptians to lay down that Water was the beginning and origin of all things, for that his ocean is Osiris, and his Tethys Isis, as nursing, and helping to breed up all things. For the Greeks call the emission of seed , and copulation ; and from and , and Bacchus they entitle , as being lord of the moist principle, he being no other than Osiris, in fact Hellenicus has
put down that he heard Osiris called Ysiris by the priests; and he persists in so denominating that god, probably on account of his nature, and his invention.XXXV. That indeed he is the same with Bacchus, who is more fitted to know than yourself, Clea, you who have headed the Bacchanals at Delphi, and have been initiated into the rites of Osiris, ever since your childhood? But if for the sake of other people we must produce testimony, let us put on one side the things not to be revealed; but the ceremonies the priests perform in public when they are conveying the body on a raft, at the burial of the Apis, differ in nothing from the Bacchanalea; for they tie fawn-skins about them, and carry thyrsi, and make shoutings and motions like those possessed with the divine frenzy in honor of Bacchus; for which cause many of the Greeks represent Dionysos in the form of a Bull in his images; and the women of the Eleians when praying, exhort the god with the bulls foot, to come to them. The Argives too have a Bacchus by title the Bull-born; and they call him up out of water by the sound of trumpets, casting into the deep pool as offerings to the Pylaochus. The trumpets they conceal within the thyrsi as Socrates has described it in his treatise on Rituals. The Titanic also and Nyctelean rites are of the same kind with the fabled tearing to pieces of the body of Osiris, his returnings to life, and his new births; and, similarly, the stories about his burials. For the Egyptians, as already stated, show Tombs of Osiris in many places; and the Delphians believe that the relics of Bacchus are deposited with themselves by the side of the Oracle: [Another proof of Indian origin, relics of a Buddha being indispensable for the foundation of any dagobah.] and their Holy Ones offer a secret sacrifice in the Temple of Apollo at what time the Bacchantes waken up Him of the winnowing fan. And that the Greeks hold Bacchus for lord and leader not only of the wine but of the whole element of Moisture, Pindar is sufficient testimony where he says, May Bacchus that rejoiceth greatly in trees and pastures, augment the pure light of Autumn, for which reason it is forbidden to those that worship Osiris to destroy any cultivated tree, or to stop up any spring of water.XXXVI. For not the Nile only, but all moisture in general they call the Issue of Osiris, and the water vase always leads the procession of the priests in honor of the god, and by the figure of a fig-leaf they represent a king, and the Southern quarter of the world; and the fig-leaf is interpreted as thewatering and stimulation of all things, and it is supposed to resemble in its shape the organ of generation. And when they celebrate (as already stated) the feast of Pamylia, which is a phallic one, they expose and carry about an image of which the genital
member is thrice the natural size; for the god is the Final Cause, and every Final Cause multiplied by generation a function, that which proceeds from itself: and for often we are accustomed to say thrice, for example thrice-happy, andThree times as many chains, without an end.Unless perhaps, this triplication of the member was understood by the ancients in its strict sense; inasmuch as the moist Principle being the Final Cause and origin of all things, has produced from the beginning the three first elements, Earth, Air, Fire. For the tale that is tacked on to the myth, how that Typhon threw away the genital member of Osiris into the River, and that Isis could not find it, but deposited and prepared a model of the same, ordaining that people should honor it and carry the phallus aboutall this permits us to infer that the generative and seminal power of the god had first for materialsmoisture, and by means of moisture was mixed up with the things fitted by Nature to participate in birth. There is another legend of the Egyptians that Apopis, being brother of the Sun, made war upon Jupiter, and that Jupiter adopted for son Osiris who had assisted him, and had brought the war to an end along with him, and surnamed him Bacchus. Of this legend the fabulous character can be shown to contain a touch of truth as regards natural history. For the Egyptians give the name of Jupiter to the breath, [Or wind.] to which everything dry and fiery is antagonistic. This latter element is not the Sun, but has a certain affinity to the Sun; now moisture quenching the excess of dryness, augments and strengthens the exhalations by means of which the wind is nourished and made vigorous.XXXVII. And, moreover, the Greeks consecrate the ivy to Bacchus, and amongst the Egyptians it is called Kenosiris, the name signifying (as they say) the plant of OsirisAriston, therefore, who wrote the Colonies of the Athenians, met with an epistle of Alexarchus (a writer without any knowledge of the subject) in which it is related that Bacchus, being son of Isis, was not called Osiris by the Egyptians, but Arsaphes (in his First Book), this name signifying manliness. Hermaeus, too, declares the same thing in his First Book Upon the Egyptians, for he says that Osiris interpreted is weighty. I pass by Mnaseas who identifies with Epaphus both Bacchus, Osiris, and Serapis; I also pass over Anticlidas, who says that Isis was daughter of Prometheus, and consort of Bacchusfor the above-stated peculiarities in the sacrifices and ceremonies carry with them proof more convincing than any testimony.XXXVIII. Of the stars, they hold Sirius to be Isis Water-carrier, they honor the Lion, and decorate the gateways of temples with gaping lions heads, because the Nile swells:When first the Sun doth with the Lion join.And as they hold and believe the Nile the issue of Osiris, so do they regard the earth as the body of Isis: not indeed the whole earth but just as much as the Nile inundates,
fecundating and mingling with it; for from the union they beget Horus. Horus is that which preserves and nourishes all thing, namely the Seasons and the regulator of the circumambient air; and they tell that he was nursed by Leto in the marshes round Buto, because the watery and thoroughly soaked earth chiefly nurses the exhalations that quench and relax the dryness and drought of the air. Nephthys they call the remotest parts and boundaries of the land, and those contiguous to the sea; for which reason they style Nephthys the end, and say that she is the consort of Typhon. And when the Nile rising beyond the usual height, and growing great, approaches on the opposite side towards the extremities of the country, they call this the copulation of Osiris with Nephthys, which is betrayed by the springing up of plants; amongst which is the melilote, by which flowers having fallen off and been left behind (by Osiris) Typhon made the discovery of the injury done to his bed: from which same copulation Isis indeed conceived Horus legitimately, but Nephthys had Anubis, a bastard. However, in the Successions of the Kings they record that Nephthys, being married to Typhon, was at first barren, and if they tell this not of a woman, but of a goddess, they express enigmatically that the entire extent of the country was unproductive, and bore no crops from barrenness.XXXIX. The conspiracy and tyranny of Typhon means the power of drought getting the better of, and destroying the moisture that both generates and augments the Nile: and his helper, the Queen of the Ethiopians, signifies the south winds from Ethiopia; for when these prevail over the Etesian winds (which drive the clouds towards Ethiopia), and hinder them from dissolving into rains and swelling the Nile, then does Typhon take possession and burn; and at that time he has completely mastered the Nile, which through weakness is contracted and shrunk up within itself; and drives it out, hollow and humble, into the sea: for the shutting up of Osiris in the coffer probably means nothing else than the concealment and disappearance of the water: for which reason they say that Osiris vanished in the month Athyr, at which time, the Etesian winds having entirely ceased, the Nile recedes, and the country is laid bare, and night lengthening, darkness is increased, and the power of light wastes away and is subdued, and the priests also perform other dismal rites, and cover a gilt ox with a black veil of linen; and so exhibit it in mourning for the goddess (for they consider the ox as the animated image of Osiris) for four consecutive days, beginning with the seventeenth. For the things mourned for are four in number: first, the Nile failing and shrinking; secondly, the Northerly breezes entirely extinguished through the Southerly getting the upper hand; thirdly, the day growing shorter than the night; and in addition to all this, the exposure of the land, coupled with the stripping of the trees, which cast their leaves at that very