On with the philosophy.

[kiya]

Hm. Now that my blood pressure is somewhat more stable, at least for the moment.

This is inspired in response to something that fyrekat posted about, but wasn't directly useful. It's . . . somewhere in the intersection of paradigm, philosophy, and theology.


I tend to look at the world in overlapping dualities, each essential to the other in some ways. (This doesn't map well to dualisms at all, which I find myself ill-equipped to understand; this is arguably why my personal interpretation of the angel/demon division of spirits in common parlance is that angels inspire virtues and demons inspire passions, both of which in excess produce intolerable results.)

In all this mish-mash of dualisms, there's one that I personally find the most important, resonate with the strongest; it's a division I call 'dark' and 'light', and which I'm occasionally thrilled to see someone defining similarly.

Apollo, the god of light, of reason, of proportion, harmony, number--Apollo blinds those who press too close in worship. Don't look straight at the sun. Go into a dark bar for a bit and have a beer with Dionysios, every now and then. --Ursula K. Le Guin

I quote that a lot. Like here, which talks about the dark and the light, and which marykaykare gave me a rasseff award for, which is how I could find it.

It's something I feel really strongly about.

'Cause I'm one of the dark ones.

Which is one of the reasons that my dominant handle and primary front is called 'Darkhawk'.

And here's where we get into congregations and priests, which is what fyrekat was talking about. What are the duties of the priest?

To which my first response is: where does the priest fall within that dualism?

A priest of the light, that's someone who looks at the established forms, maintains them in their richness, their truth, upholds that which is known to be real and true, makes sure nobody forgets the names.

A priest in the middle, depending, that's someone who has one foot in each, and learns the balance. I think this is really damn hard, but that's because I'm so much of one and not so much of the other, I suspect; the passions and intuitions run so strong in me that trying to bring them to forms confounds my mind.

The priest of the dark is out there in the wild. The congregation they serve is whoever comes behind, the community they serve is tomorrow's. Or perhaps today's, in the forms of those who are out in the wild where there are no tracks to be kept clear, maintained, and upgraded by the light. The priest of the dark is the trailbreaker, going off somewhere where there aren't forms to be had yet.

I think a faith needs all of these. A community of whatever sort needs all of these; too much of the light, and stagnation comes, too much of the dark, and nothing's stable enough to survive, there's no continuity or cohesion.


And now I've done all this writing about this stuff rather than getting work done.

What was that about displacement activity? :P

Comments

[jehanna.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much for posting this. A lot of it maps very well to my own particular way of doing my own tradition. I am very much on that difficult middle way between those two forces--I have two patron Gods. One is Lug (solar, rational, largely Appolonian) and the other is Angus Og (youthful, emotional, trickster impulses, dreams and passions, closer to the Dionysiac side). It's wonderful to see pagans writing about theology! Not enough of us give enough thought or voice to these matters of faith IMO.

Now if I can ever get any better at walking that tightrope between the two forces, my life would be so much easier. :P

[kiya]

I get the impression that there are a couple of Default Theological Conceptualisations out there, and most people just snag one of 'em.

I'm wondering if the growth of reconstruction traditions and other traditions that don't partake of the Wiccan paradigm will make the discussion and dissemination of ideas more common.

[jehanna.livejournal.com]

I get the impression that there are a couple of Default Theological Conceptualisations out there, and most people just snag one of 'em.

I think that's largely true. Certain archetypal religious concepts call to certain types of people.

I'm wondering if the growth of reconstruction traditions and other traditions that don't partake of the Wiccan paradigm will make the discussion and dissemination of ideas more common.

I certainly hope so. Most of the discussion I've seen and participated in over the years has been with other reconstructionists from various trads. I always enjoy the exchange of ideas.

I have yet to find a community that I feel works for me for my trad, unfortunately. All of the reconstructionist Celt groups I've encountered have had Issues.

[morningwind.livejournal.com]

Reading the quote by Ursula Le Guin, I can't help but think of Mann's Death in Venice and the theme of the Dionysian vs. the Apollonian. I've always found it fascinating how the two seem to be polar opposites, and yet both can have an equal draw on people. Just using the more reconstructionist pagan denominations as an example, I've noticed that many Hellenics (at least the ones I've encountered online) are devoted to both Dionysus and Apollo. And among Kemetics, almost all children of Heru-Wer are Beloved of Set. I don't know if I'm a Heru-Wer kid, but I've certainly felt a connection to Him as of late...and yet, I also see many aspects of Set in myself. It's something I've been mulling over quite a bit recently.

I had never thought of the concept of angels and demons in the way that you described, but it's certainly given me food for thought. "Angels inspire virtue, demons inspire passion"...I like that.

Huh...I'm using...a...lot of ellipses...in...my comments. I suppose I'm guilty of my own pet peeve. :P

It would seem that most priests, whether Christian or Kemetic or whatever, are "priests of light," as you put it -- emphasizing virtue and order and tradition. It's rather hard to picture priests in any other way, because the notion of what a priest is like (even from different religions) is pretty ingrained in our heads. What sort of priest would you consider to be a priest of the dark? Is there any modern example of what it would be, and would its role differ from a priest of the light? Is the difference mainly in mindset and outlook? I'm rambling here and I'm not even sure if my questions make any sense whatsoever, but I guess I'm asking in a round-about way if you could elaborate on your concept of a "priest of the dark." My curiosity has been piqued. :)

(I also should have read fyrekat's original post before writing this. Whoops! *scurries off to do so*)

[kiya]

(We pause here for a brief IB survivor note: Death in Venice! Aaaaaaagh! IB English! AS I LAY DYING IN VENICE FORETOLD! Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagh!)

(Okay. Better now. I was actually pretty pleased with my Special Arty Project for Death in Venice. It was something I was doing anyway for Art&Design.)

One of the things that I've seen in the movements of all forms of paganism is a rebellion against what I see as . . . well, the relentless Apollonianism of much of Western culture. Backlash, perhaps is a better word than rebellion.

The only modern example I can think of of someone who feels like a priest of the dark to me just at the moment is Aleister Crowley. (I'm not as up on him as I'd like to be, so this is sort of half-informed impressions.) He had a Vision, a set of passions, something that he wanted to get to, an Idea. He cut out huge chunks of new ground in pursuit of that vision, such that people decades later are still following parts of his path, using his words and thoughts, taking pieces of his vision and making them his own. He made a fair number of enemies, and is seen as a pretty ambiguous figure overall, because nobody's sure quite what to make of him: he broke down the forms, he didn't use them, he stomped around and made things that were his own.

And in the path he cut, there are people who find ways of integrating virtue and passion the better because he rampaged through there and showed that it was possible.

I think most any visionary is coming out of the dark, at least in part; visions tend not to conform to the established forms, they go off in their own directions. Some visions generate forms right after them, people able to follow on their own now that they've seen the way and making the paths into rituals; some are harder and harsher and less easy to follow, in areas less easily mapped.

People coming out of the dark are often seen as heretics; that, or the guiding lights and visionaries just needed to solve their faith's current problems. Or they form sort of side branches of their faith, for the people who wind up finding that path best for them, and become neither, a sort of middle way.

Oh, here's another one: John Shelby Spong. Christian archbishop (retired), Episcopalian, I believe. A man with a vision, a passion, trying to adjust the forms and rituals of his faith to be better in alignment with what he sees as truth. Not going off into the deep dark, he, but not taking the middle way either: his vision has consumed him for years, despite its risks to his health and career. Not just the gay rights part of his dream, but his vision of his God. (Though he's best known for the gay rights stuff.)

There are gradations everywhere. :}

[morningwind.livejournal.com]

Heh, I did my Internal Assessment on Death in Venice, but it wasn't a nifty arty one. Rats. :P

I know woefully little about Aleister Crowley; what I do know is fairly limited to what I've heard from Thelemics floating around LiveJournal. Now that I think about it, I'm surprised that Crowley didn't come to mind when I was considering who could be considered a priest of the dark. I'd like to read his books at some point, to get a better grasp of what sort of path he was blazing.

I agree that any sort of visionary would pretty much be a priest of the dark by default, unable to find complete satisfaction with established tradition and thus breaking out and establishing new ground. It would also seem that a priest of the dark would have an extremely decentralized congregation; if it were to crystallize into something like, say, a temple (such as the Kemetic ones), wouldn't it lose its "dark" quality?

Then again, there are Thelemic organizations like the OTO (Ordo Templis Orientis) and even Thelemic Masses (Mass as in Catholic-style Mass), from what I understand, but I would hazard that the focus still is the individual and not the community. Meaning that the congregation is seen as being composed of individuals, rather than an entity in and of itself.

I think my main confusion in trying to grasp the priest of the dark concept stems from one thing you wrote: "A community of whatever sort needs all of these; too much of the light, and stagnation comes, too much of the dark, and nothing's stable enough to survive, there's no continuity or cohesion." I definitely agree with the importance of balance, but most Kemetic communities place a huge focus on the "community" part, which has always been a struggle for me; I tend to focus on the individual, so a community is a collection of individuals first and foremost (and I believe you also tend to feel the same way...correct me if I'm wrong). A priest of the dark, as a visionary or a trailblazer, would be very much an individual. How would this work in the context of a community, especially a rigid hierarchy such as the Kemetic temples?

(I know I'm defining a community in a limited fashion by focusing on the Kemetic part, but that's what feels most relevant at the moment)

Okay, since I just re-read your last paragraph, I do have a better idea of how a priest of the dark could work within the community; it doesn't necessarily mean throwing out the community's ideas wholesale, but there does have to be a particular vision that shakes up the established norm. I am still interested in how priests of the dark would function in a community setting, though. *grins* Eh, I rambled a lot for a comment, but I find this to be an intriguing topic.

[kiya]

I don't have a coherent paragraph answer to that, really. Just . . . scattered bits.

Suppose there's a part of the community that can't work within the established structures -- and suppose someone has a vision that happens to alleviate that concern. (Consider, if you're at all familiar with it, the part of the early growth of Wicca that was rooted in the development of a women's spirituality movement.)

Suppose in a different circumstance that someone's vision is speaking to the concerns and needs of a community that doesn't even exist now, but might in ten years, fifty, a thousand. Or that does exist, but can't hear the message yet. (I consider Jesus ben Miriam one of these!)

I would say that a well-structured community has space for the revelations that come in out of the dark, the insights and new ways. And that one of the risks of forming a structured system at all comes of accepting the revelations only along certain lines -- say, in a Kemetic concept, only if the insight comes from a saq. "Inspiration may come knocking, but only if it knocks at this door."

One of the risks in having established rule-systems is in having some of the rules be there and firm and not bendable even when they fail to work. Thing is, I like having an established system; I was a completely eclectic pagan for a long time, but found that . . . work in that didn't have enough spine for me to move with. If that makes sense.

There are continua of how much of the dark and how much of the light are in a particular congregation, in a particular individual for that matter. I'd say that something strongly rooted in passion and inspiration would retain the nature of the dark, even if it's organised; mind, if the passion and the inspiration was only what was needed to get there, get to the endpoint, it wouldn't. Different situations, neh?

I think a healthy tradition will have the interweavings and answerings of both parts. Yin/yang. They're essential to each other, and something which doesn't have sufficient space for either is like the right half of a body without a left; it falls over in an oozy, bad-smelling mess.

Priests of the Dark

[(Anonymous)]

A priest of the dark Will tell you, smiling that in darkness resides Anything you truly desire to be had for the asking if you really want it all -- will swallow darkness whole. There is nothing that says no death in the thick dark under the oaks, no sharp pain in the new heart, born to break as splintered as the old (did you desire change?) and a priest of the dark will tell you, after, smiling. -- Graydon

let's try that again...

[(Anonymous)]

Priests of the Dark

A priest of the dark
Will tell you, smiling
that in darkness resides
Anything you truly desire
to be had for the asking
if you really want it all --
will swallow darkness whole.

There is nothing that says
no death in the thick dark
under the oaks, no sharp pain
in the new heart, born to break
as splintered as the old
(did you desire change?)
and a priest of the dark
will tell you, after, smiling.

("don't autoformat" is not following the principle of least surprise, which is as ironic as one cares to take it in this discussion, I do suppose.)

Graydon