pagan religion

Totalitarianism, Salvation, and Messianism are the three obvious expressions of Abrahamism conflicting with Heathen spiritual traditions.

Intolerance of alternate spiritual traditions, teleological, beginning/end times, salvation myths, and a divine mission all represent this contradiction of world views.
Only an Abrahamic mind could have thought up Marxism and Globalization, or self-fulfilling prophesies concerning the "end of times", i.e., Armageddon.
Religious fanaticism - zealotry - is a by-product of Abrahamism.

Satyr wrote
Pagan comes from a Latin word paganus, meaning villager, rustic, civilian, and itself comes from a pāgus which refers to a small unit of land in a rural district.

LOL
writes the man who lives in a high rise apartment......

Do I have to move to the country to be a pagan, or does paganism refer to an attitude?
Do you know where I grew up?

Maybe I ought to become a Christian now that I'm living in a city.
Believe in an invisible idea that exists only in my mind, like unicorns or...satyrs.

Can you show me one singularity to inspire me to convert?

Satyr wrote:

Pagan = Latin:

Quote :

Pagan comes from a Latin word paganus, meaning villager, rustic, civilian, and itself comes from a pāgus which refers to a small unit of land in a rural district. It was a demeaning Latin term (like the word hick), that originally lacked a religious significance.

A derogatory term given to heathens or polytheists by Abrahamics (Jews, Christians/ Muslims), indicating those that held onto their ancient traditions of nature worship, resisting the urban trend of monotheism and the god of the Jews.
Abrahamism is urban occultism which became dominant by spreading, from mind to mind, in urban environments - furthest away from nature, e.g., ghettos, slums, catacombs. Mind virus helping minds cope with their genetic inheritance and with the emerging vulnerability of self-consciousness.
Rise of the slave, a.k.a. victim psychology, "herd psychology" in Nieatzchean terms.

Herd differing from pack in quality and quantity.
Here the inversion from quality towards quantity, into from quantity towards quality.
Pack = small quantities emphasizing qualities; herd = large quantities deemphasizing qualities.
Quantity = numbers/words - abstractions.
Quality = essence, pattern, behaviour, i.e., interactivity.

The Aussie simpleton understood this to mean:
Pagans live in the country.
Abrahamic nihilists live in cities.

The reason why so called pagans remained immune to Abrahamism, is over her urbanite flat-head.
Why Abrahamism spread like a disease, in cities, is also over her blonde streaked flat-head.

She envies a history that her ancestors may not have taken part in.

You have chosen Pagan practice, not my problem nor my interest.

AEon wrote:
If you cannot demonstrate the face of God, then it is not alive.

The example you gave was Exodus 20.4
"Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth..........."

Exodus 20.4
What the second commandment disallowed was the worship of God under a material form. While in the rest of the ancient world there was scarcely a single nation or tribe which did not “make to itself” images of the gods, and regard the images themselves with superstitious veneration, in Judaism alone, was this practice disallowed. God would have no likeness made of Him, that might cloud the conception of His entire separation from matter, His purely spiritual essence.

Exodus 32:8
How quickly they have turned aside from the way that I commanded them! They have made for themselves a molten calf and have bowed down to it. They have sacrificed to it and said, 'These, O Israel, are your gods, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt.'"

I respond to the posts written by you AEon, when it is obvious you have no understanding of the Scriptural meaning.

AEon wrote:
I've argued against Christians, Jews, and Moslem about the existence of God and how they and their authorities define God

"Abiding in the midst of ignorance, thinking themselves wise and learned, fools go aimlessly hither and thither, like blind led by the blind". Katha Upanishad

LOL


You are entrenched in Catholicism in all elements of your arguments, even Exodus 20.4 the example you gave, was abbreviated in the Roman Catholic Catechisms:

The second commandment is removed (no idols).

"The Pope can modify divine law" "Prompta Bibliotheca".

"Thou are a priest forever, says the ordaining bishop....... He is no longer a man. a sinful child of Adam, but an "Alter Christus", another Christ......Forever a priest of the Most High, with power over the Almighty. The Pope is not only the representative of Jesus Christ, but he is Jesus Christ himself, hidden under the veil of flesh." The Catholic National, July 1895, and finally

"Paganism has no dedicated places of worship that adherents attend; instead, they create their sacred spaces each time they wish to practice in a process called “casting the circle.” This entails demarcating the boundary of the circle (using physical markers such as salt, rocks, or candles) and through the use of magical tools such as a magic wand or athame (ritual knife) to manipulate subtle energies"


In a survey of British Pagans, Ruickbie (2011) found that “personal development” was the second most popular reason for conducting magical rituals. When asked what effect practicing magic had, 60% stated that magic had had a profound effect on their lives, often this effect was one of personal transformation; “they had discovered themselves, improved themselves, solved their personal problems or expanded their awareness . . . a large number specifically stated that magic had increased their self-confidence” (Ruickbie, 2011, p. 206).

Not unlike Tony Robbins' philosophy............

"At the core of Tony Robbins' philosophy is personal power. Each of us has everything we need to succeed within ourselves if we can only learn to access and maximize it. So why do we choose to let our true capabilities go unrecognized? Perhaps we lack the drive to act or are too full of self-doubt to proceed".

But wait, this is getting interesting.........

Pagan practice can be especially healing for those who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer/questioning, and others (LGBTQ+), particularly those who have come from other, less tolerant religions. Being part of a religion that condemns LGBTQ+ individuals can have a serious negative impact on self-esteem (Beagan & Hattie, 2015). Paganism, on the other hand, is not simply accepting of the LGBTQ+ community; the sacralization of the body and of sex espoused in Paganism, and the embodiment inherent in Pagan rituals can provide LGBTQ+ folks with a spirituality that celebrates their sexuality and allows them to see it as a source of joy, power, and worship rather than as something sinful to be denounced (Beagan & Hattie, 2015).

Again, you want me to defend Abrahamism on Abrahamic terms.

Not my prerogative but it exposes everything about you.



What did Christian Crusaders do to European pagan tribes during their Northern Crusades?  They broke their idols, smashed pagan and shaman relics, destroyed carven images of their pagan gods.

It's shameful that you don't know basic history.

Laugh all you like, in your ignorance, and by all means, continue defending your Abrahamic indoctrination.

I believe even those with a basic understanding of Paganism, are more knowledgeable and insightful than you, reasonvemotion.

Did you come here to prove your ignorance to everybody? Congratulations, you succeeded beautifully.

I ask you for a "Pagan Authority" and you cite the Pope.

I don't know how much more ignorant a person can be honestly.

You already admitted, allow your enemies to define who you are, what you believe in.



You are a weak-minded, witless woman, with no Hearth to defend. A Modern, through-and-through, playing at something she wishes she were -- or that you had a substantial, spiritual connection to the past, to Europa, which you do not.

Sorry, Not Sorry. Most European women are lost, rootless, severed. No spirituality, and no spiritual strength, or strength of mind, for that matter.

For those who are serious about 'Paganism', or at least want to know a more unbiased, general knowledge, I recommend a few methods:

1. Recognize Abrahamism for what it is and the dogmas of mass-religion (Christianity, Judaism, Moslems)
2. Recognize the Native European peoples, tribes, their beliefs, and their gods
3. Learn European history, how Abrahamism spread originally as a slave-ideology (Slave-Dialectic), of conquered nations
4. Learn about the Crusades
5. Learn about the Catholic Dark Ages, suppression and annihilation of competing (religious/spiritual) ideologies
6. Finally, recognize that European Paganism is centered on Europeans who fought, and resisted, more successfully against the spread of Abrahamism


How does this appear today? Has history really changed things all that much? Are the same players today, those of the past, of 100 years ago, 500, 1000, 2000? Trace the roots.

What is Paganism, if not Roman-Greco Pantheism? What does it mean to accept many gods as opposed to the "One-And-Only God" of Christianity/Judaism/Islam?



All these questions I would pose against somebody with real, genuine interest.

Not somebody like reasonvemotion, who knows the answers to her questions before she answers them, looking to mock and ridicule, demean her opposition.

Here to score debate points...



Intellectually dishonest.

“When the debate is lost, slander becomes the tool of the loser.”

A debate requires two opposing positions.

You're welcome to try again anytime, if and when you have one.

Yikes....

reasonvemotion wrote:

You ask..........Who is an authority on Paganism?

The Pope?

Yes.

Things I've learned so far from the flathead:
*Paganism is only practiced like a religion. In specific places by authorized practitioners.
Because nature is found only in those sacred places and only through sanctioned mediators.
*Pagans live in the country, because when we say "nature" we mean trees, flowers, brooks....clouds...and those sacrificial alters where virgins are offered to the gods and then consumed around fire pits, and who knows what else the Pope said, or some book told her.
*Gays and lesbians are pagans, therefore, if you are pagan you may be gay or lesbian. We can't think of any other reason LGBTQJEWLMNOP+ are attracted to paganism or repelled by Abrahamism.
I mean this kind of emotional manipulation is effective, and this flat head must have had success in applying it among mediocre spirits...but come on.

Such minds must remain on ILP where I can, at the very least, use them for entertaining distractions in those rare down times when I have nothing better to do than watch vermin nibble at little scraps of crumbs that fall off my dining table.

Paganism is LGBTQJEWLMNOP+ just like she is an empowered-shield-maiden (TM) and the sugar daddy of the van-clan is Odin-incarnate. Tomorrow paganism is about free love between adults and children. Once they have polluted something enough they will become a member of something else and repeat the process.

“The noble caste was always the barbarian caste” -Nietzsche

— Barbaric Disciple (@barbaricvitalsm) [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Pagan ethics:
-No shame for the body. Body - physical, tangible.
-Meritocratic hierarchy. Aristocratic. Exaltation of the superior.
-No worship of the nil, the absent absolute.
-Worship of ancestry and ones ancestors - past, sum of nurture = nature. Past made present, presence - apparent. No denial of ones past = no rejection of ones essence, nature, i.e., soul.
-Spirit = mind/body synthesis, i.e., essence.
-No exaltation of victims and victimhood.
-Asceticism as a means, not an end.
-Ideals, raised up to the divine, remain connected to the real, i.e., the experienced, tangible world.
Divinity is not a contradiction of reality - anti-nihilistic: both pure and positive nihilism is part of the same anti-nature, anti-life ideological paradigm.
-Natural order is not absolute; man does not bow to divinity, does not submit; has agency, i.e., free-will.
Nature includes chaos...that which contradicts, challenges, confronts natural order. Chaos, like order, is not absolute.
-Nature, metaphysically, is order/chaos, not only order raised to a supernatural status - anti-totalitarian, anti-authoritarian. That which frees us is the source of our anxiety. Agon. Laws of nature are man's discovery of patterns underlying patterns of interactivity, restricted to natural order.
Chaos cannot be reduced to manmade laws.
-Ethics are naturally evolved moral behaviours, e.g., altruism, tolerance, reciprocity, compassion, cooperation, social behaviours converted into codes, and then adjusted to human needs/desires, ideals. Genes to Memes
-Emotions are not divine in origin - love is not god, nor is hate the devil. Emotions are automated reactions triggered externally, so that they produce an internal spontaneous response. They facilitate a gamut of survival and reproductive functions. Ergo, love is not universal, nor is hate a source of shame or suffering.

For me, Paganism is a spiritual connection to nature, expressed through practice, rather than any sort of specific belief. An inherent feeling that one is part of everything. But that's just me, of course. Whenever two or three Pagans are gathered together, there will be at least half a dozen different opinions as to what Paganism is.

Harmonizing organic energies with natural energies.
Harmony is the goal of paganism.

What the Greeks called metron, balance.
Παν Μετρον Αριστον
But balance is like an ongoing process.
I use the metaphor of a surfer on his board trying to balance on the waves.

Existence = waves....organism the surfer, the board his will.
Words are expressions of will.

Nihilism uses words to disconnect from the waves and float upward into ideology.

Satyr wrote:

Harmonizing organic energies with natural energies.
Harmony is the goal of paganism.

What the Greeks called metron, balance.
Παν Μετρον Αριστον
But balance is like an ongoing process.
I use the metaphor of a surfer on his board trying to balance on the waves.

Existence  = waves....organism the surfer, the board his will.
Words are expressions of will.

Nihilism uses words to disconnect from the waves and float upward into ideology.    

Or, as I call it, going with the flow.

Yes...but you also have to impose your will to direct the momentum of your rider towards a destination.
You can't just ride the waves - or the tiger, as Evola would say.
The momentum of the wave pushes you towards the beach, but the surfer directs the board - reason directs the will.

Only in this metaphor there is no beach.,...the rider falls into the abyss...

Satyr wrote:

Yes...but you also have to impose your will to direct the momentum of your rider towards a destination.
You can't just ride the waves - or the tiger, as Evola would say.
The momentum of the wave pushes you towards the beach, but the surfer directs the board - reason directs the will.

Only in this metaphor there is no beach.,...the rider falls into the abyss...

Yes, that's what magic is, in my opinion. Directing the flow.

In your conviction focusing your organic aggregate energies - you aura - upon a specific outcome.
Multiply this by a collective and you get the spiritual experience, the ritual.
The symbol/idol, acts as a focal point, gathering collective wills.

This is why this "magic" - linguistic conjuring - works best with collectives.
A church. A ritual.
Intoxication helps, even hormonal, psychosomatic.

Satyr wrote:

In your conviction focusing your organic aggregate energies - you aura - upon a specific outcome.
Multiply this by a collective and you get the spiritual experience, the ritual.
The symbol/idol, acts as a focal point, gathering collective wills.

This is why this "magic" - linguistic conjuring - works best with collectives.
A church. A ritual.
Intoxication helps, even hormonal, psychosomatic.

Personally I avoid all forms of intoxication, as I find it inhibits the flow of energy. I agree though that this can then be replaced by a natural intoxication, not derived from the use of any external substances.

Personally I sometimes indulge on some chemical intoxication - alcohol - and it frees me from my inhibitions and lets those repressed feelings flow freely....but I do not confuse my intoxicated thoughts for my sober ones.

Words - language - can become intoxicants.
All they require is fermentation - aging.

Some people are prone to become addicted/obsessed...and some are prone to become the object of addiction/obsession, they are intoxicating.
Some because of their body and some because of their mind.

Need/Desire.
Symmetry/Proportionality - mind/body.

Satyr wrote:

Personally I sometimes indulge on some chemical intoxication - alcohol - and it frees me from my inhibitions and lets those repressed feelings flow freely....but I do not confuse my intoxicated thoughts for my sober ones.

Words - language - can become intoxicants.  
All they require is fermentation - aging.

Some people are prone to become addicted/obsessed...and some are prone to become the object of addiction/obsession, they are intoxicating.
Some because of their body and some because of their mind.

Need/Desire.
Symmetry/Proportionality - mind/body.

I often feel what I suppose could be described as a type of intoxication when I'm out in nature, an overload of the senses. This is the right frame of mind, I think, for ritual.

Yes...but not all can show such reverence toward nature, so many rituals include music, or repeating chants, or scents, dances, or even chemical toxins...

These place the mind in a state of mind that enhances collectivity, connectivity with otherness, even if with an inanimate object or a faceless concept, or environment.