Casting off the serpent power to escape the Underworld
Here the hero must die by tree and in doing so his own serpent power is circumcised from him; he is then able to escape the underworld.
Aino
A handsome and brave young man, who was skillful in the chase, one day, pursued a large bear into the recesses of the mountains. On and on ran the bear and still the young fellow pursued it up heights and crags more and more dangerous, but without ever being able to get near enough to shoot it with his poisoned arrows. At last, on a bleak mountain-summit, the bear disappeared down a hole in the ground. The young man followed it in, and found himself in an immense cavern, at the far end of which was a gleam of light. Towards this he groped his way, and, on emerging, found himself in another world. Everything there was as in the world of men, but more beautiful. There were trees, houses, villages, human beings. With these, however, the young hunter had no concern. What he wanted was his bear, which had totally disappeared. [Little did he know The bear was a goddess of The Underworld who wished to marry him. She it was who assumed the form of a bear, lured him into the cavern, and thence to the Underworld] The best plan seemed to be to seek it in the remoter mountain district of this new world underground. So he followed up a valley; and, being tired and hungry, picked the grapes and mulberries that were hanging to the trees, and ate them as he trudged along. Happening suddenly, for some reason or other, to look down upon his own body, what was not his horror to find himself transformed into a serpent! His very cries and groans, on making the discovery, were turned into serpent’s hisses. What was he to do? To go back like this to his native world, where snakes are hated, would be certain death. No plan presented itself to his mind. But, unconsciously, he wandered, or rather crept and glided, back to the entrance of the cavern that led home to the world of men; and there, at the foot of a pine-tree of extraordinary size and height, he fell asleep. To him then, in a dream, appeared the goddess of the pine-tree, and said: “I am sorry to see you in this state. Why did you eat of the poisonous fruits of The Underworld? The only thing you can do to recover your proper shape is to climb to the top of this pine-tree, and fling yourself down. Then you may, perhaps, become a human being again.” On waking from this dream, the young man,—or rather snake, as he still found himself to be,—was filled half with hope and half with fear. But he resolved to follow the goddess’ advice. So, gliding up the tall pinetree, he reached its topmost branch, and, after hesitating a few moments, flung himself down. Crash he went. On coming to his senses, he found himself standing at the foot of the tree; and close by was the body of an immense serpent, ripped open so as to allow of his having crawled out of it. After offering up thanks to the pine-tree, and setting up the divine symbols in its honour, he hastened to retrace his steps through the long, tunnel-like cavern, through which he had originally entered The Underworld. After walking for a certain time, he emerged into the world of men, to find himself back on the mountain-top, whither he had pursued the bear.
.—(Written down from memory. Told by Ishanashte, 22nd July, 1886.)
-Basil Chamberlain. pp 40-42.
The True Circumcision
The-Saviour cut off the serpent from himself, this is the first true circumcision.
The serpent has always been seen as a phallic symbol and so circumcision or indeed full emasculation is a symbol of the cutting away of the serpent power, the true circumcision to come.
Gnosticism
Some gnostics describe the negative aspects of the serpent power within the individual as “kundartiguator” which means the “abominable organ” 817
Jesus’ disciples said to Him, “Is circumcision beneficial or not?” He said to them, “If it were beneficial, their father would beget them already circumcised from their mother. Rather, the true circumcision in spirit has become completely profitable.” 818
817 Samael Aun Weor. The Great Rebellion
818 The Gospel of Thomas
Death, Circumcision and Emasculation
Here we see that true circumcision/emasculation comes after death or in connection with death.
Ancient Australians
Aranda Aboriginal youths are decorated and placed under blankets as a symbol of death. Then the sacrificial operation of circumcision is performed.819
The Xhosa of Africa
A Xhosa boy is considered to be a man by the others of his tribe, after he has gone through the initiation of the circumcision lodge, which can take more than a week. During the time of the initiation, the young men live in special huts, secluded from the rest of the tribe and especially from any females. The boys cover themselves all over with white sandstone and wrap themselves in a reed skirt and a reed cone headdress with a fringe-like mask. When the day of the circumcision comes the symbols of the death of the child begin; they burn all the items that they have used in the rituals including the huts. They circumsize the boy and after the circumcision they are required to bury their foreskin and are driven to the river while being beaten by the initiators. Finally all the white sandstone is washed from their bodies and with it the last vestiges of their youth. They return to their villages and are daubed with red ochre which is not removed for another three months. After this, they are considered to be men. 820
Ancient Greece
Cybele loved the beautiful shepherd, and made him her own priest on condition that he should preserve his chastity inviolate. Attis broke the covenant with a nymph, the daughter of the river-god Sangarius, and was thrown by the goddess into a state of madness, in which he unmanned himself. When in consequence he wanted to put an end to his life, Cybele changed him into a fir tree, which henceforth became sacred to her, and she commanded that, in future, her priests should be eunuchs.821
Attis was a handsome youth loved by the goddess Kybele. However when she discovered that he had been unfaithful, she forced him to castrate himself and transformed him into a silver fir. The tree was decorated at the centre of her orgiastic rituals, its phallic cone representing the castrated members of her lover.822
Adonis pricked the boar with a swift-turned spear. The fiery boar tore out the slender splinter And rushed the boy, who saw his death heave toward him. With one great thrust he pierced the boy’s white loins. And left him dying where one saw his blood flow into rivulets on golden sands.823
Set found the coffer of Osiris as he was hunting a boar one night by the light of a full moon. And he knew the body, and rent it into fourteen pieces, and scattered them abroad. But Isis sailed up and down the marshes looking for the pieces and she buried each limb as she found it so that if Set searched again for the body he might not be able to find it. However, the genital member of Osiris had been eaten by the fishes, so Isis made an image of it instead.824
“But the Aigyptians (Egyptians) in their myths about Priapos [i.e. the Egyptian god Min] say that in ancient times the Titanes formed a conspiracy against Osiris [who was identified with Zagreus] and slew him, and then, taking his body and dividing it into equal parts among themselves, they slipped them secretly out of the house, but this organ alone they threw into the river, since no one of them was willing to take it with him. But Isis [Demeter or Io] tracked down the murder of her husband [or son in the Greek version], and after slaying the Titanes and fashioning the several pieces of his body into the shape of a huma n figure, she gave them to the priests with orders that they pay Osiris the honours of a god, but since the only member she was unable to recover was the organ of sex she commanded them to pay to it the honours of a god and set it up in their temples in an erect position. Now this is the myth about the birth of Priapos and the honours paid to him, as it is given by the ancient Aigyptians.” “This god [Zagreus] was born in Krete (Crete), men say, of Zeus and Persephone, and Orpheus has handed down the tradition in the initiatory rites that he was torn in pieces by the Titanes. And the fact is that there have been several who bore the name Dionysos.”825
819 Joseph Henderson. pp. 130-131
820 Mandela. N. A Long Walk to Freedom.
821 Ovid. Fast. iv. 221
822 Pausanias, Ovid
823 Ovid, Metamorphoses, 10
824 Sir James Frazer, The New Golden Bough, edited by Theodor H. Gaster, pp. 386-388.
825 Diodorus Siculus, Library of History 4. 6. 1 and Diodorus Siculus, Library of History 5. 75. 4
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