Strange Wind and Still Ponds @oldcrowshag - Tumblr Blog

joelpersels

girlfleeshouse

As fate would have it, she is gale-blooded.

muddyswirls

emoparamore

hayley williams, copenhagen

#She's a mother fucking rockstar

the-enchanted-little-star

bodyfeeling

op turned off reblogs but i want this post on my blog

zzoupz

I know basically nothing about tarot cards but I absolutely need to make this a reality

adistraughtjester

I am hoping that this is some sort of exaggeration or oversimplification because this is just blatant erasure of a major element of Greek culture and replaced by a more Christian version and I want to bang my head into a wall. That’s not what xenia is, and you just erased a major part of the Odyssey.

adistraughtjester

@watchanddream Sure! This got a bit lengthier than I intended, but I wanted to try and be thorough.

Put far too simply, xenia is the practice of hospitality, but it's also a ritual and in a sense a contract between guest and host. When a stranger arrives at your doorstep, you're expected to feed them and give them a gift as the host. Typically, you're not even supposed to ask them their name until they've finished their meal. Once you've done this as the host, the guest is now expected to share stories and information about themselves, and not burden you or your household. Typically, people focus on how hosts violate xenia, but guests can also violate xenia.

This is called a guest-friendship, and once it's established, you are expected to offer the same to your host should they ever visit. It's a ritual of hospitality, yes, but it's also used to establish alliances and can be passed down through generations. For example, in the Iliad, when Glaucus and Diomedes discover that their grandparents were guest-friends, they decide not to fight, but rather exchange armor.

Theoxeny is a common story you see in myth where a god (typically Zeus) disguises themselves as a mortal and requests to be hosted by someone. Should the host follow the rules of xenia, they'll be rewarded, but if they fail, they'll be punished or killed.

This is important to the Odyssey, as it comes up multiple times, but in particular, the cyclops, and the suitors. In both these instances, Odysseus arrives disguised and gives a false name, the practices of xenia are failed, and Odysseus reveals himself and punishes the one that failed to follow xenia. The suitors in particular fail xenia, as they both fail as hosts, AND as guests, for burdening Odysseus's household.

Xenia being treated as the golden rule comes across to me like a Christian reinterpretation, as while many Greek philosophers did have something similar to the golden rule, those were philosophers, and the idea that it's a religious command from a god seems much more in line with a Christian idea of where the rule comes from. (Note, I'm aware that other religions had something similar, even as a command from a god, but I highly doubt Nolan is drawing inspiration from those instances)

deathandmysticism

Views of heaven and its relation to earth, 1898

windvexer

You've probably been asked this before but I'm having trouble understanding : is the witchfather one entity with many forms, or many entities with the same archetype?

Witchfather is a title, generally referring to any male/masc entity who will initiate (or at the very least, become a primary tutelary spirit) for a person who wants to become a Witch.

Because Witchcraft is not a generic term for any kind of magic, Witchfathers therefore are not any male/masc initiatory spirits: they are initiators into Witchcraft. And this lends to there being a specific archetype.

Of this, I assume when people speak of The Witchfather they are referring to the broader archetype, but you will also see many people referring to My Witchfather to clarify they mean only a single entity and not the archetype.

Of any particular entity who can be categorized this way as a Witchfather, they may have multiple aspects or facets which are not easy to untangle, and a major part of this is IMO the preconceptions and filters of the individual practitioner.

For example, people who generally regard the Witchfather as just being 'what if Cernunnos was an emo daddy dom' may have an easier time connecting to his primeval wilderness aspects as a haunter of forlorn places, but may wholly reject that other strands such as Azazel-Cain lore are connected to the entity they are working with.

Even if a single, individual entity fits into the archetype of Witchfather, which aspects they exemplify or express will be unique to them. And of those expressions, the practicing witch may be able to see and accept them, or not.

So while I believe the most correct answer is "Witchfather is a title," both sides of your question are true: it refers to many entities within the same archetype, but those entities typically do have many forms, possibly because shapeshifting and transmuting one's form and essence is (IMO) a pretty big deal in witchcraft.