The Hierophant and Bacchus and the Eleusinian Mysteries?

Day-to-day life

wheelie said:

If the HP is formal, organized religion, wild drunken cannibalism doesn't seem to fit.

Click to expand...

Well, even religions with drunken orgies have some traditional rituals leading up to them. Meaning some organization. But I think the problem here is that religions wth wild partying (drugs, drink, sex, etc.) or just rites that involve the weird, subversive or unusual, don't do such rituals all that often.When we think of a religiously motivated bacchanal, it's a special occasion. That, I think, is key to why Dionysus doesn't make convincing Hierophant. Because whatever else the Hierophant is in regards to religion and spirituality, he is a part of a community and involved in the day to day life of his flock. That's really, really, important to his archetype. So, an androgynous holy man you see twice a year for that wild mystery rite (the very definition of Dionysus) can't be the Hierophant.

The Hierophant is there at births and confirmations and weddings and when you get sick or when you have trouble with the kids or disagreements with your neighbors. He's there to help you spiritually in the day-to-day. And he's the only holy person in the deck who does that. The HPS is apart from people and not involved with their day-to-day lives. The Hanged-Man is on his own vision quest and might bring back something important to everyone, but he's out of the picture till then. And the Hermit is...well, a hermit.

So if we make the Hierophant an archetype that doesn't do that--if we make him an archetype that is unique and strange and is only seen when you need spiritual liberating....then we're taking away from the Hierophant an essential key to what he is. My point being, that the Hierophant as a member of an organized religion isn't as important as his being a spiritual leader who is there for his flock 24/7--there to help the kids put on a religious play, or give counseling to a newly married couple, or hand out food every evening to the poor. He can't just be there for the twice a year mystery orgies

Yes. It makes sense that there would have to be something typical about an archetype. We may dress it up in different ways and respond in different ways and apply in different ways, but I suppose there has to be an underlying something for each one that we can tap into.

Chocolate!

wheelie said:

If the HP is formal, organized religion, wild drunken cannibalism doesn't seem to fit.

Click to expand...

Howabout sublimated "drunken cannibism?

Now as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and after blessing it broke it and gave it to the disciples, and said, “Take, eat; this is my body.” Then he took a cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them, saying, "Drink from it, all of you. This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.

A French seeker, one Daimonax, has a website dedicated to this very topic: http://www.bacchos.org/
I don't think he is active online nowadays, but he did do an awful lot of iconographic research trying to link the cult of Bacchus with the origins of the Tarot.

As I recall, his conclusions were regarded by the online French "Tarosphere" as being largely inconclusive... This led to quite a bit of jousting online at the time.

Still, well worth a look for the imagery.

For what it's worth, neither Dionysus nor Cybele are of Greek origin, the former being Minoan, the latter Anatolian.

Also, celibacy within the Church is a relatively late phenomenon and priests of the mystery cults would not have been celibate either, with the notable exception of those priests of Cybele as we well know.

And since Brahmins were mentioned earlier, it might be opportune to note that Brahmin is cognate with Flamen, according to Dumézil.

kwaw said:

Howabout sublimated "drunken cannibism?

Now as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and after blessing it broke it and gave it to the disciples, and said, “Take, eat; this is my body.” Then he took a cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them, saying, "Drink from it, all of you. This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.

Click to expand...

Yes, there is something to your comparison here, in the eating flesh and drinking blood symbolism. Thirteen dealt with it in part in an earlier post. Jesus did turn water into wine as well as turn off a lot of religious people by saying they needed to eat his flesh.

kwaw said:

“Take, eat; this is my body.” Then he took a cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them, saying, "Drink from it, all of you. This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.

Click to expand...

Technically not. Jesus did hand out bread and wine to his disciples, not slices of his flesh and sips of his blood. Which leads to the whole Catholic/Protestant argument of transubstantiation (leading to all those years of a war in Europe)...but either way it doesn't equal cannibalism if you're eating/drinking bread/wine that is magical enough to transforms into godly flesh/blood after you swallow it, OR you're eating/drinking bread/wine and it is metaphorically flesh and blood.

It's only cannibalism if you consume your own species. Mortal flesh can't be bread that becomes flesh after being consumed, nor can mortal blood start out as wine and becomes blood after being consumed. That kind of transformation is the province of divinity and what is divine isn't mortal. Hence, mortals consuming it aren't committing cannibalism. Technically.

I recently came across a curious reference to the supposed equivalency between Le Pape and Bacchus (as depicted in the Vandenborre Tarot, for instance), but unfortunately cannot find the original article where I read this. I'll post it if I can find it.

On another note, in an early 20th-century booklet, a Belgian aristocrat, Le Clément de Saint-Marcq, a high-ranking Freemason and occultist, put forth a rather controversial explanation of the eucharistic phenomenon. (In the parlance of our times, NSFW...)