14:40 -
Posted by wicca -
Man although being spiritual being, can not go without body. Our body is the vessel for our Spirit or Soul. Submission to God, thus have certain physical forms. Prostration is the most beautiful of its kind. Muslims prostrate in the exact way as described in Torah and Bible (THE SCRIPTURES). We find prostration in other religion as well, like Hinduism, Buddhism, Catholicism etc. But the way muslims perform prostration regularly in prayer which is quite unique and inline with Biblical teachings (JEWISH PPL ALSO DO IT IN SIMILAR MANNER).
Many people have a misconception about prostation. Some think that muslims are kissing the ground. Infact they don't kiss the ground. During prostration the forehead and the tip of the nose only touches the ground.
Biblical Prophets all used to fall on their faces (PERFORMED PROSTRATION OR SAJDA WHICH IS AN ARABIC WORD) while worshipping before God...
ABRAHAM: And Abram FELL ON HIS FACE: and God talked with him, saying...- (KJV) Genesis 17: 3
JOB: Then Job arose, and rent his mantle, and shaved his head, and fell down upon the ground, and worshipped. - (KJV) Job 1: 20
MOSES without the least arrogance.
[22:18] Do you not realize that to GOD prostrates everyone in the heavens and the earth, and the sun, and the moon, and the stars, and the mountains, and the trees, and the animals, and many people? Many others among the people are committed to doom. Whomever GOD shames, none will honor him. Everything is in accordance with GOD's will."See how people of different faiths prostrate (CLICK PLS): Catholics, Buddhist, Catholics 2, Catholics3, Muslims1, Muslims2, Jewish, Hindu and Buddshist.
Related Post: Symbology and Meaning of Prostration.
Tag: Prostration, Prophet, Muslim, Quran, Bible. ["+"] Please visit MysticSaint.Info For full multimedia experience and enjoy special music.
BLESSINGS,
SADIQ
Tags: authentic voodoo doll making a candle witch craft wicca wiccan book of shadows full wiccan rede wiccan creed wicca ritual the book of shadows pages gods and goddesses
Source: magick-keys.blogspot.com
16:39 -
Posted by wicca -
i reflect on my life and i am thankful for my memories, my experiences, the good and bad. i may have not lived a glamorous lush life with all the luxuries nor did i live reckless live-for-now life. i will not say i'm completely content with my life right now, nor will i say that i feel bad about it. i will just say that i am blessed to have the life i have right now.
i've had my share of hurts, not being understood, not being allowed to completely make decisions for myself, not being able to truly be myself or express myself without being shushed til recently, feeling caged, feeling like a disappointment and a failure. but you what? I WOULD NOT TRADE THE WAY I WAS RAISED FOR ANYTHING. i am blessed to have parents who raised me deeply rooted in faith that even if i go astray i will find myself in faith, i will find myself where i came from. my parents are examples of people who surrendered thier lives and ours to God, trust that God will always provide, that He will always make a way. even if they sometimes loose their temper, i know that they just want me safe and want what is best for me. they just want me to respect people and respect myself. i am proud to have parents that don't depend on anyone but themselves and always provide for us. they have sent us to the best private educational institutions and in my case still send me to the one of the best private schools for design and art in the country. i never felt that i had to worry if my parents would have money for food, or school, or any my basic needs. they could have spoiled us with the latest technologies or the latest fashion trends, but they didn't. they lived within their means, lived modestly as if i we were always in need, and saved for a rainy day. whenever we needed money we had money, even if my dad was unemployed we had money, even if business wasn't picking up we had money. i am proud that i was raised in the Philippines and not anywhere else. my parents taught me to appreciate simpler things like a trip to a farm or going to church as a family and to embrace my culture. my mom may be conservative and not conservative at the same time but that's just the way she is. i am blessed to have parents who care so much about me, the whole me and everything about me.
MIND, BODY AND SOUL.
as i grow older i start to understand why they are the way they are. they have prepared me for the real world and i know i am well equiped to face the harder challenges in life. I still may have my issues and i still feel that sometimes am misunderstood, and i guess somehow i will always be misunderstood. even if we don't see eye to eye most of the time, even if i get mad at them, never did i see them as people i wouldn't want to spend time with. i've learned so much about the world and life through my parents when have our moments, emotional sentimental moments.
they are the way they are and i wouldn't change a thing.*
Reference: i-love-witchcraft.blogspot.com
02:32 -
Posted by wicca -
High-class at the Llewellyn blogs, there's an neurotic new rag that's definitely leaving to enclose rationally a arise of pagan bloggers weighing in over the coming week. I haven't done much in the way of Pagan data in a minute, so I wariness this forte be fun.
To understand the focus, we should at first understand a few things:
* There's this in a row called The Section Affair Go through Order that comes up with whatever thing called BISAC (SECTION AFFAIR PRINCIPLES AND EXCHANGE) codes. These codes are hand-me-down by publishers to codify their books.
* Section stores - the same as Barnes ">CUE THE PAGAN OUTRAGE!Ok...Probably not disgust, but temper and amusement.
This channel that Wicca is now leaving to be not rushed a religion to book buyers. So, books about Wicca momentum be sitting smooth books about Christianity, Hinduism, Shinto, Taoism, Religion, Zoroastrianism, Demonology, Satanism and outstanding. Phase books of spells, witchcraft, etc. momentum be categorized upcoming to books on tarot, crystal magic, Divine Female, magick, and communing with angels.
Exactly, this makes hint to me. Wicca is a religion in all work out of the word. It has a group of beliefs and practices that can be in black and white down and seen as to a certain extent customary by most adherents. It is not rushed a religion by the US army, the IRS, the Assembly of Foundation Religions, and the Veteran's Working group. In 2007, the Headquarters of Veterans Interaction normal to add the pentacle to a list of qualified committed symbols at the rear of a true spat unadulterated beyond 10 verve in which we tried to get them to see Wicca as a religion.
But, all of a starvation, book stores forte be putting Wicca arrived the religion enter and we're unnerved. Admirably, not necessarily unnerved as in 'I'm a teenage trunks clad brown and this is Texas Chainsaw Thrash, but outstanding scheduled the ramparts of thoughtlessly angered by the doable for whatever thing to appear that is throughout guaranteed to not appear.
The wits that is about to happen in the pagan community is this... Really, let me quote from the Llewellyn blogger's post:"Seeing as if our books do enclose to be sold to the Theology client, and that inhabitant is someone of anticipate who is much outstanding overfriendly with export Christian books than Wiccan books, or has no understanding of our categories the way pour New Age buyers do, we momentum enclose impediment realization our books arrived stores. If the Theology client has absolutely X numeral of budgeted dollars to waste sideways their aggregate enter, they momentum procure to waste it on preponderance religions, in view of the fact that hey, display are simply outstanding of them, and outstanding doable for condescending earnings. It's a organization, kin. And yes, I can see how that could be potentially dreadful for book sales. If we were hard-pressed out of the work out stores, we'd stock-still enclose impartial metaphysical shops to fall back on, but not each person has go through to one and they operate on very first-class budgets, meaning we simply wouldn't be vending adequately books to be located. Amazon and ebooks would become our utmost lifeline if work out bookstores dormant export our books."Exactly, I am consumed scratching my sculpture a bit inside. So, we know for a fact that for book stores - and by definition - the word religion does not automatically mean '"Christian"', right? We know for a fact that if you walk in to a substantial book store, you'll find books in the religion wing ranging from, yes, Christianity to Buddhism to a initiate of other religions, both disdainful and minor than Wicca. I don't know about you, but because I read information on religion, Satanism and Zoroastrianism don't group in the preponderance religions' enter. And yet, books about them are each bought by the Theology book client and to be found on book shelves.
We each know that Wicca has had its own catwalk in the book store for rationally a longing time. Wicca has somewhat much owned the New Age/Occult/Body, Sympathy, ">Fire Lyte
Origin: practicing-wicca.blogspot.com
14:02 -
Posted by wicca -
1. Standing is the luster to not soap suds.
2. If you discord, you didn't pray. If you pray, don't discord.
3. As a child of God, prayer is species of in the neighborhood occupation home every day.
4. Sanctified are the limp, for they shall not be hooked out of type.
5. To the same degree we get disheveled up in our snag, be calm down. God requests us to be calm down so God can examine the fix.
6. Do the calculation. Supplement your blessings.
7. God requests spiritual fruit, not devoted loopy.
8. Honey God: I accept a problems. It's me.
9. Stillness is often misinterpreted, but never misquoted.
10. Laugh every day, it's in the neighborhood inner jogging.
11. The ceiling principal objects in your home are the employees.
12. Going up old is abut, getting higher up is optional.
13. Display is no key to joy. The impertinence is forever open.
14. A bad blood is a round thing to fetch.
15. He who dies with the ceiling toys is calm down dead.
16. We do not remember days, but moments. Natural life moves too fast, so practice your intense moments.
17. Go fast is real to you until you knowledge it, by it's in simple terms account.
18. It's all amends to sit on your suffering pot every now and once again. Simply be even to come into flower subsequently you are done.
19. Surviving and living your life gloriously requires courtesy. The goals and thoughts you're seeking necessitate courtesy and thrill-seeking. Establish from the turtle -- it simply makes string subsequently it firewood out its neck.
20. Be especially concerned with your mold than your notoriety, what your mold is what you really are, because your notoriety is attractively what others hold on you are.
Reference: practicing-wicca.blogspot.com
22:14 -
Posted by wicca -
"Twelve Healing Stars is a yearlong project in cooperation with the Temple of Witchcraft that explores social justice through the lessons of the 12 Zodiac Signs. This is part six." Basic social psychology suggests that religion can be a very dangerous thing. Open any introductory textbook to the chapter on social psych, and you'll be hit with a flurry of concepts that build upon each other to show us how tribal, exclusionary, and potentially violent religion - any religion - can become.
* The Out Group Homogeneity Effect tells of our tendency to see all people that are not part of our group as "all the same."
* In Group Bias is our ability to tolerate differences within our own groups, even as we don't see them in other groups.
* The Fundamental Attribution Error leads us to blame another person's character for mistakes they make and any behavior they do while ignoring the situational variables that could have caused the mistake or behavior.
* Group Polarization is our tendency, once within a group, to gravitate toward extreme thinking. Our opinions may be moderate on a topic, but as we hang out with people with more extreme opinions, we move in that direction.
* Groupthink tells us that when we have a charismatic leader and a lack of dissenting opinions in a group, we make very poor choices.
Add these together, and any time a group gets together they risk extreme thinking and tribalism. We see that play out in everything from sports team rivalries to international politics. We tend to naturally separate ourselves from others. And one of the places we see it way too often in is religion. Ethnobiologist E.O. Wilson is working on a trilogy to explore the human condition and its intersections with spiritual practice. He says that a major problem with religion is this tribal mentality. "Religion," he says "features supernatural elements that other tribes - other faiths - cannot accept." The problem with that is that, "Every tribe, no matter how generous, benign, loving, and charitable, nonetheless looks down on all other tribes." Mix that with social psychology and you are creating a pretty toxic brew for humanity's survival. There is a way out of this. Another concept from social psychology, a deceptively simple one, can be our key. It's called the Mere Exposure Effect. We've all experienced it. When a person begins with a negative attitude toward a person or group, spending time around that group - merely being exposed to it - can improve their attitude. It's one of the reasons that coming out of our closets, be they broom closets or any other kind of closet, is so important. When we know good people who belong to a misunderstood group, our perceptions of that group improve. Instead of separation, we need to come together. We need the Piscean message of merging together, yet we can't lose what makes us all unique. This is a large part of the mission for Alix Wright, the Pisces Lead Minister for the Temple of Witchcraft. Paganism of any brand, but especially Witchcraft, runs a great risk of being misunderstood and maligned. Wright says that, "The air of mystery surrounding the various pagan faiths could feed the fear of those who don't truly know what we do." She adds that, "Anytime you keep things closed off and secretive, those not in 'the know' have the opportunity to put their own spin on things and can demonize what the only have minimal, or no, understanding of."
TOW Pisces Ministry Sigil
Wright runs open, public sabbat rituals for the organization in an effort to wash away that dangerous secrecy. "Being open about our beliefs and practices, making rituals open to those who are curious," she says, "allows us to disabuse those who would say that what we do is evil."
Sam Carranza, a member of the Druid group "Ar nDraiocht Fein" (ADF) from Tampa, FL, agrees. He calls public ritual the "Sine qua non" of ADF. Indeed, ADF's website states that they are "committed to public ritual," and that, "Every ADF grove has at least eight publicly-open High Day rites a year." Carranza says that these are helpful to "contribute to the path of others, whatever that path might end up being." Echoing Wright and Wilson, he says that secrecy, "lends itself to the worst instincts of humans...if something isn't clear on first glance, then it's mysterious, bad, and is something to be avoided." Public practice can help change that view.
Religious conflict is an unfortunate truth all around the world. Terrorist groups that claim to be fueled by their faith publicly murder outsiders and those of us outside that part of the world rush to blame the entire religion. Crazy people like Fred Phelps and his Westboro Baptist Church and other tribal-minded religious groups give their faiths a bad name. In one country or region, you may be persecuted for being a Christian, in another for being a Muslim, in another for being the wrong kind of either religion. "Witches," most of whom have nothing to do with the neo-pagan movement, are still being burned in parts of Africa. The search for the divine has, according to Wilson, "been hijacked by the tribal religions."
While it is better here in the United States, it isn't perfect. The Temple of Witchcraft "holds public rituals in four states," says Wright. "It would be five," she says, "but one celebrant had to travel an hour away from home to find a place where she was safe." Emphatically, Wright states that, "When you have a Christian church on every street corner in some towns, the idea that pagans can't practice for fear of persecution or bodily harm in this day and age is repugnant."
She's right, but it's also true of all other people of all other faiths. The tribal, "Us vs. Them" mentality is a weight dragging humanity down. All people of all faiths should have the right to practice their beliefs openly. We can't go out and make this happen, but we can do some magickal work for it.
Wright suggests working with Ganesha to assist in removing obstacles for "all people to be able to celebrate their faiths." I really love that cross-cultural imagery in this case. Ganesha is popular with neo-pagans, but those of us not of an Hindu background, it could be quite powerful to work with him to do this important tribalism-destroying work. Tribalism is the obstacle, cross-cultural work seems a good tactic to help remove it.
Wright also suggests working with Archangel Michael in protection work for people who are in danger when celebrating publicly. Again, I love the idea of working cross-culturally western archangel on one side and a Hindu deity on the other. Both entities are popular in the neo-pagan community and have their own way to help people in all parts of the world.
While his studies have led E.O. Wilson to conclude that religion is an obstacle for humanity, he does not advise atheism. "Yearning" to answer the great questions of life and existence is what he calls "one of the great things that unites humanity." Let us work toward a world where religion unites us with rather than separates us from deity, the earth, the worlds, and or fellow human beings.
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Credit: animals-and-shamanism.blogspot.com
19:13 -
Posted by wicca -
David J. Hufford, Professor Emeritus of Humanities and Psychiatry, Penn State College of Medicine and Adjunct Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Pennsylvania provides the forward to Jacques Vallee's and Chris Aubeck's book (pictured above).
Professor Hufford is erudite and insightful.
Here are some examples from his Foreward:
I [Hufford] was pursuing the heretical idea that folk belief traditions might actually incorporate accurate observations...
[Vallee in his books, Anatomy of a Phenomenon and Passport to Magonia] recognized the difference between the core phenomenology of [UFO] reports and the local language and interpretations that clothed that core in traditional accounts.
Criticizing conventional UFO investigators for "confusing appearance and reality" [Vallee] said that "The phenomenon has stable, invariant features....But we have also had to note carefully the chameleonlike character of the secondary attributes of the sightings.
The willingness of [Vallee and Aubeck] to cast a very wide net, andn ot to allow the particular cultural interpretations of events to limit their view, offers us a remarkable opportunity to seek patterns that may lead to new understandings.
Those with a view of these matters narrowly focused on a particular interpretation, especially the extraterrestrial idea, may be annoyed by the mixing of the aerial and the religious, the political and the mystical and more.
The problem with "spaceship" is not that it is anomalous; it is that it is an interpetation rather than an observation.
But Vallee and Aubeck undercut these judicious remarks by Professor Hufford by making these comments in their Introduction:
We will show that unidentified flying objects have had a MAJOR [sic] impact not only on popular culture but on our history, on our religion...
...the fact would remain that an unexplained phenomenon has played and continues to play a fantastically important role in shaping our belief systems, the way we view our history and the role of science.
...their [UFOs] impact has shaped human civilization in important ways.
Vallee's and Aubeck's hubris astounds.
UFOs have never had a "major" impact on humanity or civilization or history or religion.
The phenomenon has always been a remote and peripheral aspect of societal life, of human existence.
UFOs, today, are as inconsequential to humanity and society as a whole as they have always been, despite Vallee's insistence that UFOs have been and are integral to life on Earth.
Vallee's view is egocentric, megalomanic almost.
His view typifies that of those, generally, who are absorbed by the pheonomenon.
Irritated by Stephen Hawking's postion vis a vis UFOs - "I am discounting reports of UFOs. Why would they appear only to cranks and weirdos?" - Vallee and Aubeck don't get it:
The persons seeing UFOs are not cranks and weirdos. Hawking is wrong. The people who study UFOs are the cranks and weirdos - Vallee and Aubeck among them.
RR
Source: witchnest.blogspot.com
18:55 -
Posted by wicca -
While C.L. Moore created numerous characters over the course of her decades-long writing career, her two most popular creations are the medieval French warrior Jirel of Joiry and the futuristic ne'er-do-well Northwest Smith. I've written about both of them before in this space and with good reason. I consider both Jirel and N.W. to be among the most memorable characters of pulp fantasy, right up there with John Carter and Conan. These characters are not only interesting in their own rights, but very influential to boot, becoming prototypes for later fantasy and science fiction characters (It's pretty clear, for example, that Northwest Smith served as a significant inspiration for George Lucas's Han Solo).
Given their popularity with "Weird Tales" readers, where both Jirel and Smith first appeared, it's little surprise that the two characters would eventually appear side by side in a single story. "Quest of the Starstone" was that story, published in the November 1937 issue of The Unique Magazine. This story was not written solely by Moore, but was a collaboration with Henry Kuttner, whom Moore would marry in 1940. Consequently, the story isn't, in my opinion, as good as the others about these characters, nor as good as later collaborations between Moore and Kuttner. That might be because the pair hadn't quite worked out the best way to combine their distinct talents, which gives "Quest for the Starstone" a "choppy," uneven feel. Moore's stories are usually brooding and introspective and, "Quest for the Starstone" is more of a straightforward romp and evinces a lot more humor than is typical in Moore's singular works.
What makes the story interesting, though, is its story, which I think nicely demonstrates how much our conceptions of "fantasy" and "science fiction" have changed over the last three-quarters of a century. As the story begins, Jirel is pursuing the warlock Franga in medieval France. Among his many magical artifacts is reputed to be the Starstone, which grants its possessor uncanny luck. Jirel succeeds in wresting it from Franga in a memorable exchange:
"Ha, behold it!" she screamed to the unanswering stone. "Son of a fiend, behold it! The luck of the Starstone is mine, now a better man has wrested it from you! Confess Joiry your master, you devil-deluder! Dare you show your face? Dare you?" Over that empty corner the shadow swept again, awesomely from nowhere. Out of the sudden darkness creaked a door's hinges, and the wizard's voice called in a choke of fury, "Bel's curse on you, Joiry! Never think you've triumphed over me! I'll have it back if I-if I- If you-what? D'ye think I fear you, you hell-spawned warlock? If you-what? Me you may not fear, Joiry," the wizard's voice quavered with fury, "but by Set and Bubastis, I'll find one who'll tame you if I must go to the ends of space to find him-to the ends of time itself! And then-beware!"Since I've already revealed that this short story details the meeting of Jirel and Northwest Smith, one need not guess whom Franga will choose as his champion. Using his sorcery, the warlock travels to the future and finds Smith and his Venusian sidekick Yarol in a seedy tavern on Mars. It's in this section that Moore's melancholy writing comes to the fore, as she describes Smith's dissatisfaction with his life as an interplanetary smuggler. She also has him sing a few stanzas of the song "The Green Hills of Earth," a song whose title Robert Heinlein would borrow a decade later. Just then, Franga appears and makes Smith an intriguing offer:
"Are your services for hire, stranger?" quavered a cracked voice speaking in a tongue that despite himself sent Smith's pulses quickening in recognition. French, Earth's French, archaic and scarcely intelligible, but unquestionably a voice from home. "For a price," he admitted, his fingers closing definitely on his gun. "Who are you and why do you ask? And how in the name of- It will reward you to ask no questions," said the cracked quaver. "I seek a fighting-man of a temper strong enough for my purpose, and I think you are he. Look, does this tempt you?" A claw-like hand extended itself out of the shadow, dangling a double rope of such blue-white pearls as Smith had never dreamed of. "Worth a king's ransom," croaked the voice. "And all for the taking. Will you come with me? Come where? To the planet Earth-to the land of France-to the year of 1500." So far as I know, this is the only time that the date of Jirel's time is ever explicitly mentioned in any of Moore's writings, which seem to make it canonical, but I must admit that the date doesn't sit well with me, mostly because Jirel's adventures "seem "to occur in earlier time. Regardless, Smith agrees to Franga's offer, mostly out of boredom, and he's instructed by the magician to steal the Starstone back from Jirel if he wants his reward and his way back to the future. The remainder of the story deals with what happens once Smith meets Jirel of Joiry and discovers that the situation into which he's been thrust is not quite as simple as he'd been led to believe.
As I said above, "Quest of the Starstone" isn't a great work, even by the standards of pulp fantasy. I like it nonetheless, since it reveals the much higher degree of permeability between literary genres in the past. Perhaps more precisely it reveals that, once upon a time, "fantasy" was a very broad genre, one that encompassed much more than wizards and dragons and included Martians and spaceships, too. Out of that broader conception of fantasy did games like "Dungeons & Dragons "grow, with its many references to Barsoom and robots alongside its reference to Conan and Balrogs. I won't say that I think nothing has been gained by stricter conceptions of genre, but I will say that I think some things have been "lost".
