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Post by fia on Jul 20, 2018 4:22:27 GMT
"This is my blood you drink, this is my body you eat." -- Jesus, Jesus Christ Superstar
what has been done will be done again;
there is nothing new under the sun."
Ecclesiastes 1:9 I'm not sure what these replies mean exactly –– but just to clarify, in case you meant to indicate I missed something (maybe not?): Of course the Eucharist is the currently most well-known and still practiced form of ritual god-eating, but I wanted to look into cases in polytheistic and pagan narratives, particularly cases of gods or other powerful beings eating gods, for closer similarities to the Ysengrin eating Coyote case. Many cultures, including the Lakota and the Aztecs, had ritual theophagy (in the Aztecs' case it could even get cannibalistic). The Ancient Greeks in particular have many theophagic stories (indeed Goya's depiction of Cronos looks about as crazed as Ysengrin eating Coyote). I was keen on this particular passage about Dionysus because it describes him eating 'himself', and because it describes a more anthropomorphic god-incarnation eating a more animalistic god-incarnation. I guess I was just trying to make sense of why Ysengrin would eat Coyote, besides being mad about being kept down for so long, and besides just the sheer mythos-level storytelling of it. Alternatively, I wanted an explanation that would help us with the problem of whether Coyote might have foreseen, and wanted, Ysengrin to eat him. (Odin's self-sacrifice comes to mind). It makes most sense if somehow even Coyote gains power or influence or something by means of the theophagy. Maybe he'd wanted to 'fuse' with Renard all those years ago, to become some mega-trickster, but never achieved it, so he had to settle for Ysengrin instead? It could also be that Ysengrin intended to triumph over Coyote, and instead achieved a complete transformation through eating Coyote's powers, perhaps without meaning to. We'll have to wait and see! |
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Post by keef on Jul 20, 2018 6:31:12 GMT
"What has been will be again,
what has been done will be done again;
there is nothing new under the sun."
Ecclesiastes 1:9 I'm not sure what these replies mean exactly –– but just to clarify, in case you meant to indicate I missed something (maybe not?): I liked your post and thought Warl quoting Lloyd Webber instead of the Bible was quite funny. That's why I added my own silly joke (I realise you may have missed the alt text, if on mobile). |
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Post by warrl on Jul 20, 2018 16:59:39 GMT
I quoted JCS rather than the Bible because I remembered the exact line from JCS.
I put it up at all to make it clear that this isn't just some old pagan thing and "we" aren't better than that now. (I've seen people deny that Christians engage in symbolic cannibalism - and when I point at Communion they say "it's different" but they can't explain how it's different.)
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Post by fia on Jul 20, 2018 18:58:17 GMT
I liked your post and thought Warl quoting Lloyd Webber instead of the Bible was quite funny. That's why I added my own silly joke (I realise you may have missed the alt text, if on mobile). Oh cool! Yes, I think I missed the alt text. Got it now 
I quoted JCS rather than the Bible because I remembered the exact line from JCS. I put it up at all to make it clear that this isn't just some old pagan thing and "we" aren't better than that now. (I've seen people deny that Christians engage in symbolic cannibalism - and when I point at Communion they say "it's different" but they can't explain how it's different.) Agreed! I'm not a believer, myself, but if I were, I'd probably be more of a pagan than a monotheist, just based on personal taste. I'm ethnically/was raised Catholic, tho |
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Post by Runningflame on Jul 21, 2018 19:46:19 GMT
But the real question is, Does he exist?Also: a wolf (-ish creature) named Wolf. Kinda like a robot named Robot or a shadow named Shadow. I sense a theme.  |
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Post by todd on Jul 22, 2018 0:16:01 GMT
One difficulty with the whole "these etheric beings don't really exist" business; they succeed in working a lot of physical changes on the world (Coyote making the chasm through which the Annan Waters flow and knocking a Court building down, all the damage that Loup caused in the preceding chapter, etc.). For seeming figments of the human imagination, they can produce some very real results. (Unless it turns out that all of those things are just some form of mass hypnosis and that if Loup was somehow "imagined out of existence", the Court would automatically revert to the way it was before the attack - which seems far-fetched.) Maybe it's just one of those things that we shouldn't think over too much. |
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