What makes a "sacred text" sacred?

Fair enough, to each their own. I posted a wider survey of the 'sacred item' thing under 'Talking Statues and Bitch Swords', above.

P_Synthesis wrote:Nah, I don't really think we're disagreeing here. What I'm getting from you is that magickal use and 'sacredness' are two different things in your personal practice. Which, given that you see your tools on the level of your black & decker, I totally get.

Okay. Gotcha.

I admit that I sometimes like to see potential for an argument (and not necessarily in the formal sense of that term either ) where none actually exists.

You seemed to me to be supporting the idea that magick tools are viewed by most people as sacred objects. No disagreement that people do that, but I think doing so too easily becomes a distraction bordering on idolatry for the inexperienced in particular. Perhaps that's no bad thing...dunno.

Personally I don't have an opinion on the desirability. I was just speaking to the original question -- 'How and why do we regard certain texts as "sacred"?' Etc. When the text has talismanic value it has obviously crossed that line; whether that's wise or not is another question.

It's probably another question, but one that I think is implied in the OP topic question under why we consider texts sacred, since a text is an object and magick tools may have inscriptions.

So, mayhap we could toss around the idea of when a talisman is simply a magickal object (if one ever truly is simply that) and what constitutes the distinction between useful object devoted to a specific purpose and "sacred" object.

gillyflower wrote:...nothing is more important to the Divine than any other part, as far as I am aware, meaning that to the Divine a wooden wand and a plastic spoon are equally divine, IMO, which means to me that it is the person that finds the one tool more to their liking than another.

Yep. Although I'm not at all sure you and I would agree on what constitutes "the divine."

I get nervous when people talk about such terms as if everyone understands the same meaning when that often is not at all the case.

Too many years of teaching interpersonal communication probably...

DotNotInOz wrote:No disagreement that people do that, but I think doing so too easily becomes a distraction bordering on idolatry.

'Too easily' no. For me truly, genuinely 'sacred' items are not common-or-garden things. The question is, in what way are they special? Is it a question of affect as some are implying? I would say, not always. For many there might be sentimental attachment, symbolic purpose and a modicum of attunement, which amounts to something you treat as sacred at your option, or as black and decker as another option. But not all objects fall into this category. I gave a lot of examples on the other thread.

It's probably another question [whether it's wise to give a text talismanic, 'sacred' value], but one that I think is implied in the OP topic question

Sure, it's just not one upon which I have an opinion!

On this part:

...nothing is more important to the Divine than any other part, as far as I am aware

... as far as I'm concerned it isn't exactly about that...

See, if a person has worked on themselves for many years and has masses of harmonious energy, wisdom and power, that doesn't make them more important to 'the divine' (to call it that), but it can make them somewhat more close to it or more in tune with it. This is why some people work at such length on their spiritual stuff. What I'm saying is, one can work on an object as well such that it is more 'in tune' if you like, by lots of different methods. Like I say, lots of examples in the other thread. It was a long post so I didn't post it here.


To widen again, I think another interesting question is whether writing in itself can be sacred. Look at the Hebrew letters or the Ogham, etc. -- they have a certain value in themselves. In the Bardon system there is a massive Kabbalah training involving letter energies, and interestingly he mentions that the druids had the same letter-energies in their system. One Bardonist mage actually found those letter energies residing in a stone circle on the isle of mull:

http://shell.lava.net/~pagios/mull.html

... which is a rather nice sacred object in itself.

DotNotInOz wrote:

gillyflower wrote:...nothing is more important to the Divine than any other part, as far as I am aware, meaning that to the Divine a wooden wand and a plastic spoon are equally divine, IMO, which means to me that it is the person that finds the one tool more to their liking than another.

Yep. Although I'm not at all sure you and I would agree on what constitutes "the divine."

I get nervous when people talk about such terms as if everyone understands the same meaning when that often is not at all the case.

Too many years of teaching interpersonal communication probably...

Good oh! Yes, that is exactly it. We each have our world view and they are different. The way I use the divine is different than TED uses the divine, which is why I kept throwing in IMO. I suspect we are talking about "sacred" in the same way without using a standard definition too. To me all of the Divine is sacred if that is defined as worthy of respect, so it is kind of not my world view to hold one thing more worthy than another.

Other people, in whose world view, somethings have more value than others will of course look at it differently.

P_Synthesis wrote:

...nothing is more important to the Divine than any other part, as far as I am aware

... as far as I'm concerned it isn't exactly about that...

See, if a person has worked on themselves for many years and has masses of harmonious energy, wisdom and power, that doesn't make them more important to 'the divine' (to call it that), but it can make them somewhat more close to it or more in tune with it. This is why some people work at such length on their spiritual stuff. What I'm saying is, one can work on an object as well such that it is more 'in tune' if you like, by lots of different methods. Like I say, lots of examples in the other thread. It was a long post so I didn't post it here.

If a person works on themselves to be more in tune with the divine (and they may not have a world view that includes everything in the divine or be like me - you already are) and may or may not be doing what they think they are doing, yes? If these same people work on an object how are you going to measure that it is more in tune with whatever it is than it was before? Meaning to say, this is all UPG.

If you are wondering where that came from look at Pat Robertson. He has worked on himself for years to amass wisdom and power and thinks that he is closer to and more in tune with his idea of the divine - Yahweh. Now there are many people who would deny that he is or could be closer to the divine, but I bet he would never believe it and there are lots of people who believe that he is closer. I think it all depends, as they say, on your world view.

gillyflower wrote:If a person works on themselves to be more in tune with the divine ... may or may not be doing what they think they are doing, yes?

Sure!

If these same people work on an object how are you going to measure that it is more in tune with whatever it is than it was before? Meaning to say, this is all UPG.

Oh, granted. I can't prove any of it, it's simply what I think from my experience.

(I would mention the data we do have on psi from parapsychology suggests to me that some are more in tune with the non-physical than others. And in general my experience would tend to support that, both as far as 'natural gift' and also as far as intensive training. But that is another question and OT again surely.)

As for how you would know (rather than measure or prove) about an object with intrinsic 'spiritual power' or 'divine attunement', I did give plenty of good examples on the other thread I thought. Along with ideas about methods, which would start to go towards verifiability on the experiential level, but not towards measurability or provability, of which there is precious little in this area.


On Mr Robertson's spiritual development, yes, I guess there's plenty of opinion involved. Such things are down to personal judgment and conscience. It's certainly possible to be completely deluded about one's level of attainment, and it's possible to delude oneself one has made some massively powerful object when in fact it has nothing in it at all. But the fact that developing wisdom can be illusory doesn't mean it always is, and the same in my opinion goes for the divine attunement thing.

Developing wisdom can be happening or not and things may be in tune with the divine (or anything else) or not. So far no one has proven that the divine or any gods exist or that anything can be more tune with any of it (aside from a personal feeling that they are) or that any method is better for that except what the person feels works best for them. It's subjective.

I'm with the little girl once who asked me for a magic wand when I was helping a friend out at her shop. I said "Sure honey," and pushed forward a container of magic wands - the kind that was filled with sparkley stuff, very pretty. She looked me straight in the eye and said "No. A real one." I laughed and told her if she found one of those, let me in on it. What's the use of a magic object if it doesn't do anything?

Developing wisdom can be happening or not and things may be in tune with the divine (or anything else) or not. So far no one has proven that the divine or any gods exist or that anything can be more tune with any of it (aside from a personal feeling that they are) or that any method is better for that except what the person feels works best for them. It's subjective.

Well first of all, if you want to talk about 'proving' that things exist, as I say, that's a whole different thing. But obviously, the fact that proof doesn't exist doesn't necessarily mean that we live in a completely relativistic ocean of subjectivity either IMO. (The truth in my opinion is that whether things are entirely subjective or not is itself subjective! And IMO the subjective and the objective shade into one another, as wonderfully described by Patrick Harpur in Daimonic Reality, for example.)

On the question of whether we know or don't know that things are more in tune with the divine or not, I personally happen to feel that, for example, the people I've known who have been more psychologically healthy have also been in tune with an inner non-physical part of themselves -- one could call it 'divine' or not. Of course that's a major aspect of some modern psychology eg. Transpersonal.

Although there's no 'proof' statistically (and there's little proof on whole reams of therapeutic methods just because tests are difficult to do and have not been done) it's certainly a valid viewpoint IMO that people can be more or less in touch with deeper or higher things within themselves, based on therapeutic experience. Yes that is subjective -- but harmony or disharmony do reflect outward. There is a wider effect, the effect of harmony within a person; something is visible, but very hard to 'prove.'

Of course this only refers to the divine within a person, rather than something transhuman. But in my opinion the effects of some 'sacred' objects are similar. Since John T Mainer has also experienced objects that have power (magical tools in Asatru and Wicca by the look for example), I'm glad to know I'm not the only one who has that particular idea.

Now what interests me very much gillyflower is where you say:

So far no one has proven that ... any method is better for that except what the person feels works best for them.

I'm rather confused as to why you think that needed saying? I don't think anyone recommended one method (or belief system, etc.) over any other method! Certainly not me.

In general in fact, I don't think it matters what system you follow or what you think the divine might be, for the purposes of this discussion. But I certainly am not saying that one sort of divine has been proven to be 'correct', which it obviously has not... nobody here really thinks that do they? I thought the multidisciplinary nature of this place was part of the point!

We are a multi-religious group including also those without religion. I just think sometimes we need reminding that there are also people who think that all of this is bunk and we are imagining things. They could be as right as any one of us and sometimes when we talk about things that are so very subjective as someone feeling power in an object, I'm reminded of that.

It is funny you bring up emotionally healthy people as being more in tune. I read an article in the NYTs recently (I think it was there) about how America's biggest export to the rest of the world is our mental illnesses. It seems that each culture has unique and accepted expressions of mental illness (named) that isn't seen in other cultures. Our mental illnesses (anorexia was one example) are now showing up in other areas (China) where they were unknown before. I wonder if "being more in tune" was also more culturally connected and now imported from other cultures and exported too.

I am interested in the power felt by people from objects but not convinced that it isn't triggered by something within the person rather than something that the object really has, if I am making myself clear. In my tradition, one of the exercises is to surround oneself with sacred objects - in this case defined as things that mean a great deal to a person - and even do ritual like that. It is a very powerful experience, in my opinion. But I don't think that my sacred objects would give another person the same experience I had. In other words, those sacred objects are personal. I don't know if everyone holding an object that is supposed to be powerful in its own right would feel that power. That could be explained, of course, by saying that the second person isn't sensitive enough. The other explanation could be that the object triggered the response in the person because something about it was connected in the brain with something else.

Sure some people think it is all bunk, it doesn't bother me. I've mentioned twice now that a pure-behaviourist (you mentioned Pavlov) sacredness-by-association is definitely the whole explanation as far as some are concerned. I really don't mind. We can all lay out whatever views we've got.

When you say:

I am interested in the power felt by people from objects but not convinced that it isn't triggered by something within the person rather than something that the object really has, if I am making myself clear.

... yes, you are clear! You have said exactly this from the beginning.

All one can do on a site like this is tell of one's own experience and truth, and of course, there's an implicit expectation on a multifaith site that the truth of others might differ. I have no problem with that whatsoever. I hope that's clear.

I do think experience is the key factor here personally. In the case of 'sacred objects' there isn't much research but there are many similar subjects in 'religious'/'spiritual'/'divine'/'sacred' matters (for example OBE) where a little research has been done. Without wishing to get too far into it, I suspect we each tend to assume that our own experience is equivalent to the experience of others or constitutes 'all there is to know', when in fact it might not, and there is research that bears this out to a certain extent IMO. However, that's another thread again. And I have to have a life.

Our mental illnesses (anorexia was one example) are now showing up in other areas (China) where they were unknown before. I wonder if "being more in tune" was also more culturally connected and now imported from other cultures and exported too.

The spread of western industrialized culture and TV would predictably be incomplete if the neuroses didn't spread as well. This is a most virulent form of something which has probably been occurring ever since cultures began subsuming one another.

But clearly, if this idea is partly an 'import' then it didn't originate here. There are heaps of examples worldwide of this notion, always have been. We can to-and-fro it if you want, but it is linked to the idea that what is divine is deeper and higher and finer, something which you just rejected on the other thread. So maybe that's where we are differing.

I think where we are differing is that I am open to the explanations coming from a lot of different directions. I like to think that it could be 1) our imaginations at work, 2) the gods/spirits using the object for some goal, 3) we are making connections due to our prior experiences (ie. conditioned response), 4) objects themselves can have auras, 5) other animals besides ourselves can imprint objects, 6) instances in time can imprint objects, 7) people can imprint objects on purpose or accidentally, groups of people can imprint an object over time, 9) we are primed to expect to feel something when we see, touch are in the presence of something so we do and we are much smarter than we think and our subconscious has drawn some conclusions that are spot on.

But it would be an interesting experiment to try to mentally imprint an object and then hand it to people when they come in the door and see what they feel.

and I guess those numbers cue some smilies! sorry

A question for you, Gilly, and for anyone else who wishes to dive into this one. Do you understand the meaning of sacred to involve more than merely being worthy of respect? Must something considered sacred also inspire awe and wonder?

To me, for something to be sacred, there usually will also be something mysterious about it. It must be an object or a text not readily understood.

In short, the most sacred texts or objects would be "all of the above," as I perceive them.

DotNotInOz wrote:A question for you, Gilly, and for anyone else who wishes to dive into this one. Do you understand the meaning of sacred to involve more than merely being worthy of respect? Must something considered sacred also inspire awe and wonder?

To me, for something to be sacred, there usually will also be something mysterious about it. It must be an object or a text not readily understood.

In short, the most sacred texts or objects would be "all of the above," as I perceive them.

I tend to delineate between the use of sacred as a place holder (I worship the sacred) and sacred as it pertains to texts, geographies, objects, etc. The former is simply the basic meaning of the term, that which is worshiped, held in reverence, respect, etc. Saying "I worship the sacred" is redundant, it means you worship what you worship, it does not have descriptive power outside of itself. In the later however it acts as a descriptor, a geographic location may be sacred, because of symbolism, history, it has been sanctified, etc. I believe that sacred is often synonymous with numinous, holy, ineffable. So the idea of something being held in awe or wonder is often understood as being an aspect of sacredness.

gillyflower:

I think where we are differing is that I am open to the explanations coming from a lot of different directions.

No, that can't be right -- I agree with the existence of every 'explanation' idea you've given there, and I've introduced even more of my own.

I simply believe that our experiences are leading us to different a priori conclusions! Nothing in my viewpoint prevents items without 'actual divine power' being sacred to a person and having real effects for that reason, but I simply don't think that explanation covers all the cases I know of, because in my experience, some objects do have 'actual divine power' which is a different phenomenon.

It's a little similar to the situation with OBE and lucid dreaming. Research indicates that those who have both think they are different, but that lucid dreamers think OBEs must be dreams. The experience changes the viewpoint.

I do understand that in your experience you think that some objects have "actual divine power" - but I don't know what you mean by that. Divine? Every object is part of the Divine and has it's own energy signature IMO. Are you saying that gods reside in objects?

Yes, experience can change the person's viewpoint, or not. My experience may not affect your viewpoint however, and that is as it should be. I think you have been putting forth your opinions and I have been putting forth my opinions, but none of the terms have been defined. That makes it a rather frustrating experience for all.

Dot, "sacred" in the definition that I am using means "physical symbols of more than what they are." (Kaathryn MacMorgan-Douglas)

We might like, as an exercise, to make a short list of the things we personally hold to be sacred.

Short list of things I hold to be sacred:

As a text: the Hamaval

As objects:
1-My wedding ring
2-The arms of my father (rifle), taken from his whelmed foe and given to me upon reaching manhood.
3-The knife I have sworn my oaths upon, offered blot with
4-The Freyr's spear- a power object of the Freehold (really potent fertility energy-I do not let my daughters handle)
5-My dogtags (and the hammer hanging from them).

gillyflower wrote:We are a multi-religious group including also those without religion. I just think sometimes we need reminding that there are also people who think that all of this is bunk and we are imagining things. They could be as right as any one of us and sometimes when we talk about things that are so very subjective as someone feeling power in an object, I'm reminded of that....

I am interested in the power felt by people from objects but not convinced that it isn't triggered by something within the person rather than something that the object really has, if I am making myself clear. In my tradition, one of the exercises is to surround oneself with sacred objects - in this case defined as things that mean a great deal to a person - and even do ritual like that. It is a very powerful experience, in my opinion. But I don't think that my sacred objects would give another person the same experience I had. In other words, those sacred objects are personal. I don't know if everyone holding an object that is supposed to be powerful in its own right would feel that power. That could be explained, of course, by saying that the second person isn't sensitive enough. The other explanation could be that the object triggered the response in the person because something about it was connected in the brain with something else. [emphasis added]

Gilly, I think you've nailed it, and I'm glad I came back to this thread before leaving in place a similar expression on the imbued objects thread.

As far as I'm concerned, John T has just provided us with a demonstration that what a person considers sacred is highly personal most of the time and frequently results from UPG.

I would regard none of John's listed objects as sacred, not even my own engagement and wedding rings. Those are deeply symbolic, but if they were lost or stolen, I'd regret that immensely but we'd soon replace them. Thus, I don't understand people who never take off their wedding rings because these objects are so intensely meaningful to them. It seems to me only common sense to remove a valued piece of jewelry before doing any task that might damage it.

For me, part of the mystique of something sacred is that it is irreplaceable or could be replaced only with great difficulty.

gillyflower wrote:I do understand that in your experience you think that some objects have "actual divine power" - but I don't know what you mean by that.

I already answered that in the other thread.

Gilly, I think you've nailed it, and I'm glad I came back to this thread before leaving in place a similar expression on the imbued objects thread.

As far as I'm concerned, John T has just provided us with a demonstration that what a person considers sacred is highly personal most of the time and frequently results from UPG.

I've never disagreed with the idea that someone can hold an item sacred without there being anything intrinsically special about it -- I've agreed with it explicitly in fact.

All I say is that some items are not common items in terms of their actual nature, and I put forth many, many examples, which if you read them, explain my point of view real well. (John T Mainer's item #4 is an example for sure.)


How many people here have done energy work?

A short list of sacred things to me:

The Declaration of Independence
A picture my youngest daughter drew
Dorothy's red shoes
My grandfather's medals from the Spanish American War
My father's ginger pot
The goddess and god candle holders
A picture of our extended family

This is all very interesting, to be sure.

I would distinguish between items to which I have a strong emotional bond, and items which I treat in a 'sacred' fashion, of which there are only two at the moment -- one is also a candle holder, as with gillyflower, and one is an incense burner. But then at the moment my practice mostly doesn't have many physical objects in it, apart from my own body which I guess I try to treat as sacredly as possible, and my wife's, ditto.

Also like gillyflower, I feel 'every moment is my cathedral' (or 'the divine is everywhere'). Whatever anyone might think I mean by the additional energetic charge or inhabitedness of an object, it certainly doesn't contravene the fact that the sacred is everywhere.

I might say this: although every moment of life is sacred, in certain moments the sacred is more nakedly apparent, in experiential terms, and the same could be said to be true of certain people I have known for example. I think it is true of certain places and certain objects as well.

In my tradition, we believe that objects and living things can have their own spirits.