#miasma

Its been 600 years

sisterofiris:

sir-celestyn:

I finished chapter two of Coping with the Gods, and while there’s a lot I could say about the actual topic of the chapter, the main thing that came to mind for me was to discuss the idea of punishment being passed down through generations.

So if the father “sins” (using the Christian word for ease of speaking), the son faces the punishment. In Greek mythology and writings this is commonly understood. It affected the whole family and ones progeny, if a person sinned.

I’ve never seen this topic addressed by anyone practicing hellenic polytheism/dodekstheism/Olympianism. Perhaps there’s been asks about it on Tumblr to prevelant bloggers, sure, but no big address of it in any of the major books people recommend.

So why do we entirely ignore important concepts of moral code? People freak out if you change parts of prayer or worship, but seem a bit more wiggly on the morality, ethics, and ensuing “punishments” if not followed.

I’m not saying this has to be a part of one’s religious thought but it’d be interesting to see it discussed and at least acknowledged as a feature one is leaving out. Is it actually a significant feature for the religion or is it more a cultural belief? (and can we even separate those two things?)

I’m a bit tired so some of these thoughts aren’t fully formed and I don’t have more than that to say right now, but I wanted to write this while it was fresh in my mind.

A few of my own thoughts:

I think this is related to the general misunderstanding of Ancient Greek ritual pollution by the modern polytheistic community. (Not all of it - I’ve seen certain groups treat it well - but others lack nuance.) I summarised my thoughts on this in a post here (with more details here). In short: there is a difference between everyday pollution (lyma) and serious moral pollution (miasma), and everyday pollution is farless affecting and requires farless cleansing than moral pollution. The problem is that lymaand miasmaare often treated interchangeably, which means the nuance between the two terms and what they entail is lost.

What we’re dealing with in this case is miasma(oragos, yay for partly-but-not-completely overlapping Greek terms). Miasmais a very serious offence: if we’re going to equate it to a Christian “sin”, it’s one of the mortal ones. Think sexually assaulting your grandmother, or driving a busload of children over a cliff. In this kind of context, I do think it’s relevant to include intergenerational punishment. Not because one of your ancestors did something bad once, but because your ancestor did something truly horrific and didn’t admit to it (and be ritually cleansed), and neither did you.

Imagine your grandfather was a slave trader, or a serial rapist, or a genocidal dictator or something. As his descendant, you have a responsibility to own up to your family’s past and do better, especially towards the people your grandfather harmed. If you don’t, and instead perpetuate his actions (like the descendants of Atreus and those of Labdakos did, those families were messed up and not just because of the curse), that’s when intergenerational punishment comes into play.

I think it can also be connected to collective punishment - e.g. when a city harbours a criminal and has to be collectively cleansed of the miasma. It’s a question of responsibility, and you can’t just claim you had nothing to do it. You need to reevaluate your principles, and the city in general needs to reevaluate its principles, to understand how this happened and how notto do it again. At least, that’s what I believe!

As for whether it’s cultural or religious, like most things in Ancient Greece - both. As I outlined, I think there are important religious bones to it which we can apply to modern practise, but the “flesh” which grows around it needs to be adapted. Overall, what needs to be acknowledged most is the difference between this kind of pollution and the everyday pollution, because the confusion can easily put people off this area of theology, despite it being both important and really, really fascinating.

PS: I’m also working my way through Coping with the Gods and so far I’ve found it to be an excellent book. Two small criticisms on chapter one: first, the author could’ve looked into modern polytheisms (Hinduism is an obvious one, but they’re all over the place in Africa and Asia) as well as Catholicism for more valuable comparisons; second, the author really should’ve mentioned Anatolian beliefs when discussing polyonymous Gods, and I don’t just say this because I love Anatolia but because there’s some very clear parallels that can be drawn there, yet he only mentioned the Hittites once in passing. Other than that, so far I highly recommend this book.

i just want miasma and elias bouchard to throw hands

carte blanche crew + mick, sasha, ben, & miasma

peachpvnk-remade-deactivated202:

more tonight at 6