Hierophant Knowledge :: THE LOST KNOWLEDGE Official Definitions of Spirituality, Esoteric Thought and Philosophy. Mysticism
ALCHEMY
Alchemy refers to a quest for a fabled elixir or kimia (Old Persian for "elixir", later arabicized as alchemy) capable of turning copper and other base metals to gold and also a quest for something to prevent human beings' bodies from becoming old. Alchemy is both a philosophy and an ancient practice that seeks to prepare the "elixir of longevity" or philosophers' stone, accomplish the transmutation into gold, and attain ultimate wisdom. It supposedly involves the manufacture of several substances with unusual properties, as well as improvement of the alchemist. Some alchemical sources treat the various substances, equipment and processes in an allegorical sense, as metaphors for a spiritual discipline. Practical alchemy, on the other hand, can be viewed as a protoscience, the precursor to modern inorganic chemistry, having provided many procedures, equipment and names of substances that are still in use.
Alchemy has been practiced primarily in medieval Iran as well as Egypt, Mesopotamia, India, China, Japan, Korea, the classical Greco-Roman world, the medieval Islamic world, and then medieval Europe up to the modern era, in a complex network of schools and philosophical systems spanning at least 2,500 years.
MYSTICISM
Mysticism Self-nullification (making oneself bittel, known as abnegation of the ego) and focus upon and absorption within Ein Sof Ohr: God's Infinite Light (Hassidic schools of Judaism)* Complete non-identification with the world (Kaivalya in some schools of Hinduism, including Sankhya and Yoga; Jhana in Buddhism)* Liberation from the cycles of Karma (Moksha in Jainism, Sikhism and Hinduism, Nirvana in Buddhism)* Deep intrinsic connection to ultimate reality (Satori in Mahayana Buddhism, Te in Taoism)* Union with God (Henosis in Neoplatonism and Brahma-Prapti or Brahma-Nirvana in Hinduism, fana in Sufism, mukti in Sikhism)* Theosis or Divinization, union with God and a participation of the Divine Nature (Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy)* Innate Knowledge (Sahaja and Svabhava in Hinduism; Irfan and Sufism in Islam)* Experience of one's true blissful nature (Samadhi Svarupa-Avirbhava in Hinduism and Buddhism)* Seeing the Light, or "that of God," in everyone (Hinduism, Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), Sikhism)* The Love of God, as in the Hinduism, Baha'i Faith, Christianity, Islam, Sikhism and many other spiritual traditions* Mahamudra and Dzogchen—meditation, the process of union with the nondual nature, in Tibetan Buddhism* Ability to see and recognize the pattern that nothing is ultimately dependent nor independent, but that everything is only compositionary and inter-reactional including the conception of the existence or non-existence of the identity of self. Identities and labels are only practical conceptions. Theravada Buddhism.
ESOTERICISM
Esotericism or Esoterism is a term that may be understood by two primary methods: formal definition and scholastic clarification.
- In terms of formal definition, "Esoterism" signifies the holding of esoteric opinions or beliefs, that is, ideas preserved or understood by a small group or those specially initiated, or of rare or unusual interest. The term derives from the Greek ' (esôterikos), a compound of ' (esô): "within", thus "pertaining to the more inward", mystic. Its antonym is "exoteric".
- From a scholastic perspective, the term designates a series of historically related religious currents including Astrology, Alchemy, Christian mysticism of Meister Eckhart, Johannes Tauler, and Henry Suso, the Christian Theosophy of Jacob Böhme and his followers, Illuminism, Mesmerism, Magic, Rosicrucianism, Swedenborgianism, Spiritualism, the theosophical currents associated with Helena Blavatsky and her followers, and Rudolf Steiner. There are competing views regarding the common traits uniting these currents, not all of which involve "inwardness", mystery, occultism or secrecy as a crucial trait.
GNOSTICISM
Gnosticism was a group of ancient religions that combined different elements from Hellenistic Judaism, Greco-Roman mystery religions, Zoroastrianism (especially Zurvanism), Neoplatonism, and eventually Buddhism and early Christianity. It taught that some esoteric knowledge (or Gnosis) was necessary for salvation from the material world, which was created by some intermediary figure (or demiurge) instead of God. In some systems, the demiurge was considered evil, in others merely imperfect. Different gnostic schools sometimes identified the demiurge as Adam, Ahriman, Samael, Satan, Yaldabaoth, or Yahweh. Many schools inverted traditional interpretations of the Hebrew Bible, leading Jewish-Israeli scholar Gershom Scholem to call Gnosticism "the Greatest case of metaphysical anti-Semitism." However, some scholars have argued that the Jewish mysticism Kabbalah is Gnostic.
PHILOSOPHY
Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. It is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational argument. The word "philosophy" comes from the Greek φιλοσοφία (philosophia), which literally means "love of wisdom".
SEXUALITY
History of Human Sexuality
The social construction of sexual behavior—its taboos, regulation and social and political impact—has had a profound effect on the various cultures of the world since prehistoric times.
Sources
Sexual speech—and by extension, writing—has been subject to varying standards of decorum since the beginning of history. For most of historic time writing has not been used by more than a small part of the total population of any society. Only in the 19th century and later are there societies where over half the population are basically literate. The resulting self-censorship and euphemistic forms translate today into a dearth of explicit and accurate evidence on which to base a history. There are a number of primary sources that can be collected across a wide variety of times and cultures, including the following:
- Records of legislation indicating either encouragement or prohibition
- Religious and philosophical texts recommending, condemning or debating the topic
- Literary sources, perhaps unpublished during their authors' lifetimes, including diaries and personal correspondence
- Medical textbooks treating various forms as a pathological condition
- Linguistic developments, particularly in slang.
- More recently, studies of sexuality.
THE GNOSTIC GOSPELS
The Gnostic Gospels are a collection of about fifty-two texts based upon the ancient wisdom teachings of several prophets and spiritual leaders including Jesus, written from the 2nd - 4th century AD. These gospels are not part of the standard Biblical canon of any major Christian denomination, and as such are part of what is called the New Testament apocrypha. Recent novels and films that refer to the gospels have recently increased public interest.
History
The word gnostic comes from the Greek word gnosis, meaning "knowledge", which is often used in Greek philosophy in a manner more consistent with the English "enlightenment". Some scholars continue to maintain traditional dating for the emergence of Gnostic philosophy and religious movements. It is now generally believed that the evidence suggests that Gnosticism was a Jewish movement which subsequently reacted to Christianity or that Gnosticism emerged directly in reaction to Christianity. The name "Christian gnostics" came to represent a segment of the Early Christian community that believed that salvation lay not in merely worshipping Christ, but in psychic or pneumatic souls learning to free themselves from the material world via the revelation. According to this tradition, the answers to spiritual questions are to be found within not without. Furthermore, the gnostic path does not require the intermediation of a church for salvation. Some scholars, such as Edward Conze and Elaine Pagels, have suggested that gnosticism blends teachings like those attributed to Jesus Christ with teachings found in Eastern traditions.
All from Wikipedia, via Facebook.
The Kiss. Picasso
NIHILISM
Moral nihilists assert that morality does not inherently exist, and that any established moral values are abstractly contrived. Nihilism can also take epistemological, metaphysical or ontological forms, meaning respectively that, in some aspect, knowledge is not possible or that contrary to our belief, some aspect of reality does not exist as such.
The term nihilism is sometimes used in association with anomie to explain the general mood of despair at a perceived pointlessness of existence that one may develop upon realizing there are no necessary norms, rules, or laws. Movements such as Futurism and deconstruction, among others, have been identified by commentators as "nihilistic" at various times in various contexts.
Nihilism is also a characteristic that has been ascribed to time periods: for example, Jean Baudrillard and others have called postmodernity a nihilistic epoch, and some Christian theologians and figures of religious authority have asserted that postmodernity and many aspects of modernity represent a rejection of theism, and that such a rejection entails some form of nihilism.
19th-century
Though the term nihilism was first popularized by the novelist Ivan Turgenev (1818–1883) in his novel "Fathers and Sons, it was first introduced into philosophical discourse by Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi (1743–1819). Jacobi used the term to characterize fationalism and in particular Immanuel Kant's "critical" philosophy in order to carry out a reductio ad absurdum according to which all rationalism (philosophy as criticism) reduces to nihilism, and thus it should be avoided and replaced with a return to some type of faith and revelation.
Bret W. Davis writes, for example, "The first philosophical development of the idea of nihilism is generally ascribed to Friedrich Jacobi, who in a famous letter criticized Fichte's idealism as falling into nihilism. According to Jacobi, Fichte’s absolutization of the ego (the 'absolute I' that posits the 'not-I') is an inflation of subjectivity that denies the absolute transcendence of God." A related concept is fideism.
With the popularizing of the word nihilism by Turgenev, a new Russian political movement called the Nihilism movement adopted the term. They supposedly called themselves nihilists because nothing "that then existed found favor in their eyes."
Kierkegaard
Philosophy of Soren Kierkegaard (1813–1855) posited an early form of nihilism which he referred to as levelling. Levelling was the process of suppressing individuality to a point where the individual's uniqueness becomes non-existent and nothing meaningful in his existence can be affirmed:
Kierkegaard, an advocate of a philosophy of life, generally argued against levelling and its nihilist consequence, although he believed it would be "genuinely educative to live in the age of levelling [because] people will be forced to face the judgement of [levelling] alone." George Cotkin asserts Kierkegaard was against "the standardization and levelling of belief, both spiritual and political, in the nineteenth century [and he] opposed tendencies in mass culture to reduce the individual to a cipher of conformity and deference to the dominant opinion."Levelling at its maximum is like the stillness of death, where one can hear one's own heartbeat, a stillness like death, into which nothing can penetrate, in which everything sinks, powerless. One person can head a rebellion, but one person cannot head this levelling process, for that would make him a leader and he would avoid being levelled. Each individual can in his little circle participate in this levelling, but it is an abstract process, and levelling is abstraction conquering individuality.—Søren Kierkegaard, The Present Age, translated by Alexander Dru with Foreword by Walter Kaufmann, p. 51-53
In his day, tabloids (like the Danish Corsaren) and corrupt Christianity were instruments of levelling and contributed to the "reflective apathetic age" of 19th century Europe. Kierkegaard argues that individuals who are able to overcome the levelling process are stronger for it and is a step in the right direction towards "becoming a true self." As we must overcome levelling, Hubert Dreyfus and Jane Rubin argue that Kierkegaard's interest, "in an increasingly nihilistic age, is in how we can recover the sense that our lives are meaningful".
It should be noted, however, that Kierkegaard's meaning of nihilism differs from the modern definition in the sense that, for Kierkegaard, levelling led to a life lacking meaning, purpose or value, whereas the modern definition posits that there was never any meaning, purpose or value to begin with.
Nietzsche
Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche.
Nietzsche characterized nihilism as emptying the world and especially human existence of meaning, purpose, comprehensible truth, or essential value. This observation stems in part from Nietzsche's perspecivism, or his notion that "knowledge" is always by someone of some thing: it is always bound by perspective, and it is never mere fact. Rather, there are interpretations through which we understand the world and give it meaning. Interpreting is something we can not go without; in fact, it is something we need. One way of interpreting the world is through morality, as one of the fundamental ways in which people make sense of the world, especially in regard to their own thoughts and actions. Nietzsche distinguishes a morality that is strong or healthy, meaning that the person in question is aware that he constructs it himself, from weak morality, where the interpretation is projected on to something external. Regardless of its strength, morality presents us with meaning, whether this is created or 'implanted,' which helps us get through life. This is exactly why Nietzsche states that nihilism as "absolute valuelessness" or "nothing has meaning" is dangerous, or even "the danger of dangers": it is through valuation that people survive and endure the danger, pain and hardships they face in life. The complete destruction of all meaning and all values would be tantamount to suicide or mass-murder.
Nietzsche discusses Christianity, one of the major topics in his work, at length in the context of the problem of nihilism in his notebooks, in a chapter entitled 'European Nihilism'. Here he states that the Christian moral doctrine provides people with intrinsic value, belief in God (which justifies the evil in the world) and a basis for objective knowledge. In this sense, in constructing a world where objective knowledge is possible, Christianity is an antidote against a primal form of nihilism, against the despair of meaninglessness. However, it is exactly the element of truthfulness in Christian doctrine that is its undoing: in its drive towards truth, Christianity eventually finds itself to be a construct, which leads to its own dissolution. It is therefore that Nietzsche states that we have outgrown Christianity "not because we lived too far from it, rather because we lived too close." As such, the self-dissolution of Christianity constitutes yet another form of nihilism. Because Christianity was an interpretation that posited itself as the interpretation, Nietzsche states that this dissolution leads beyond skepticism to a distrust of all meaning.
Stanley Rosen identifies Nietzsche's concept of nihilism with this situation of meaninglessness, where "everything is permitted." According to him, the loss of higher metaphysical values which existed in contrast with the base reality of the world or merely human ideas give rise to the idea that all human ideas are therefore valueless. Rejection of idealism thus results in nihilism, because only similarly transcendent ideals would live up to the previous standards that the nihilist still implicitly holds. The inability for Christianity to serve as a source of valuating the world is reflected in Nietzsche's famous aphorism of the madman in the Gay Science. The death of God, in particular the statement that "we killed him", is similar to the self-dissolution of Christian doctrine: due to the advances of the sciences, which for Nietzsche show that man is the product of evolution, that earth has no special place among the stars and that history is not progressive, the Christian notion of God can no longer serve as a basis for a morality.
One such reaction to the loss of meaning is what Nietzsche calls 'passive nihilism', which he recognises in the pessimistic philosophy of Schopenhauer. Schopenhauer's doctrine, which Nietzsche also refers to as Western Buddhism, advocates a separating oneself of will and desires in order to reduce suffering. Nietzsche characterises this ascetic attitude as a "will to nothingness," whereby life turns away from itself, as there is nothing of value to be found in the world. This mowing away of all value in the world is characteristic of the nihilist, although in this, the nihilist appears to be inconsistent:
Nietzsche's relation to the problem of nihilism is a complex one. He approaches the problem of nihilism as a deeply personal one, stating that this problem of the modern world is a problem that has "become conscious" in him. Furthermore, he emphasises both the danger of nihilism and the possibilities it offers, as seen in his statement that "I praise, I do not reproach, [nihilism's] arrival. I believe it is one of the greatest crises, a moment of the deepest self-reflection of humanity. Whether man recovers from it, whether he becomes master of this crisis, is a question of his strength!" According to Nietzsche, it is only when nihilism is overcome that a culture can have a true foundation upon which to thrive. He wished to hasten its coming only so that he could also hasten its ultimate departure.A nihilist is a man who judges of the world as it is that it ought not to be, and of the world as it ought to be that it does not exist. According to this view, our existence (action, suffering, willing, feeling) has no meaning: the pathos of 'in vain' is the nihilists' pathos — at the same time, as pathos, an inconsistency on the part of the nihilists.—Friedrich Nietzsche, KSA 12:9 [60], taken from The Will to Power, section 585, translated by Walter Kaufmann
He states that there is at least the possibility of another type of nihilist in the wake of Christianity's self-dissolution, one that does not stop after the destruction of all value and meaning and succumbs to the following nothingness. This alternate, 'active' nihilism on the other hand destroys to level the field for constructing something new. This form of nihilism is characterized by Nietzsche as "a sign of strength," a wilful destruction of the old values to wipe the slate clean and lay down one's own beliefs and interpretations, contrary to the passive nihilism that resigns itself with the decomposition of the old values. This wilful destruction of values and the overcoming of the condition of nihilism by the constructing of new meaning, this active nihilism could be related to what Nietzsche elsewhere calls a 'free spirit' or the Ubermensch from Thus Spoke Zarathustra and the Antichrist, the model of the strong individual who posits his own values and lives his life as if it were a work of art.
Heidegger's interpretation of Nietzsche
Many postmodern thinkers who investigated the problem of nihilism as put forward by Nietzsche, were influenced by Martin Heidegger's interpretation of Nietzsche. It is only recently that Heidegger’s influence on nihilism research by Nietzsche has faded. As early as the 1930s, Heidegger was giving lectures on Nietzsche’s thought. Given the importance of Nietzsche’s contribution to the topic of nihilism, Heidegger's influential interpretation of Nietzsche is important for the historical development of the term nihilism.Heidegger's method of researching and teaching Nietzsche is explicitly his own. He does not specifically try to present Nietzsche as Nietzsche. Rather he tries to incorporate Nietzsche's thoughts into his own philosophical system of Being, Time and Dasein. In his Nihilism as Determined by the History of Being (1944–46) Heidegger tries to understand Nietzsche’s nihilism as trying to achieve a victory through the devaluation of the, until then, highest values. The principle of this devaluation is, according to Heidegger, the Will to Power. The Will to Power is also the principle of every earlier valuation of values. How does this devaluation occur and why is this nihilistic? One of Heidegger’s main critiques on philosophy is that philosophy, and more specifically metaphysics, has forgotten to discriminate between investigating the notion of a Being (Seiende) and Being (Sein). According to Heidegger, the history of Western thought, can be seen as the history of metaphysics. And because metaphysics has forgotten to ask about the notion of Being (what Heidegger calls Seinsvergessenheit), it is a history about the destruction of Being. That is why Heidegger calls metaphysics nihilistic. This makes Nietzsche’s metaphysics not a victory over nihilism, but a perfection of it.
Heidegger, in his interpretation of Nietzsche, has been inspired by Ernst Junger. Many references to Jünger can be found in Heidegger’s lectures on Nietzsche. For example, in a letter to the rector of Freiburg University of November 4, 1945, Heidegger, inspired by Jünger, tries to explain the notion of “God is dead " as the “reality of the Will to Power.” Heidegger also praises Jünger for defending Nietzsche against a too biological or anthropological reading during the Third Reich.
A number of important postmodernist thinkers were influenced by Heidegger's interpretation of Nietzsche. Gianni Vattimo points at a back and forth movement in European thought, between Nietzsche and Heidegger. During the 1960s, a Nietzschean 'renaissance' began, culminating in the work of Mazzino Montinari and Giorgio Colli. They began work on a new and complete edition of Nietzsche's collected works, making Nietzsche more accessible for scholarly research. Vattimo explains that with this new edition of Colli and Montinari, a critical reception of Heidegger's interpretation of Nietzsche began to take shape. Like other contemporary French and Italian philosophers, Vattimo does not want, or only partially wants, to rely on Heidegger for understanding Nietzsche. On the other hand, Vattimo judges Heidegger's intentions authentic enough to keep pursuing them. Philosophers who Vattimo exemplifies as a part of this back and forth movement are French philosophers Deleuze, Foucault and Derrida. Italian philosophers of this same movement are Cacciari, Severino and himself. Habermas, Lvotard and Rorty are also philosophers who are influenced by Heidegger’s interpretation of Nietzsche.
Postmodernism
Postmodern and poststructuralist thought question the very grounds on which Western cultures have based their 'truths': absolute knowledge and meaning, a 'decentralization' of authorship, the accumulation of positive knowledge, historical progress, and certain ideals and practices of humanism and the Enlightenment. Jacques Derrida, whose deconstruction is perhaps most commonly labeled nihilistic, did not himself make the nihilistic move that others have claimed. Derridean deconstructionists argue that this approach rather frees texts, individuals or organizations from a restrictive truth, and that deconstruction opens up the possibility of other ways of being. Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, for example, uses deconstruction to create an ethics of opening up Western scholarship to the voice of the subaltern and to philosophies outside of the canon of western texts. Derrida himself built a philosophy based upon a 'responsibility to the other'. Deconstruction can thus be seen not as a denial of truth, but as a denial of our ability to know truth (it makes an epistemological claim compared to nihilism's ontological claim).Lyotard argues that, rather than relying on an objective truth or method to prove their claims, philosophers legitimize their truths by reference to a story about the world which is inseparable from the age and system the stories belong to, referred to by Lyotard as meta-narratives. He then goes on to define the postmodern condition as one characterized by a rejection both of these meta-narratives and of the process of legitimation by meta-narratives. "In lieu of meta-narratives we have created new language-games in order to legitimize our claims which rely on changing relationships and mutable truths, none of which is privileged over the other to speak to ultimate truth." This concept of the instability of truth and meaning leads in the direction of nihilism, though Lyotard stops short of embracing the latter.
Postmodern theorist Jean Baudrillard wrote briefly of nihilism from the postmodern viewpoint in Simulacra and Simulation. He stuck mainly to topics of interpretations of the real world over the simulations of which the real world is composed. The uses of meaning was an important subject in Baudrillard's discussion of nihilism:
The apocalypse is finished, today it is the precession of the neutral, of forms of the neutral and of indifference…all that remains, is the fascination for desertlike and indifferent forms, for the very operation of the system that annihilates us. Now, fascination (in contrast to seduction, which was attached to appearances, and to dialectical reason, which was attached to meaning) is a nihilistic passion par excellence, it is the passion proper to the mode of disappearance. We are fascinated by all forms of disappearance, of our disappearance. Melancholic and fascinated, such is our general situation in an era of involuntary transparency.—Jean Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulation, "On Nihilism", trans. 1995
Picasso
Forms of nihilism
Nihilism has many definitions and is thus used to describe arguably independent philosophical positions.Moral nihilism
Moral nihilism, also known as ethical nihilism, is the meta-ethical view that morality does not exist as something inherent to objective reality; therefore no action is necessarily preferable to any other. For example, a moral nihilist would say that killing someone, for whatever reason, is not inherently right or wrong. Other nihilists may argue not that there is no morality at all, but that if it does exist, it is a human and thus artificial construction, wherein any and all meaning is relative for different possible outcomes. As an example, if someone kills someone else, such a nihilist might argue that killing is not inherently a bad thing, bad independently from our moral beliefs, only that because of the way morality is constructed as some rudimentary dichotomy, what is said to be a bad thing is given a higher negative weighting than what is called good: as a result, killing the individual was bad because it did not let the individual live, which was arbitrarily given a positive weighting. In this way a moral nihilist believes that all moral claims are false.
Existential nihilism
Existential nihilism is the belief that life has no intrinsic meaning or value. With respect to the universe, existential nihilism posits that a single human or even the entire human species is insignificant, without purpose and unlikely to change in the totality of existence. The meaninglessness of life is largely explored in the philosophical school of existentialism.Epistemological nihilism
Nihilism of an epistemological form can be seen as an extreme form of skepticism in which all knowledge is denied.Metaphysical nihilism
Metaphysical nihilism is the philosophical theory that there might be no objects at all, i.e. that there is a possible world in which there are no objects at all; or at least that there might be no concrete objects at all, so even if every possible world contains some objects, there is at least one that contains only abstract objects.An extreme form of metaphysical nihilism is commonly defined as the belief that existence itself does not exist. One way of interpreting such a statement would be: It is impossible to distinguish 'existence' from 'non-existence' as there are no objective qualities, and thus a reality, that one state could possess in order to discern between the two. If one cannot discern existence from its negation, then the concept of existence has no meaning; or in other words, does not 'exist' in any meaningful way. 'Meaning' in this sense is used to argue that as existence has no higher state of reality, which is arguably its necessary and defining quality, existence itself means nothing. It could be argued that this belief, once combined with epistemological nihilism, leaves one with an all-encompassing nihilism in which nothing can be said to be real or true as such values do not exist. A similar position can be found in solipsism; however, in this viewpoint the solipsist affirms whereas the nihilist would deny the self. Both these positions are forms of anti-realism.
Mereological nihilism
Mereological nihilism (also called compositional nihilism) is the position that objects with proper parts do not exist (not only objects in space, but also objects existing in time do not have any temporal parts), and only basic building blocks without parts exist, and thus the world we see and experience full of objects with parts is a product of human misperception (i.e., if we could see clearly, we would not perceive compositive objects).Political nihilism
Political nihilism, a branch of nihilism, follows the characteristic nihilist's rejection of non-rationalized or non-proven assertions. In this case the necessity of the most fundamental social and political structures, such as government, family, law and law enforcement. The Nihilist movement in 19th century Russia espoused a similar doctrine. Political nihilism is rather different from other forms of nihilism, and is actually more like a form of Utiliatrianism.Cultural manifestations
Dada.
The term Dada was first used by Tristan Tzara in 1916. The movement, which lasted from approximately 1916 to 1922, arose during World War l, an event that influenced the artists.The Dada Movement began in Zürich, Switzerland – known as the "Niederdorf" or "Niederdörfli" – in the Café Voltaire. The Dadaists claimed that Dada was not an art movement, but an anti - art movement, sometimes using found objects in a manner similar to found poetry. The "anti-art" drive is thought to have stemmed from a post-war emptiness. This tendency toward devaluation of art has led many to claim that Dada was an essentially nihilistic movement. Given that Dada created its own means for interpreting its products, it is difficult to classify alongside most other contemporary art expressions. Hence, due to its ambiguity, it is sometimes classified as a nihilistic modus vivendi.
Literature.
In the graphic novel Watchmen, the character The Comedian/Edward Blake displays and is characterized as being a nihilist, both moral and political, to the extent of openly committing murder in order to demonstrate the lack of human concern or nerve (stating that anyone could have stopped him at any moment, but chose not to). In the novel Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk, the concept of nihilism is frequently displayed throughout the narrator's viewpoint and he and Project Mayhem's actions, with many events having an overall disregard with morals. The rest of Palahniuk's fiction also has a tendency to express forms of nihilism. Anton Chekhov portrayed nihilism when writing Three Sisters (play). The phrase "what does it matter" or such variants is often spoken by several characters in response to events; the significance of some of these events suggests a subscription to nihilism by said characters as a type of coping strategy.
Music
A 2007 article in The Guardian noted that "...in the summer of 1977, ..punk's nihilistic swagger was the most thrilling thing in England." The Sex Pistols' 'God Save The Queen', with its chant-like refrain of "no future", became a slogan for unemployed and disaffected youth during the late 1970s.
The Nine Inch Nails album The Downward Spiral has several nihilistic themes and concepts throughout the overall storyline, with the narrator rejecting the world and the concept of God and attempting to forge his own versions (with lines such as "God is dead, And no one cares, If there is a Hell, I'll see you there"). Nihilism is also expressed in some gangsta rap, as part of a "street code", but it is only one of many viewpoints or perspectives presented in such music.
Black metal and death metal music often emphasizes nihilistic themes.
The Classic Crime, an indie rock band, has a song titled "The Happy Nihilist".
Film.
Three of the antagonists in the movie The Big Lebowski are nihilists, with the lead nihilist being portrayed by Peter Stormare.
The character Animal Mother from Stanley Kubrick's Full Metal Jacket holds nihilistic beliefs.
The character Tyler Durden from the movie Fight Club supports nihilistic life styles.
The character John Morlar from the Peter Van Greenaway novel & 1978 film The Medusa Touch expresses nihilist sentiments.
KAHUNA
Kahuna is a Hawaiian word, defined in the Pukui & Elbert (1986) as a "Priest, sorcerer, magician, wizard, minister, expert in any profession.
Forty different types of kahuna are listed in the book, Tales from the Night Rainbow. Kamakau lists more than 20 in the healing professions alone, including for example Kahuna la'au lapa'au, an expert in herbal medicine and kahuna haha, an expert in diagnosing illnesses.
With the revival of the Hawaiian culture beginning in the 1970s, some native Hawaiian cultural practitioners call themselves kahuna today. Others, particularly devout Christians, disdain the term. The word has been given an esoteric or secret meaning by modern followers of Max Freedom Long and Huna to emphasise a priestly or shamanic standing.
Legal status of Kahuna
Many myths have grown up around kahuna. One is that kahuna were outlawed after the white man came to Hawai'i. For the purpose of this discussion, it is useful to divide kahuna into 3 categories: "craft" kahuna, such as kalai wa'a, an expert canoe maker, and ho'okele, an expert navigator; "sorcerers" including kahuna 'ana'ana; and healers.
Craft kahuna were never prohibited; however, during the decline of native Hawaiian culture many died out and did not pass on their wisdom to new students. As an example, when the Hōkūle‘a was built to be sailed to the South Pacific to prove the voyaging capabilities of the ancient Hawaiians, master navigator Mau Piailug from Satawal was brought to Hawai'i to teach the Hawaiians navigation, as no Hawaiians could be found who still had this knowledge.
It is often said that the missionaries came to Hawai'i in 1820 and made kahuna practices illegal. In the 100 years after the missionaries arrived: all kahuna practices were legal until 1831, some were illegal until 1863, all were legal until 1887, then some illegal until 1919. Since 1919, all have been legal, except sorcery which was decriminalized in 1972.
The first Christian missionaries arrived in 1820. The most powerful person in the nation, Ka‘ahumanu, did not convert until 1825. But it was not until 11 years after missionaries arrived that she proclaimed laws against hula, chant, ‘awa (kava), and Hawaiian religion. (Kamakau, Ruling Chiefs, p. 298-301)
As both healing and sorcery were based in prayer to the ancient gods, the kāhuna went underground for the next 30 years. During that same time, as a result of the high death rate among Hawaiians from introduced diseases, some died before they were able to pass on their wisdom. But many others quietly kept the traditions alive within their families.
King Kamehameha V came to power in 1863. He disdained the law and encouraged the revival of native practices. (Chai) Many kahuna who had been quietly practicing came forward. On Maui, a group of eight Hawaiians founded the 'Ahahui La'au Lapa'au in 1866. They were not only kahuna, several were also members of the Hawai'i Legislature. They interviewed twenty-one kahuna to compile a complete resource of prayers and remedies for the Legislative record. (These interviews have been republished in the book, Must We Wait in Despair? by Malcolm Naea Chun.)
In response to this and other initiatives, in 1868 the Legislature established a Hawaiian Board of Health to license kahuna la'au lapa'au. Kahuna practices including lomilomi massage and la'au kahea healing remained legal for the next twenty years. But the following year, "sorcery" was made illegal, and it remained illegal until 1972.
Both Kamehameha V and his successor, King Kalakaua, invited kahuna to come to Honolulu to share their wisdom. They compiled oral and written histories and documented the prayers, chants, hulas, and remedies for healings. Kalakaua convened groups of kahuna to consult with each other to preserve their heritage. This and many other moves by Kalakaua outraged the Christian residents. In 1887 they forced the “Bayonet Constitution” upon the King. The Legislature outlawed all kahuna practices, including "praying to cure," a law in effect for the next thirty-two years.
In 1919 the Legislature passed a law once again licensing kahuna la'au lapa'au to practice, and since then it has been legal to practice herbal medicine. The Legislature repealed the anti-sorcery laws in 1972 (well before the federal government’s American Indian Religious Freedom Act of 1978) and since then all forms of practice are legal.
In 2001, a licensing law was put in place which allows native practitioners to be certified by Papa Ola Lokahi and the community health centers (not the State). Some have come forward to be licensed, while others refuse to participate in what they see as fundamentally a Western process. (Chai)
While all this legal maneuvering has been going on, many traditional practitioners have continued to practice as they and their ancestors have always done.
Non-Hawaiian uses.
Interesting to note that the word for priest, Kahuna, is reminiscent of the Hebrew word for priest: Kohen. The use of the term in reference to surfing can be traced back to the 1959 film Gidget, in which "The Big Kahuna", played by Cliff Robertson, was the leader of a group of surfers. The term then became commonplace in Beach Party films of the 1960s such as Beach Blanket Bingo, where the "Big Kahuna" was the best surfer on the beach. Eventually, it was adopted into general surfing culture. Hawaiian surfing master Duke Kahanamoku may have been referred to as the "Big Kahuna" but rejected the term as he knew the original meaning of the word.
Thank you to Wikipedia for all these excerpts.
Picasso
Amera Ziganii Rao. Writer. Mystic. Philosopher. Artist
Freedom, sedition and self responsibility. Killing oneself and transcending into soul. Divinity within.
Amera Ziganii Rao © 2011
.jpg)
