Category Archives: O
The Odyssey
Ulisses i les sirenes, British Museum: Originally uploaded by Sebastià Giralt
The Odyssey is an epic poem traditionally ascribed to the Greek poet Homer. As a sequel to The Illiad, also ascribed to Homer, The Odyssey is an account of the archetypal hero‘s adventure.
The protagonist Odysseus must face terrible perils on his return home from the Trojan wars. Gods and goddesses, especially Athena, frequently provide otherworldly assistance. The Greek pantheon is depicted as residing at Mount Olympus, a godly abode.
On his return, and after numerous near-death adventures with frightening and bewitching creatures such as the Cyclops and the sirens,¹ Odysseus outwits a slothful pack of suitors who had considered him dead while pestering Penelope, his ever-faithful wife.
Odysseus ends up killing them all with the help of his son Telemachus.
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¹ The illustration (right) shows Odysseus strapped to the mast of his ship, as he sails past the dangerous bird-women called the sirens. He’d instructed his crew to bind him tight so that he would not be enticed by the sirens’ irresistible song. For once a sailor gets too close to the sirens, there’s no return and death is assured.
Search Think Free » Hermes, Hesiod
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Oedipus
Oedipus: Originally uploaded by litmuse / GR L
According to several ancient Greek writers, Oedipus (Greek Oidipous: “swollen foot”) is the mythical son of Laius and king of Thebes. In trying to avoid a prophecy that Oedipus would kill his father and marry his mother, he unwittingly did so.
The Austrian psychologist Sigmund Freud named one of his most important ideas after the tragic story of Oedipus–the Oedipus Complex.
The tale of Oedipus exemplifies the Greek belief in hubris, arguably the Hindu idea of bad karma and generally the Jewish and Christian idea of the generational curse.
J.F. del Giorgio, author of The Oldest Europeans (2006), adds that
It is also a dramatic example of the change of institutions in Greece. In matrilineal tribes, the son of the king was not supposed to succeed him, as that would mean to marry his own mother, as it happened with Oedipus. » Source
On the Web:
- “The Oedipus Plays” summarized at http://www.sparknotes.com/drama/oedipus/
Search Think Free » Sita, Theseus
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Oedipus Complex
Oedipus at Colonus by Jean-Antoine-Theodore Giroust 1788 French Oil (5): Photographed by mharrsch / Mary Harrsch
In Greek myth Oedipus was the king of Thebes who, in trying to avoid a prophecy that he would kill his father and marry his mother, actually unwittingly did so.
The celebrated Austrian psychologist Sigmund Freud named one of his most important ideas after the tragic story of Oedipus.
According to Freudian psychoanalytic theory, an Oedipal complex develops after the male infant becomes fixated to his mother during the Oedipal phase of ego development (ages 3-5).
During this time, the infant develops bizarre beliefs which only a child’s mind could produce. He sees or perhaps hears his father and mother lovemaking (called the “primal scene”) and perceives his father as a threat.
His fear intensifies when seeing the father’s penis, which leads the child to irrationally assume that he, himself, has been castrated. The child then demonizes the father and identifies with his apparently ‘all-good’ mother.
He resolves this potent complex by eventually identifying with the father and the external, worldly demands that the father represents to the child.
If his complex goes unresolved, his choice of – and demands from – lovers and marriage partners in subsequent years reflects lingering unconscious infantile, mother-based expectations, which are unrealistic and not grounded in the reality principle.
Freud believed that this was a natural process.
Current trends in psychoanalysis trace the Oedipus complex to earlier conflicts apparently present in the first few years of psychosexual ego development.
While some say that psychoanalysis is a science, others see it as a joke with little or not empirical support to validate its fanciful claims. Although the spirit of Freud’s approach is still present within psychiatry, especially with the almost unquestioned status of the concept of the “unconscious,” the actual content of many of his ideas has fallen by the wayside.
As such, most countries recognize medical psychiatry as a credible discipline (with legal powers and associated responsibilities) while giving less weight to non-medical psychologists and social workers.¹
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¹ In Canada, for instance, psychiatry is covered by national health care whereas non-medical therapies (such as Jungian and other holistic psychological approaches) are not.
Search Think Free » Electra Complex, Melanie Klein, Stages of Psychosexual Development, Totem
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Origen
Origen (185-254) was a Christian scholar and intellectual, thought to be an Egyptian, who tried to synthesize Greek philosophy and Christian belief.
He believed that all souls existed prior to birth, an idea condemned by the Church in the 6th century and repudiated by St. Thomas Aquinas.
Origen may have proposed a type of reincarnation but his surviving texts are too incomplete and fragmentary to be sure.
We do know that he believed in universal salvation–i.e. the idea that all souls are eventually redeemed and admitted to heaven, even the Devil’s.
A fierce ascetic, Origen castrated himself. C. G. Jung says that this self-castration enabled Origen to remain faithful to an extreme type of Gnosticism. But Jung’s claim is debatable because many mystics prize celibacy due to the transformative potential that is allegedly contained in sperm.
If Origen was a mystic in the way that Jung envisioned him, he most likely would not have castrated himself. Celibate Christian, Hindu and Buddhist mystics all seem to agree that there’s a bio-spirit relationship between profound contemplative states and retained semen (i.e. the ‘seed’ of religious scripture that is not to be spilled on the ground or wasted on lustful sex).
Arrested in 250 CE under the persecutions of the Roman Emperor Decius, Origen suffered prolonged and repeated torture before dying two years later from his injuries.
Once deemed an important Church Father, his ideas continue to influence Protestant theologians.
Search Think Free » Anathema, Church Fathers, Excommunication, Universalism
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Object
Freuds ( tipo andy warhol ): Paulo Marquez
In Freudian theory the object is that which a subject directs energy toward in an attempt to gratify instinctual desires.
Just how a person relates to the object varies according to their psychological maturity.
In Freudian discourse the object usually refers to another person, aspects of a person, or a full or partial symbolic representation of a person.
When an object refers to another complete person replete with human rights and dignity, the object is a whole object.
Search Think Free » Cathexis, Fixation, Projection, Repression, Splitting, Stages of Psychosexual Development
References:
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Charles Rycroft, A Critical Dictionary of Psychoanalysis, Harmondsworth: Penguin 1977, p. 100.
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Ontological Argument
Canterbury Cathedral Anselm Chapel_005: Friar's Balsam / Christopher John SSF
The ontological argument is a theological position that apparently proves God’s existence. St. Anselm of Canterbury devised the argument, which was later taken up by the French philosopher, René Descartes.
St. Anselm describes God in his Proslogion II as “aliquid quo nihil majus cogitari possit” (that than which nothing greater can be conceived). And he says that such a being cannot merely exist in the “imagination” or “understanding” but must also exist.¹
For Anselm, the very greatest conceivable being must also exist in reality and not just in the mind. Therefore, so the argument goes, God is the greatest conceivable being which by necessity exists.
St. Thomas Aquinas rejected this argument on purely rational grounds, although he did believe in God.
Descartes presented a similar argument to that of Anselm’s, beginning with a method of doubt. After coming to the conclusion, “Je pense, donc je suis” (I think, therefore I am), his next question, similar to that of solipsism, was: “how do I know that the outside world truly exists?”
He was not the first to look at things this way. Thomas Leahey notes that
St. Augustine [354–430 CE] had said, “If I am deceived, I exist,” and Parmenides [515-445 BCE] had said, “For it is the same thing to think and to be.”¹
Descartes’ answer to the problem of whether or not the outside world really exists (with truth limited to inner experience) involved God. For Descartes, God exists by necessity. God must exist in order to be perfect. A perfect God also by necessity is Good. And a God that is Good would not deceive his creatures into believing in an outside world if no such thing existed.
Descartes, then, reasoned that an infinite being must exist. Moreover, he believed that this idea must have come from beyond himself.²
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¹ See argument at http://mally.stanford.edu/cm/ontological-argument/barnes-translation.html
² See explanation of the argument at http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/philosophers/descartes-god.html
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Obsession
Feeding an obsession: HydrogenPops / Hirni Pathak
In psychoanalytic terms obsession this is a neurosis where one dwells on an issue or another person to an unhealthy and potentially destructive degree.
Obsessive thinking is often accompanied with compulsive behavior—for example, an internet stalker.
Psychologists see obsessive thought and compulsive behavior as flawed mechanisms where a person tries to avoid unconscious feelings of pain, guilt or inadequacy.
A classic literary example of obsession is found in Shakespeare’s character Lady Macbeth, whose repeated hand washing bespeaks a crime and her feelings of guilt and defilement from it.
In Catholic theology, the term obsession refers to a person who is unduly influenced or harassed by evil spiritual powers or beings. By way of contrast, the term possession suggests that a person loses control over the body – but not the soul – as the devil appears to control them.
Psychological and theological perspectives on obsession arguably could be combined to their mutual advantage. For instance, an unresolved psychological complex could be a weak spot for demonic influences to develop or exacerbate physiological conditions and behavioral patterns related to obsessive-compulsive behavior.
Put simply, evil might like to prey on psychological vulnerabilities.
» Mental Illness, Occam’s Razor, Shaman, Shamanism, Spiritual Attack, Tramp Souls, Undoing
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Occam’s razor
Occam's Razor: Thunderchild tm
Occam’s razor is a philosophical belief, forwarded by William of Occam (circa 1288-1348), that an intellectual ‘razor’ should cut away all unnecessary aspects of a given explanation in order to achieve the greatest degree of parsimony.
This belief – and that’s what it is – in the virtue of parsimony has since become a mainstay of contemporary scientific method. Not a few thinkers see this as contributing to reductionism, particularly in the fields of clinical and experimental psychology as well as in sociology and history.
By way of illustation, ancient and medieval cultures often regarded demons (i.e. evil spiritual beings) as a developmental factor in both physical and mental illness. But some aspects of 21st-century science tend to summarily dismiss this idea and a wide variety of other paranormal claims and hypotheses as “magical thinking,” which arguably isn’t a scientific approach but a biased and limiting one.
While some people may engage in fantastical, magical thinking that appears to have no bearing on reality, that doesn’t mean we should uncritically discard all paranormal and parapsychological truth claims. Moreover, it would be hasty to reject the idea that spirituality is not a contributing factor to flawed magical thinking. Flawed magical thinking could be partly caused by evil spirituality–that is, spirituality that is not from a Godly source.
Not surprisingly, holistic theorists tend to question the value of Occam’s razor. The potential shortcomings of Occam’s razor are aptly illustrated in the science fiction film Contact (1997), based on a novel by Carl Sagan. Actor Jodie Foster plays a scientist, Ellie Arroway, who travels through a wormhole to meet an intelligent being at the far edge of the universe. She returns to Earth in a matter of seconds and no one believes her claim to have undergone an incredible journey. As a scientist, Arroway admits that she could have been hallucinating due to stress. But as a human being, her heart says her experience was real.
» Karma Transfer, Nominalism, Obsession, Shaman, Shamanism, Spiritual Attack
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Obi Wan Kenobi
Winning the Obi-Wan Bust: Official Star Wars Blog
In the Star Wars Original Trilogy (1977-83), Obi Wan Kenobi is an honorable Jedi knight (played by actor Alec Guiness) and spiritual teacher of the young hero, Luke Skywalker.
Obi Wan is the only character to appear within all six Star Wars films. He’s played by actor Ewan McGregor in the Prequel Trilogy (1999-2005).
While many say the Prequel Trilogy isn’t in quite the same class as the Original Trilogy, it does reveal the early development of Obi Wan’s benevolent character.
In Jungian thought, the Alec Guiness version of Obi Wan portrays the archetype of the wise old man. Although one could say that Obi Wan’s miraculous ability to manipulate “The Force” for good purposes would also qualify him for the archetype of the Sacred Warrior.
The popular mythologer Joseph Campbell argued in the PBS TV series The Power of Myth (1988) that the original Star Wars films are a modern myth. And Campbell said this well before pop culture regarded science fiction as a type of myth.
The fact that audiences see Star Wars as a mythic tale, par exellence, isn’t surprising. George Lucas, the creator of Star Wars, says that Campbell’s work influenced the original trilogy’s mythic patterns, helping them to resonate within the hearts and minds of moviegoers worldwide. » Bhagavad-Gita, Yoda
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Odin
Odin The supreme Norse God who anticipates the German Wotan. As head of the Nordic pantheon called the Aesir, Odin has many faces. He is the giver of laws, the mystic author of poetry, a fierce war god and the protector of heroes. He is also a shaman, magician and shapeshifter. Like the Greek Zeus, Odin is an unfaithful husband. His wife Frigga tolerates his numerous affairs with goddesses and human women. Odin is popularized in the Tarot deck as the god who hangs himself from the World Tree (Ydgrassil) for nine days and nights to gain for humanity the esoteric wisdom of the runes-i.e. the secret of immortality. Ambient music artist Giles Reaves released a track called “Odin (The Unknowable)” on his 1986 album Wunjo. » Balder, Fenris, Freya, Hero, Thor
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