‘Special screening of Hidden Treasures’

     

Tickets went on sale yesterday to a special screening of the film Hidden Treasures at the Archive for Research in Archetypal Symbolism.

You’re all members of ARAS, yes?

From the publicity:

Hidden Treasures screening

Archive for Research

in Archetypal Symbolism

Friday, September 27 at 7:30 p.m.

28 East 39th Street, Manhattan

Tickets here

Join us at ARAS for a very special screening of Hidden Treasures: Stories from a Great Museum.

The film will be followed by a question-and-answer session with the director of the film, Alexandra Isles with some of the film’s participants, and a wine and cheese reception.

This is all in support of a great cause! All proceeds will benefit Pioneer Teens, a program for high school students that focuses on deepening the relationship to art and image.

This program is dedicated to the memory of Jungian analyst, Armin Wanner (1938-2011), Diplomate of the C.G. Jung Institute, Zurich and long-time faculty member of the New York Jung Institute and the Jung Foundation.

The art and symbols that capture our attention and draw us in are what psychologist C.G. Jung might call the mysterium fascinosum (seductive mystery). We each have our favorite images, whether it is St. George slaying a dragon, Mickey Mouse brandishing a top hat, or a winged Nike. These images each call out to us differently and illuminate our lives with their archetypal energy. You are invited to support the educational outreach of ARAS (Archive for Research in Archetypal Symbolism) a unique archive of more than 18,000 images and archetypal commentaries spanning human eras and cultures.

Film synopsis:

Every year, millions of people visit the Metropolitan Museum, but how many are able to find the secrets and powers hidden in the works of art? Museum staff, who spend their days, and sometimes their nights, restoring, guarding, moving, cleaning, and teaching about the art, reveal some of the magic they have discovered. Their stories include a wish-granting statue, a sword with a secret compartment, a time-traveling melody, a portrait that has become a trusted mentor, a famous landscape with an unexpected population, and rooms and objects that brought joy to a dying woman.

Alexandra Moltke Isles grew up in New York where her father was a permanent member of the Danish Mission to the United Nations, and her mother was an editor at Vogue magazine. As a child she hated school but always had her nose in a book. Growing up as a U.N. brat honed her sensitivity to injustice and a theme running through all her work is social justice and dignity for the outsider. Her historical documentaries are as notable for the memorable personalities interviewed as they are for the richness of the archival material. Isles’ passion for research was developed during her years as a Researcher and then Assistant Curator at New York’s Museum of Radio & Television, now the Paley Center of Media. Her previous films are The Power of Conscience: The Danish Resistance and Rescue of the Jews (1995); Scandalize My Name (1999) about the black listing of African-American performers during the Red Scare; Porraimos: Europe’s Gypsies in the Holocaust (2002); The Healing Gardens of New York (2007); and Hidden Treasures: Stories from a Great Museum (2011). Isles also has been an interviewer for Stephen Spielberg’s Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Project and an ESL tutor at the Bellevue/NYU Program for Survivors of Torture. Since the making of this film her passion has led her to become a docent at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
     

‘Hermes, Gurdjieff, Superstitions, Tarot and Rosicrucians’

     
Four great events in New York City, and one in California, you may want to attend.

The Mythic Moment

The New York Mythology Group, the New York City Roundtable of the Joseph Campbell Foundation, will meet Sunday at the Metropolitan Museum of Art from 11 a.m. to noon for “The Mythic Moment.” From the publicity:

Mythic Moments: Storytelling in Greek and Roman Art Gallery Talk—A story told in words can extend through many points in time, but an illustration needs to capture only one. The talk is free with museum admission. Assemble at the Great Hall at 10 o’clock before heading to the venue at the Velez Blanco Patio.

While this event is not exclusive to the Mythology Group, it is definitely a relevant topic. The Velez Blanco Patio (Gallery 534) holds very interesting artifacts, one of which is the inspiration for the two-tailed mermaid that we now attribute as the symbol for Starbucks. Jean Sorabella, an expert in Greco Roman art will take us through the myths that inspired the artworks that are now on exhibit at the Met.

Origins: Superstitions

Mitch Horowitz, author of Occult America and One Simple Idea, has launched a new project titled “Origins: Superstitions.” This web series of 90-second episodes defines and decodes the, well, origins of superstitions. Directed by Ronni Thomas (The Midnight Archive), the series can be heard here.

Meaning in the Midst of Life

The Gurdjieff Foundation of New York will offer another introductory event on Friday, March 13. Titled “The Search for Meaning in the Midst of Life,” this program will begin at 6 p.m. at Quest Bookshop at 240 East 53rd Street in Manhattan.

Click to enlarge.

“Only by beginning to remember himself does a man really awaken. And then all surrounding life acquires for him a different aspect and a different meaning.”

G. I. Gurdjieff

For reservations (recommended) or further information, e-mail gurdjieffevent(at)gmail.com

Tarot at the Met

Queen of Flowers playing card, 1435.

Also at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, on April 22, tarot scholar Robert Place again will lead a small group of seekers into the hidden archives to examine the Met’s collection of historic tarot and divination cards, ranging from the earliest woodcut Tarocchi, printed in 15th century Italy, to rare 19th century Le Normand divination decks. All accompanied by Place’s talk on the history and symbolism of the cards. The group also will see The Queen of Flowers, created in 1435, making it one of the oldest European playing cards still in existence, and Le Sorti, one of the oldest and richly illustrated books on divination with cards, published in Venice in 1540.

The afternoon at the Met costs $70 per person, prepaid. Each participant also is responsible for obtaining a ticket for entrance to the museum for the day. There is only room for 14 people at this event and 9 have already signed up so don’t delay; it will fill up quickly. To register contact Place at: alchemicaltarot@aol.com

AMORC World Convention 2015

Join Imperator Christian Bernard and all of the Grand Masters from throughout the world for the 2015 AMORC World Convention, commemorating the founding of AMORC in America. The convention will be hosted at the Fairmont San Jose, July 29 to August 2. Click here for the details.
     

‘An honest man is always in trouble’

   

The Death of Socrates by Jacques Louis David, oil on canvas, 1787.
On exhibit at the Met, located only three blocks from our meeting.

“When I leave this court I shall go away condemned by you to death, but [my accusers] will go away convicted by Truth herself of depravity and wickedness. And they accept their sentence even as I accept mine.”
  
Socrates


It is not intentional, but I really have been remiss in updating The Magpie with news of recent events—Masonic, Rosicrucian, and other experiences of recent months. This one took place at the School of Practical Philosophy on East 79th Street the Sunday before last. “The Trial of Socrates” was the day-long program, involving readings from Plato’s Apology, lots of group discussion, and watching a brief couple of scenes of a relevant film. Plus a surprisingly great Greek vegetarian lunch midway, and a wine reception afterward. The best Sunday I’ve had in some time.

So what is Plato’s Apology? First, an understanding of the word. Here it does not signify any expression of remorse. “Apology” derives from the ancient Greek word “apologia,” meaning a formal rebuttal tendered by a defendant in court.

My own copy of the text comes from one of those Walter J. Black Classics Club books from 1941. (I haunt used book sales in the hope of assembling a complete 44-volume set.) Apology actually is a chapter in the book Five Great Dialogues by Plato, as translated by Professor Benjamin Jowett, a luminary at Oxford University in the nineteenth century. Here is the Introduction, penned by Professor Louise Ropes Loomis:

It is the year 399 B.C. Four years ago Athens drove out the bloody terror of the Thirty, which the Spartans had set up to govern her after their victory in the Peloponnesian War. She has restored her democratic constitution, but hardly yet begun to recover from the shock of her terrible defeat and humiliation. Her citizens are embittered, suspicious, eager to blame anyone and everyone for the mistakes and failures of the past. In this year Socrates, now seventy years of age, is accused by three men, Meletus, Anytus, and Lycon, of the formidable crimes of corrupting the youth of the city and professing to disbelieve in the ancestral gods. Of the accusers themselves we know almost nothing. Meletus and Lycon, we hear, resent especially Socrates’ attitude toward the current fashions in poetry and other literature. Anytus is angered by Socrates’ outspoken criticism of the narrow commercial training he is giving his only son. But the charge they bring is such as to stir up superstitious fears of sacrilege and moral uneasiness in the popular mind. Several of Socrates’ old pupils have indeed been involved in the disgraceful events of recent years. His case comes before a citizen court of five hundred and one jurors, a majority vote being sufficient to convict.

The Apology is Plato’s version of his master’s speech in his own defense, written down possibly within two or three years after its delivery. That Plato was present and heard it we know from Socrates; allusions to him [are within the text]. How nearly he has reproduced Socrates’ very words we cannot, of course, judge. As it comes to us, the Apology is actually three speeches. In the first, Socrates, fearlessly and with much play of ironical humor, refutes not only the formal charges contained in the plaintiffs’ immediate indictment, but also the slanderous stories circulated about him by his enemies in years past. He explains and justifies his way of life and religious beliefs, and in a sharp bit of cross-examination exposes the insincerity of the quickly befuddled Meletus. At the close, the court votes him guilty by the comparatively small majority of sixty. The penalty for his offense has next to be determined, since it comes under no existing law. The accusers demand a verdict of death. By rule of court, however, the culprit may propose a counter penalty, the jurors then to choose between the two. In a short second speech, Socrates, less conciliatory and more hotly defiant than before, proposes that instead of punishment he receive the reward of a distinguished citizen, honorable maintenance at the public expense. If he must pay something, he may with his friends help scrape together enough for a moderate fine. The court, annoyed, we may suppose, by what seems his obstinate frivolity, votes to approve the death sentence. In his final words, Socrates, now calm again, accepts the decision and bids his judges and fellow-citizens farewell.

I cannot reproduce here the entire text, which runs about twenty-seven pages in the book, but I’ll share some of the passages that got our attention during the group discussions. If you ever have caught hell for telling the truth—I mean really paid a price—then this is a must read, but everyone should be familiar with this Socratic Dialogue. We didn’t begin at the beginning, but we did start early on. Here Socrates explains to the court how he came to be renowned as the wisest of men:

And here, O men of Athens, I must beg you not to interrupt me, even if I seem to say something extravagant. For the word which I will speak is not mine. I will refer you to a witness who is worthy of credit, and will tell you about my wisdom—whether I have any, and of what sort—and that witness shall be the god of Delphi. You must have known Chaerephon; he was early a friend of mine, and also a friend of yours, for he shared in the exile of the people, and returned with you. Well, Chaerephon, as you know, was very impetuous in all his doings, and he went to Delphi and boldly asked the oracle to tell him whether—as I was saying, I must beg you not to interrupt—he asked the oracle to tell him whether there was anyone wiser than I was, and the Pythian prophetess answered that there was no man wiser. Chaerephon is dead himself, but his brother, who is in court, will confirm the truth of this story.

Why do I mention this? Because I am going to explain to you why I have such an evil name. When I heard the answer, I said to myself, What can the god mean? And what is the interpretation of this riddle? For I know that I have no wisdom, small or great. What can he mean when he says that I am the wisest of men? And yet he is a god and cannot lie; that would be against his nature. After a long consideration, I at last thought of a method of trying the question. I reflected that if I could only find a man wiser than myself, then I might go to the god with a refutation in my hand. I should say to him, “Here is a man who is wiser than I am; but you said that I was the wisest.” Accordingly I went to one who had the reputation of wisdom, and observed to him—his name I need not mention; he was a politician whom I selected for examination—and the result was as follows: When I began to talk with him, I could not help thinking that he was not really wise, although he was thought wise by many, and wiser still by himself; and I went and tried to explain to him that he thought himself wise, but was not really wise; and the consequence was that he hated me, and his enmity was shared by several who were present and heard me. So I left him, saying to myself, as I went away: Well, although I do not suppose that either of us knows anything really beautiful and good, I am better off than he is—for he knows nothing, and thinks that he knows. I neither know nor think that I know. In this latter particular, then, I seem to have slightly the advantage of him. Then I went to another, who had still higher philosophical pretensions, and my conclusion was exactly the same. I made another enemy of him, and of many others besides him.

After this I went to one man after another, being not unconscious of the enmity which I provoked, and I lamented and feared this: but necessity was laid upon me—the word of God, I thought, ought to be considered first. And I said to myself, Go I must to all who appear to know, and find out the meaning of the oracle. And I swear to you, Athenians, by the dog I swear!—for I must tell you the truth—the result of my mission was just this: I found that the men most in repute were all but the most foolish; and that some inferior men were really wiser and better.

So, it’s a good way to make enemies. Assess the big shots you see in life, and usually see them rightly as empty suits. After spending some time conferring with politicians, poets, and artisans to gauge their knowledge, assuming each to be far more knowing than himself, he found them to be lacking in “high matters.”

This investigation has led to my having many enemies of the worst and most dangerous kind, and has given occasion also to many calumnies, and I am called wise, for my hearers always imagine that I myself possess the wisdom which I find wanting in others: but the truth is, O men of Athens, that God only is wise; and in this oracle he means to say that the wisdom of men is little or nothing; he is not speaking of Socrates, he is only using my name as an illustration, as if he said, He, O men, is the wisest, who, like Socrates, knows that his wisdom is in truth worth nothing. And so I go my way, obedient to the god, and make inquisition into the wisdom of anyone, whether citizen or stranger, who appears to be wise; and if he is not wise, then in vindication of the oracle I show him that he is not wise; and this occupation quite absorbs me, and I have no time to give either to any public matter of interest or to any concern of my own, but I am in utter poverty by reason of my devotion to the god.

Addressing the nature of the punishment that awaits him, Socrates invokes a stoicism that would be familiar to Master Masons:

Someone will say: And are you not ashamed, Socrates, of a course of life which is likely to bring you to an untimely end? To him I may fairly answer: There you are mistaken: a man who is good for anything ought not to calculate the chance of living or dying; he ought only to consider whether in doing anything he is doing right or wrong—acting the part of a good man or of a bad. Whereas, according to your view, the heroes who fell at Troy were not good for much, and the son of Thetis above all, who altogether despised danger in comparison with disgrace; and when his goddess mother said to him, in his eagerness to slay Hector, that if he avenged his companion Patroclus, and slew Hector, he would die himself—“Fate,” as she said, “waits upon you next after Hector.” He, hearing this, utterly despised danger and death, and instead of fearing them, feared rather to live in dishonor, and not to avenge his friend. “Let me die next,” he replies, “and be avenged of my enemy, rather than abide here by the beaked ships, a scorn and a burden of the earth.” Had Achilles any thought of death and danger? For wherever a man’s place is, whether the place which he has chosen or that in which he has been placed by a commander, there he ought to remain in the hour of danger; he should not think of death or of anything, but of disgrace. And this, O men of Athens, is a true saying.

In the end, Socrates is left to face his death sentence, and to ponder the nature of the afterlife. Twenty-four centuries after, we still study Socrates, but his persecutors are unknown, long forgotten, except as their names appear in this ancient literature.

Let us reflect in another way, and we shall see that there is great reason to hope that death is a good, for one of two things: Either death is a state of nothingness and utter unconsciousness, or, as men say, there is a change and migration of the soul from this world to another. Now if you suppose that there is no consciousness, but a sleep like the sleep of him who is undisturbed even by the sight of dreams, death will be an unspeakable gain. For if a person were to select the night in which his sleep was undisturbed even by dreams, and were to compare with this the other days and nights of his life, and then were to tell us how many days and nights he had passed in the course of his life better and more pleasantly than this one, I think that any man, I will not say a private man, but even the great king, will not find many such days or nights, when compared with the others. Now if death is like this, I say that to die is gain; for eternity is then only a single night. But if death is the journey to another place, and there, as men say, all the dead are, what good, O my friends and judges, can be greater than this? If indeed when the pilgrim arrives in the world below, he is delivered from the professors of justice in this world, and finds the true judges who are said to give judgment there, Minos and Rhadamanthus and Aeacus and Triptolemus, and other sons of God who were righteous in their own life, that pilgrimage will be worth making. What would not a man give if he might converse with Orpheus and Musaeus and Hesiod and Homer? Nay, if this be true, let me die again and again. I, too, shall have a wonderful interest in a place where I can converse with Palamedes, and Ajax the son of Telamon, and other heroes of old, who have suffered death through an unjust judgment; and there will be no small pleasure, as I think, in comparing my own sufferings with theirs. Above all, I shall be able to continue my search into true and false knowledge; as in this world, so also in that; I shall find out who is wise, and who pretends to be wise, and is not. What would not a man give, O judges, to be able to examine the leader of the great Trojan expedition; or Odysseus or Sisyphus, or numberless others, men and women too! What infinite delight would there be in conversing with them and asking them questions! For in that world they do not put a man to death for this; certainly not. For besides being happier in that world than in this, they will be immortal, if what is said is true.

Wherefore, O judges, be of good cheer about death, and know this of a truth: that no evil can happen to a good man, either in life or after death. He and his are not neglected by the gods; nor has my own approaching end happened by mere chance. But I see clearly that to die and be released was better for me; and therefore the oracle gave no sign. For which reason also, I am not angry with my accusers, or my condemners; they have done me no harm, although neither of them meant to do me any good; and for this I may gently blame them.

Still I have a favor to ask of them. When my sons are grown up, I would ask you, O my friends, to punish them; and I would have you trouble them, as I have troubled you, if they seem to care about riches, or anything, more than about virtue; or if they pretend to be something when they are really nothing, then reprove them, as I have reproved you, for not caring about that for which they ought to care, and thinking that they are something when they are really nothing. And if you do this, I and my sons will have received justice at your hands.

The hour of departure has arrived, and we go our ways—I to die, and you to live. Which is better God only knows.

The title of this edition of The Magpie Mind comes not from Plato or Socrates, but from Henry Fool. Google it, and go to your favorite source of movie downloads.
     

‘A Midsummer’s Night Mythology’

     
New York Mythology Group, the New York City Chapter of the Joseph Campbell Foundation, will take it outside for a night under the stars in Central Park on Wednesday. From the publicity:

A Midsummer’s Night Mythology:

Stories Under the Stars

With Antoine Faddoul

Wednesday, July 16 at 7 p.m.

Antoine will present stories of the constellations as viewed by different civilizations’ myths, with expressions through artworks, and artifacts. Join us for an enchanting evening. Bring refreshments, if you like.

Meet at Cleopatra’s Needle behind the Metropolitan Museum of Art at 79th Street.

Antoine Faddoul is a polymath designer, artist, storyteller, and futurist with a multidisciplinary approach combining elements of astronomy, general science, archaeology, history, art, ancient mythology, and linguistics. He has lectured, written, and edited dozens of books, papers, and articles.
     

‘Words and wishes of the gods’

     
Morbid Anatomy will continue its Death and the Occult in the Ancient World lecture series next month with another illustrated presentation. This one will be in Manhattan, rather than Observatory’s Brooklyn location. From the publicity:

Possession and Prophets

Illustrated Lecture

with Ava Forte Vitali

of the Metropolitan Museum of Art

Thursday, June 12 at 8 p.m.

Morbid Anatomy Museum

424A Third Avenue (at Seventh Street)

$8 per person—click here

The new year festival of Opet.

On the ancient Mediterranean, the words and wishes of the gods were handed down through a number of different conduits – some human and some not. What were the vehicles for prophecy and how were they interpreted in ancient Egyptian society? From omens to offerings to the ancient equivalent of ‘phone a friend,’ the manner in which the living communicated with their deities varied, across economic levels and with the development of time. We often see instances of both godly and demonic possession, and will discuss the different vehicles through which the gods could speak, including statues, smells, wind, light, and humans and animals, briefly expanding our dialogue to include neighboring Greece and Rome.

Ava Forte Vitali

Ava Forte Vitali completed her Master’s Degree in Art History and Archaeology, with a specialization in the Egyptian and Classical World, at the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University. Her research interests include the interaction of the physical and spirit world in Ancient Egypt, archaeology of the household, and Ancient Egyptian domestic and ancestor cults, on which her Master’s focused. She has excavated at sites in Egypt and Turkey, and is a Collections Manager for Greek and Roman Art at the Metropolitan Museum. She is currently writing a contribution on the Arts and Archaeology of Ancient Egypt, for an upcoming textbook on the introduction to Art History.

Death and the Occult

in the Ancient World Series

Death and the Occult in the Ancient World is a new series of monthly lectures, workshops, and tours that aim to examine the way people along the ancient Mediterranean interacted with the unseen forces in the world. While many basic ancient myths and mortuary traditions are known to most people with a casual interest, often this barely scrapes the top of a rich wealth of information and long history of interesting, engaging, and surprisingly weird traditions and beliefs. Through illustrated lectures, guided tours, and occasional workshops, we will strive to understand the different approaches that the ancient Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans had to explain the world around them and challenge popular misconceptions held by the public today.

Through this series we hope to bridge the gap that often exists between academic disciplines and the public audience, bringing the two together in an approachable forum. Led by a trained archaeologist and art historian Ava Forte Vitali of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, this series will expand on topics including religion, art, archaeology, and texts, to further our understanding of both our world and theirs.
     

‘The Fine Arts Inspiration of Rosicrucianism’

     

Transfiguration, by Raphael, oil on wood, 1516-20.

It’s back to Centerpoint next Wednesday night for David Lowe’s long-awaited lecture on how art can communicate the inestimable meaning of deity via the finite artistic expressions of man. From the publicity:

The Last Supper, by Leonardo da Vinci, fresco, 1494-8.

The Face of Christ: The 1400s from Giotto On

Presented by David Lowe

Wednesday, April 30 at 7 p.m.

Anthroposophical Society

138 West 15th Street

Manhattan

How to paint the face of a god become human? Through the 1400s, Europe’s painters sought answers, with dramatic changes during the Renaissance from Giotto onwards, in particular the depiction of Christ Jesus in Leonardo’s The Last Supper, Michelangelo’s The Last Judgment, and Raphael’s Transfiguration. Their solutions lead us deep into the origins of Rosicrucianism, and to what these artists laid down for the future evolution of humanity and the Earth.

The Last Judgment, by Michelangelo, fresco, 1536-41.

David Lowe of Yorkshire, England, studied at Oxford, and at Emerson College. In his thirties, he followed Goethe’s Italian journey with painter Simon Sharp, from which they wrote Goethe and Palladio. He organizes study groups and workshops at Steiner House in London.

On Saturday, May 3, he will lead a gallery walk at the Met, beginning at 2:30 p.m. We’ll meet at the information desk, and enjoy discussion and tea after. A donation for David is requested.
     

‘Rites of death, afterlife and beer in ancient Egypt’

     
Two more great events coming to Observatory on two Thursdays next month that I can’t resist. On March 13 and March 27, Ms. Ava Forte Vitali, of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, will present illustrated lectures discussing the ancient Egyptians’ myths and rituals built around death, the afterlife—and beer. These are part of Morbid Anatomy’s Death and the Occult in the Ancient World Series.

From the publicity:

The Ancient Egyptian End of the World

and the Mythology of Beer

Illustrated lecture with Ava Forte Vitali

with free beer provided

by sponsor Brooklyn Brewery

Thursday, March 13 at 8 p.m.

Admission: $12

Observatory

543 Union Street

Brooklyn

Join us for a pre-St. Patrick’s Day celebration of one of the world’s oldest and most beloved drinks—beer! Ava Forte Vitali, from our Death and the Occult in the Ancient World Series, will give us a quick glimpse into a few of the gods, goddesses, myths, and ancient festivals associated with the drink, paying close attention to the “Ancient Egyptian Legend of the End of the World,” celebrated March 12.

Then stay and mingle with other like-minded enthusiasts and enjoy a few bottles on us, provided by our sponsor Brooklyn Brewery!

The ‘After’ Life: Death in Ancient Egypt

Illustrated lecture with Ava Forte Vitali

Thursday, March 27
at 8 p.m.

(Rescheduled from February 13)

Admission: $8

Observatory

543 Union Street

Brooklyn

When one considers “Death and the Occult in the Ancient World,” often the first culture that comes to mind is that of the ancient Egyptians. Known for their elaborate tombs, complicated religious texts, and captivating mummies, the ancient Egyptians’ fascination with death has captivated public interest for centuries. This lecture in our monthly series will introduce the mortuary beliefs, traditions, and archaeology of the ancient Egyptians, and will examine whether they were as morbidly focused as they traditionally have been portrayed.

Ava Forte Vitali completed her Master’s Degree in Art History and Archaeology, with a specialization in the Egyptian and Classical World, at the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University. Her research interests include the interaction of the physical and spirit worlds in ancient Egypt, archaeology of the household, and ancient Egyptian domestic and ancestor cults, on which her Master’s focused. She has excavated at sites in Egypt and Turkey, and is a Collections Manager for Greek and Roman Art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. She is currently writing a contribution on the arts and archaeology of ancient Egypt for an upcoming introduction to art history textbook.

Death and the Occult

in the Ancient World Series

This is a new series of monthly lectures, workshops, and tours that aim to examine the way people along the ancient Mediterranean interacted with the unseen forces in the world. Many basic ancient myths and mortuary traditions are known, but often this barely scrapes the top of a rich wealth of information and long history of interesting, engaging, and surprisingly weird traditions and beliefs. Through illustrated lectures, guided tours, and occasional workshops, we will strive to understand the different approaches that the ancient Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans employed to explain the world around them, and to challenge popular misconceptions held by the public today.

Through this series we hope to bridge the gap that often exists between academic disciplines and the public audience, bringing the two together in an approachable forum. Led by Vitali, this series will expand on topics including religion, art, archaeology, and texts, to further our understanding of both our world and theirs.
     

‘Cyrus Cylinder at the Met’

  
As reported a number of months ago in The Journal of The Masonic Society, The Metropolitan Museum of Art will exhibit the ancient “Cyrus Cylinder,” on loan from The British Museum for a tour of the United States with other artifacts of ancient Persia, beginning tomorrow.

From June 20 through August 4, The Met will show The Cyrus Cylinder and Ancient Persia: Charting a New Empire. New York City is the third stop on the tour; the artifacts will go to San Francisco in August and Los Angeles in October before being brought back to Britain.

Courtesy The British Museum

The Cyrus Cylinder, the clay cuneiform artifact excavated in Iraq in 1879, dates to the reign of King Cyrus the Great in the Sixth Century BCE. The text includes the royal decree that allowed deported peoples to return to their homelands.

The Cyrus Cylinder often is called “the first charter of human rights,” to lend it a meaning that we in 2013 can appreciate comfortably. (It’s similar to how the First Charge of Anderson’s Constitutions of 1723, which calls on Freemasons “to obey the moral Law” and to keep their religious opinions to themselves, is believed by many Masons today to represent the dawn of an ecumenical—or even multicultural—Freemasonry, when its reality was the far more practical goal of facilitating friendships among brethren of the various Christian denominations in 1720s London.) Scholars of the ancient Near East today recognize that rulers in that time and place began their reigns with proclamations and edicts to set a tone, and Cyrus continued a governing tradition we now know was more than a thousand years old.

And this is where Freemasonry ought to show its interest. Cyrus and his edict figure dramatically in the High Degrees of the Scottish and York rites of Freemasonry, and elsewhere, such as the Irish degrees of Knight Masonry. Different Masonic ritual tellings of the building of the Second Temple in Jerusalem, loosely based on verses of the Hebrew Bible, explain how Zerubbabel was permitted to lead his people out of the Babylonian Captivity to return to Jerusalem to rebuild the Temple and continue life in freedom, as decreed by Cyrus. Again, reality showers some cold water on Masonry’s romantic tales; Jews were not mentioned with any specificity by King Cyrus, who actually had established a general religious freedom to benefit a number of peoples who had lived in captivity in the empire.

Regardless, you Scottish Rite and York Rite Masons should charter some buses and visit The Met this summer. The Cylinder and the other pieces in this exhibit lack the fantastic resplendence of, say, the Tutankhamun dig (also exhibited by The Met, 35 years ago), but what will open tomorrow unquestionably possesses the greater spiritual and philosophical heft.

Additional programming is scheduled for June 20, June 25, June 28, and July 11.
    

‘Cole mining’

    
Way back a long time ago, when I was a junior in high school, my teacher of U.S. history sadistically assigned his class, as requisite to passing the course, what seemed like impossibly obscure topics for research papers. Obscurity is in the eye of the beholder, of course, and to a 16-year-old underachiever, the prospect of delving into the life and work of one Thomas Cole, father of the Hudson River School in the fine arts, was akin to being sentenced to a gulag to mine coal, barehanded. This was far before the internet, Google, and the rest; it was merely the dawn of the PC age itself. Research meant legwork at the library, and my subject Thomas Cole required travel to the public libraries of neighboring towns which, to me, was as unheard of as Cole himself. It was a good thing my friend Tim had access to a car – would have been even better if one of us had a driver’s license – so to foreign libraries we went to achieve our respective advancements in knowledge.

If you had tried to tell me then that decades later I would happily drive 250 miles to enjoy lectures on topics ranging from our Mr. Cole to the KKK, I would have smacked you, but there I was at the Scottish Rite’s National Heritage Museum in Lexington, Massachusetts last April being impressed by David Bjelajac’s talk, augmented by PowerPoint graphics of Cole’s work.

It’s funny what happens when you get a little culture in you.

Turns out Thomas Cole was a Freemason who made symbols familiar to the initiated eye key components in some of his work. Professor Bjelajac will appear at Cedar Grove, the Thomas Cole National Historic Site, on Sunday, March 6 to present his lecture Thomas Cole, Freemasonry and the American Hercules.

Cedar Grove

Thomas Cole National Historic Site

218 Spring Street

Catskill, New York

The lecture will begin at 2 p.m., and tickets, at $8 each, will be available on a first come, first served basis.

From the Cedar Grove website:

Thomas Cole, Freemasonry and the American Hercules

Thomas Cole became a Freemason in Zanesville, Ohio, during the summer of 1822, and soon composed sublime mountainous views that drew upon Masonry’s mysterious emblems. First publicized in New York newspapers by William Dunlap, a brother Mason, Cole’s paintings captured the patronage of the Empire State’s Masonic elite. David Bjelajac, Professor of Art and Human Sciences at George Washington University, reinterprets Cole’s The Titan’s Goblet (1833), which honored New York Governor De Witt Clinton, Erie Canal builder, art academician and leading Freemason. This small, enigmatic painting draws upon Masonic ritual and Herculean myth, and looks forward to Cole’s famed Course of Empire and Voyage of Life series.



The Titan's Goblet is on exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.



Thomas Cole's The Voyage of Life series
is on view at the National Gallery of Art.
This is Childhood.



The Voyage of Life: Youth.



The Voyage of Life: Manhood.



The Voyage of Life: Old Age.

Please pardon these low resolution images. Reproductions of these oil-on-canvas works are available in various media if you shop around.

From the National Gallery’s website:

Cole’s renowned four-part series traces the journey of an archetypal hero along the “River of Life.” Confidently assuming control of his destiny and oblivious to the dangers that await him, the voyager boldly strives to reach an aerial castle, emblematic of the daydreams of “Youth” and its aspirations for glory and fame. As the traveler approaches his goal, the ever-more-turbulent stream deviates from its course and relentlessly carries him toward the next picture in the series, where nature’s fury, evil demons, and self-doubt will threaten his very existence. Only prayer, Cole suggests, can save the voyager from a dark and tragic fate.

From the innocence of childhood, to the flush of youthful overconfidence, through the trials and tribulations of middle age, to the hero’s triumphant salvation, The Voyage of Life seems intrinsically linked to the Christian doctrine of death and resurrection. Cole’s intrepid voyager also may be read as a personification of America, itself at an adolescent stage of development. The artist may have been issuing a dire warning to those caught up in the feverish quest for Manifest Destiny: that unbridled westward expansion and industrialization would have tragic consequences for both man and nature.

The name Bjelajac is uncommon, so if it rings a bell for you, it may be because the professor is related to Bro. Michael Bjelajac, Past Master of Gate City Lodge No. 2 in Atlanta.