From: mrcaws
Message: 16632
Date: 2002-11-08
--- In cybalist@..., "tgpedersen" <tgpedersen@...> wrote:
Interesting. I think the constellation taurus was connected to the
bull horn altars found from catal huyuk on down somehow, but I'm not
sure about a meteor shower as an explanation of its religious
significance.
I think the focus on bull's horns was connected to the role that bull
sacrifice played in religious riutal, as was the labrys that
sometimes accompanied them.
Although the ideology that accompanied the bull sacrifice was
probably complex, I am attracted to an underlying psychonalytical
theme: The sacrifice of the bull represented emasculation of a male
sex symbol, which in turn is resurrected in phallic form(Pillar,
Lingam etc.). An example of this would be the story of Shiva(with
bull associations) having his phallus severed, only to have it re-
ermerge as the lingam. Another would be the dismemberment of Osiris
and the particular difficulty locating his genitals, which were
hidden in a pillar. Other comparable myths include Attis and Cybele,
Dionysus, Telepinu etc. The removed horns could be interpreted as
representative of the genitals/generative power the bull represented.
Of course, in many of the examples of comparable myths above, the
psychanalytical meaning(if a valid interpretation) is included in and
transformed by a larger cultural and religious ideology, and are not
the end-all and be-all of the symbols involved.
Cort Williams
>
> Perhaps not quite on topic, but it's been discussed before in
> connection with mythology, so:
>
> In 1951 in Århus a man walking his dog heard a commotion in the
sky;
> he looked up and saw a firey corkscrew trail. And bam! a 2 kilogram
> meteorite slammed into the sidewalk behind him. An artist present
on
> the scene drew the trail. It looked like a firey snake. Apparently
> some small meteorites corkscrew as they fall.
>
> Some meteors are comet debris in orbit around the sun. They might
hit
> the earth as earth crosses that orbit. One set of meteors are known
> as Beta Taurid since they appear to be coming out of Beta Taurus,
the
> top horn of the constellation Taurus. Is that the reason for the
> preoccupation with bull's horns etc?
>
> Torsten