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Solar Beasts

June 17, 2007 at 2:23 pm by mahud

leontocephaline: Of Time and Eternity

Also associated with the Mithraic cult was the statue of a lion-headed figure (leontocephaline), whose body was entwined by a spiraling serpent.

This statue, I believe, represents both the lunar-temporal reality, corresponding with the revolving (serpentine) planetary path leading to cosmic release, and the solar-eternal reality, corresponding with the eighth gate mentioned by Celcus, as the indestructible lion’s head. The serpent also corresponds with the image of the Ouroboros that encircles the world, that in Greek mythology was Oceanus, who himself appears frequently in Mithraic iconography.
The dual manifestation of the divine

The lion’s head represents the fearsome indestructible and devouring aspect of divinity, and is also symbolic of the sun. In his hands he holds two keys, and between them fixed to his chest is an emblem of the indestructible thunderbolt, the all-destroying weapon of the guardian of the Solar gateway, but is itself a ‘key’ embodying the self-same power as the indestructible Lion, who in a number of myths of this type is a solar-eyed ogre.

Unlocking the Solar Gateway

In the case of David and Goliath (which appears to an euhemerized version of a solar hero vanquishing a one-eyed giant), David both slays the giant with a single shot of his sling, penetrating his forehead (solar eye), and then cuts off the Philistine’s head using the giant’s own sword, equivalent to the leontocephaline thunderbolt. Odysseus penetrated the Cyclopes Polyphemus’ eye, using the giant’s own club. Again, in the myth of Diarmaid and Grainne, they sought refuge in the tree of immortality, guarded by the one-eyed giant Sharvan, who alone fed upon the ambrosial fruit of the tree. Diarmaid, in order to obtain the berries for Grainne, slew the giant with three strikes of the giant’s own club. In each case the invulnerable giant was slain, due to the self-same nature of the weapon, which is after all an extension of the sun-ogre’s indestructible essence.

The Indestructible Nature of the Solar Hero

Another way, the solar hero obtains the indestructible nature of the solar lion is to dress in the impenetrable pelt of the lion, as in the myth of Herakles. All of the heroes weapons proved useless against the skin of the Nemean lion, and the only way he could defeat the beast was by crushing it to death, perhaps becoming one in death and life in the process. Only the claws of the Lion (the indestructible and all-destroying weapon akin to the thunderbolt), were sharp enough to penetrate the lion’s hide, and from that time, Herakles himself wore the impenetrable pelt, attaining the same indestructible essence.

…This comes out quite clearly in African initiation ceremonies; here too circumcision is equivalent to death, and the operators are dressed in lion skins and leopard skins; they incarnate the divinities in animal form who in mythical times first performed initiatory murder. The operators wear the claws of beasts of prey and their knives are barbed. They attack the novices genital organs, which shows that the intention is to kill them. The act of circumcision is expressed by the verb “to kill.” But soon afterward the novices are themselves dressed in leopard or skins; that is, they assimilate the divine essence of the initiatory animal and hence are restored to live in it. (Rites and symbols of initiation: the mysteries of birth and rebirth, Mircea Eliade, p.23, 1958 Harper & Row)

Before entering the scorpion gateway and crossing of the waters of death, Gilgamesh likewise wore lion skins, to (it would seem) attain the undying nature of the sun god Shamash (Sumerian: Utu), as the journey towards the Island of Immortality (source of all rivers) could only be accomplished by the sun god himself.

Solar Dissolution

Those not clothed with an indestructible nature cannot pass safely through the lion’s mouth into the blissful realms. Instead they are devoured. Think of Kronos-Saturn (who was identified with Lion-headed figure), who devoured his own children. And again in Odysseus’ encounter with Polyphemus;

Odysseus and his companions become trapped within the cyclops’ cave, sealed with an immovable slab of stone. To their dismay, Polyphemus kills and devours two of them, before settling down to sleep. Odysseus was about to slay him, when he realized that the giant was the only one capable of removing the stone door. The following morning, the cyclops ate another two men for breakfast, and left the cave with his flocks, effortlessly closing the door behind him.
Caught within the Cosmic World Cave

Again, In the Chinese Myth of the Island of the New Moon Passage, those considered unworthy to pass through the archway of the Heavenly Peach Tree, were cast to the tigers (or tiger) to be devoured. Tigers, panthers, and leopards can all function as counterparts of the solar Lion.

Lunar counterbalance

The wrathful nature of the solar lion, while perceived as wholly without mercy in some mythological renderings, is also shown to be graceful. Bound up in the all-destroying strike or bite of the lion, is the life generating force that gives life to all things. This is the double nature of the divine weapon, that bestows both death and life. This is reflected in the nature of the Mesopotamian sun god, who both wields a weapon of death, yet is also the source of healing waters of the Mesopotamian Paradise of Dilmun (Compare Genesis 2:6).

“Bound up in the all-destroying strike or bite of the lion, is the life generating force that gives life to all things.”

When the youthful Dionysus was kidnapped by Pirates, he transfixed their ship upon the ocean with grapevines and ivy that miraculously engulfed the mast and sails (this appears to symbolize the Axis Mundi). Various animals materialized (compare Noah’s Ark), and the oars were transformed into snakes (the lunar beast of the tree of death and life). The god himself was transformed into a lion and struck the pirate captain with his all-destroying claw. The Captain wasn’t destroyed, however, but transformed into a dolphin and along with his entire crew, save one, jumped into the ocean.

Here, the mythic picture is one of transformation, rather than annihilation. The creation of a new mode of being, mythologically represented by the lunar cycle, and the ever-revolving Oceanos, sometimes rendered as a serpent that devours it’s own tail. The dolphins, appear to be symbolic of the crescent moon, and instead of passing through the mouth of the lion at the foot of the Cosmic tree, and into Eternal life or Eternal Damnation, the Pirates undergo the mercy of transformation into the cosmic realm, where they might again travel the spiraling path of the serpent and taste the eternal nectar, the boon of the god according to his lunar aspect.

“Here, the mythic picture is one of transformation, rather than annihilation. The creation of a new mode of being”

The pirate ship, like Noah’s Ark, is an Old and New Moon Boat (see also The Lunar Mystery of Death and Rebirth), such as depicted on a seal from Bahrain, with a bull (it’s horns identified with a lunar crescent), feeding from what can only be the plant of life. It is the vessel of internal darkness, obscuring the pathway of solar bliss, that rides the waters of death and life, passing from one lunar cycle (or World Cycle as in the case of Flood Heroes) to another. The Bull is the prime animal form of Dionysus, according to his lunar aspect, and it is through the sacrifice of the lunar bull, that the Solar Gateway can be traversed, which is probably the philosophy behind the Mithraic Mysteries.

Conversely, we have another variation of the myth of Dionysus and the Pirates, concerning Noah:

The wounding of the ‘lunar’ Noah is attested in the Sefer ha-Zohar (13th Century A.D), which states that Noah was bitten by a lion in the Ark and permanently lamed. We are also told that Noah, the first man to plant a vineyard, became drunk on his own wine and fell asleep naked inside his tent (Genesis 9:20–21). That the mythological victim partook of his own ambrosia is well attested.
The Temporal and the Eternal (Part 2)

Noah, who is the Hebrew counterpart of the Greek god of wine, in contrast to the solar Dionysus of the corresponding myth, is the god in lunar aspect, who is himself wounded as the prime partaker in the cosmic dissolution and re-transformation. Infact it is by the virtue of the god’s ultimately indestructible nature (in the guise of solar hero), that the cosmos is transformed.

The Lunar mediation of the Solar Principle

As the god passes through the Solar Gateway, Like the Vedic Soma, he obtains the solar-ambrosial boon of Life, which he carries, mythologically speaking in the waxing lunar cup.

Dionysus is sometimes depicted riding on the back of a leopard or panther, which is the god’s theriomorphic self, according to his eternal and indestructible (solar) nature. He holds aloft the waxing crescent, symbolic of the ever revolving return from death, and the vessel of solar ambrosia, Dionysus’ gift to all humanity.

In Mesopotamian iconography, the sun is often depicted rising from within a lunar crescent, which is basically the same mythological idea (also compare the solar Mithras upon the arched back of the lunar bull), and also forms the basis of much Tree of Life iconography. In one example, the solar principle is represented by a Lion-Bird rising from between two stags, corresponding with the crescent moon. The Vedic Soma was also conceived as a bird of prey, symbolic of the heavenly mead in the drinking bowl (Rig Veda: 9.96.19), which he guarded in the form of a lion (Rig Veda: 9.89.3).

The Iconography of the Threshold God

Finally we find a similar set of mythical motifs in the iconography of Shiva (The god who endlessly creates and dissolves the universe). The river Ganges flows like an ambrosial fountain from his top knot, next to a waxing moon anchored in his hair. His third eye corresponds with the all-destroying solar eye of the cyclopean giant. He sits in meditation upon a tiger skin, which corresponds with the indestructible pelt of the solar hero and Dionysus’ solar mount, and like the lion-headed figure of Mithraic iconography, he has a serpent (cobra), coiled around his body, symbolic of the Kundalini power that rises towards enlightenment.

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