#neoplatonic

[jane-d-ankh-veos]

Every time I tag my writing with "Platonic relationship", I have a feeling like it implies the existence of Neoplatonic relationships as well... 😁

...but wait a minute, this is not so silly, actually. All my favourite complicated asexual romances usually include a lot of meddling with transcendent mysteries, indeed. "We should fuck reality instead".

[thetelesterion]

"He is Himself, both things that are and things that are not. The things that are He hath made manifest, He keepeth things that are not in Himself.

He is the God beyond all name; He the unmanifest, He the most manifest; He whom the mind [alone] can contemplate, He visible to the eyes [as well]; He is the one of no body, the one of many bodies, nay, rather He of every body.

Naught is there which he is not. For all are He and He is all. And for this cause hath He all names, in that they are one Father's. And for this cause hath He Himself no nome, in that He's Father of [them] all." -From the Corpus Hermeticum, translated by G.R.S Mead.

[madmonksandmaenads]

I want to have a sleepover in the house of Plutarch soooooooo bad!

[gemsofgreece]

TIL from a podcast featuring historian and Byzantine archaeologist Yannis Theoharis:

Athens was one of the most religiously conservative cities of the Byzantine Empire. It adhered to the ancient Greek religion for longer than most other areas. Contrary to popular belief, its eventual conversion to Christianity did not happen violently. Christianity was getting more and more ground amongst the believers progressively. Meanwhile, the ancient temples and shrines were progressively emptying but as long as there were believers they were functioning properly and had guards and went through restoration works and all, as stated by Neoplatonic philosopher Proklos (with the exception of nude sculptures which had been destroyed already by proto-Christians). The historian also claims the conversion of the temples to churches happened later than what was previously believed, around the 7th-9th centuries. As the vast majority of the population had eventually converted to Christianity, the temples were left abandoned. The empire ordered their conversion to churches so that funding their preservation could be justified. Furthermore, there wasn’t as much of violent banning of ancient schools as it was thought. Justinian did not ban the function of the Neoplatonic school in Athens but ceased the state funding unless the school accepted to add Christian theology to its curriculum. The Neoplatonic school refused but it was not banned. It kept functioning using its own private funds until this wasn’t enough and the school had to close. Evidence for this is that it is documented that the school functioned for several decades or more than a century (don’t remember exactly) after Justinian’s imperial command, which was previously viewed as an immediate or violent shutdown. Meanwhile, the Neoplatonic school in Alexandria (in Egypt) agreed to add Christian theology to its curriculum and it kept functioning undisturbed until the 7th century and the Arab conquest.

Also, he has more insight into the similarities observed between Eastern / Greek and even all Orthodoxy and the Ancient Greek religion, such as idol / icon worship, lesser deity / saint worship, virgin female deity / super saint worship, patron gods / saints etc He says there was an interesting cycle of Christianised Hellenism followed by Hellenized Christianity. Some of these elements of Christian Orthodoxy were emphasized more than in the early years of Proto-Christianity or even exaggerated by the Byzantine Greek Christians in order to attract the pagan Greeks and make them understand more easily the philosophy of the new religion and find common ground between them. It worked.

Lastly, he disputed the dated assumptions that the Visigoth king Alaric I was assisted by monks to destroy Athens during his invasion in 396. This was falsely concluded because in documents it was found that Alaric was accompanied by men clad in black. Theoharis says these were actually Thracian soldiers (Alaric indeed fared long in Thrace and the Thracians were by large mercenaries) and supports it is very unlikely based on historical evidence of the time that Athenian or Greek Christians would collaborate with a Visigoth invader to help him destroy historical areas of Athens, even if they were pagan.

These are the most important bits from memory, I am linking the podcast here, it is in Greek.

[tragediambulante]

Apollo and the Shepherd Daphnis, Pietro Perugino, 1475-1500

[renegade-hierophant]

Order of reading Plato’s works

Alcibiades I (Ἀλκιβιάδης αʹ) - introduction to philosophy (seeking of self-knowledge), theory of the demons (present in the human soul)

Gorgias (Γοργίας) - political virtues, dogmas concerning the three demiurges

Phaedo (Φαίδων) - cathartic virtues, a.k.a. “On the Soul”

Cratylus (Κρατύλος) - theoretical virtues, “names” (words as linguistic objects), theory of the divine names

Theatetus (Θεαίτητος) - theoretical virtues, concepts proper (mental forms)

Sophist (Σοφιστής) - theoretical virtues, physical things (forms), study of the properties of celestial Gods

Statesmen (Πολιτικός) - theoretical virtues, physical things (forms), whole theory of celestial demiurgy, the cyclic movement of the cosmos and its divine causes

Phaedrus (Φαῖδρος) - divine things (forms), theory of the noetic-noeric and some classes of hypercosmic Gods

Symposium (Συμπόσιον) - divine things (forms), theory of demons and divine love

Philebus (Φίληβος) - “crown” of the virtues, teaching related to the dyad of the primal principles and triad derived from them

Timaeus (Τίμαιος)

Parmenides (Παρμενίδης)

After these have been mastered the rest can be read in any order, for example:

Laws (Νόμοι) - teaching on providence and the existential characteristics of the Gods

Protagoras (Πρωταγόρας) - relation between mortals and Gods

Republic (Πολιτεία) - justice, keys to the symbolic interpretation of myths

Euthypro (Εὐθύφρων) - piety

[khensaptah]

Mystic Egyptian Polytheism Resource List

Because I wanted to do a little more digging into the philosophy elements explored in Mahmoud's book, I took the time tonight to pull together the recommended reading he listed toward the end of each chapter. The notes included are his own.

MEP discusses Pharaonic Egypt and Hellenistic Egypt, and thus some of these sources are relevant to Hellenic polytheists (hence me intruding in those tags)!

Note: extremely long text post under this read more.

What Are The Gods And The Myths?

ψ Jeremy Naydler’s Temple of the Cosmos: The Ancient Egyptian Experience of the Sacred is my top text recommendation for further exploration of this topic. It dives deep into how the ancients envisioned the gods and proposes how the various Egyptian cosmologies can be reconciled. ψ Jan Assmann’s Egyptian Solar Religion in the New Kingdom: Re, Amun and the Crisis of Polytheism focuses on New Kingdom theology by analyzing and comparing religious literature. Assmann fleshes out a kind of “monistic polytheism,” as well as a robust culture of personal piety that is reflected most prominently in the religious literature of this period. He shows how New Kingdom religious thought was an antecedent to concepts in Hermeticism and Neoplatonism. ψ Moustafa Gadalla’s Egyptian Divinities: The All Who Are The One provides a modern Egyptian analysis of the gods, including reviews of the most significant deities. Although Gadalla is not an academic, his insights and contributions as a native Egyptian Muslim with sympathies towards the ancient religion are valuable.

How to Think like an Egyptian

ψ Jan Assmann’s The Mind of Egypt: History and Meaning in the Time of the Pharaohs is my top text recommendation for further exploration of this topic. It illuminates Egyptian theology by exploring their ideals, values, mentalities, belief systems, and aspirations from the Old Kingdom period to the Ptolemaic period. ψ Garth Fowden’s The Egyptian Hermes: A Historical Approach to the Late Pagan Mind identifies the Egyptian character of religion and wisdom in late antiquity and provides a cultural and historical context to the Hermetica, a collection of Greco-Egyptian religious texts. ψ Christian Bull’s The Tradition of Hermes Trismegistus: The Egyptian Priestly Figure as a Teacher of Hellenized Wisdom provides a rich assessment of the Egyptian religious landscape at the end of widespread polytheism in Egypt and how it came to interact with and be codified in Greek schools of thought and their writings.

How To Think Like A Neoplatonist

Radek Chlup’s Proclus: An Introduction is my top text recommendation for further exploration of this topic. It addresses the Neoplatonic system of Proclus but gives an excellent overview of Neoplatonism generally. It contains many valuable graphics and charts that help illustrate the main ideas within Neoplatonism. ψ John Opsopaus’ The Secret Texts of Hellenic Polytheism: A Practical Guide to the Restored Pagan Religion of George Gemistos Plethon succinctly addresses several concepts in Neoplatonism from the point of view of Gemistos Plethon, a crypto-polytheist who lived during the final years of the Byzantine Empire. It provides insight into the practical application of Neoplatonism to ritual and religion. ψ Algis Uzdavinys’ Philosophy as a Rite of Rebirth: From Ancient Egypt to Neoplatonism draws connections between theological concepts and practices in Ancient Egypt to those represented in the writings and practices of the Neoplatonists.

What Is “Theurgy,” And How Do You Make A Prayer “Theurgical?”

ψ Jeffrey Kupperman’s Living Theurgy: A Course in Iamblichus’ Philosophy, Theology and Theurgy is my top text recommendation for further exploration of this topic. It is a practical guide on theurgy, complete with straightforward explanations of theurgical concepts and contemplative exercises for practice. ψ Gregory Shaw’s Theurgy and the Soul: The Neoplatonism of Iamblichus demonstrates how Iamblichus used religious ritual as the primary tool of the soul’s ascent towards God. He lays out how Iamblichus proposed using rites to achieve henosis. ψ Algis Uzdavinys’ Philosophy and Theurgy in Late Antiquity explores the various ways theurgy operated in the prime of its widespread usage. He focuses mainly on temple rites and how theurgy helped translate them into personal piety rituals.

What Is “Demiurgy,” And How Do I Do Devotional, “Demiurgical” Acts?

ψ Shannon Grimes’ Becoming Gold: Zosimos of Panopolis and the Alchemical Arts in Roman Egypt is my top text recommendation for further exploration of this topic. It constitutes an in-depth look at Zosimos—an Egyptian Hermetic priest, scribe, metallurgist, and alchemist. It explores alchemy (ancient chemistry and metallurgy) as material rites of the soul’s ascent. She shows how Zosimos believed that partaking in these practical arts produced divine realities and spiritual advancements. ψ Alison M. Robert’s Hathor’s Alchemy: The Ancient Egyptian Roots of the Hermetic Art delves deep temple inscriptions and corresponding religious literature from the Pharaonic period and demonstrates them as premises for alchemy. These texts “alchemize” the “body” of the temple, offering a model for the “alchemizing” of the self. ψ A.J. Arberry’s translation of Farid al-Din Attar’s Muslim Saints and Mystics: Episodes from the Tadhkirat al-Auliya contains a chapter on the Egyptian Sufi saint Dhul-Nun al-Misri (sometimes rendered as Dho‘l-Nun al-Mesri). He is regarded as an alchemist, thaumaturge, and master of Egyptian hieroglyphics. It contains apocryphal stories of his ascetic and mystic life as a way of “living demiurgically.” It is an insightful glimpse into how the Ancient Egyptian arts continued into new religious paradigms long after polytheism was no longer widespread in Egypt.

Further Reading

Contemporary Works Assmann, Jan. 1995. Egyptian Solar Religion in the New Kingdom: Re, Amun and the Crisis of Polytheism. Translated by Anthony Alcock. Kegan Paul International. Assmann, Jan. 2003. The Mind of Egypt: History and Meaning in the Time of the Pharaohs. Harvard University Press. Bull, Christian H. 2019. The Tradition of Hermes Trismegistus: The Egyptian Priestly Figure as a Teacher of Hellenized Wisdom. Brill. Chlup, Radek. 2012. Proclus: An Introduction. Cambridge University Press. Escolano-Poveda, Marina. 2008. The Egyptian Priests of the Graeco-Roman Period. Brill. Fowden, Garth. 1986. The Egyptian Hermes: A Historical Approach to the Late Pagan Mind. Cambridge University Press. Freke, Tim, and Peter Gandy. 2008. The Hermetica: The Lost Wisdom of the Pharaohs. Jeremy P. Tarcher/Penguin. Gadalla, Moustafa. 2001. Egyptian Divinities: The All Who Are The One. Tehuti Research Foundation. Grimes, Shannon. 2019. Becoming Gold: Zosimos of Panopolis and the Alchemical Arts in Roman Egypt. Princeton University Press. Jackson, Howard. 2017. “A New Proposal for the Origin of the Hermetic God Poimandres.” Aries: Journal for the Study of Western Esotericism 17 (2): 193-212. Kupperman, Jeffrey. 2014. Living Theurgy: A Course in Iamblichus’ Philosophy, Theology and Theurgy. Avalonia. Mierzwicki, Tony. 2011. Graeco-Egyptian Magick: Everyday Empowerment. Llewellyn Publications. Naydler, Jeremy. 1996. Temple of the Cosmos: The Ancient Egyptian Experience of the Sacred. Inner Traditions. Opsopaus, J. 2006. The Secret Texts of Hellenic Polytheism: A Practical Guide to the Restored Pagan Religion of George Gemistos Plethon. New York: Llewellyn Publications. Roberts, Alison M. 2019. Hathor’s Alchemy: The Ancient Egyptian Roots of the Hermetic Art. Northgate Publishers. Shaw, Gregory. 1995. Theurgy and the Soul: The Neoplatonism of Iamblichus. 2nd ed. Angelico Press. Snape, Steven. 2014. The Complete Cities of Ancient Egypt. Thames & Hudson. Uzdavinys, Algis. 1995. Philosophy and Theurgy in Late Antiquity. Wheaton, IL: Quest Books. Uzdavinys, Algis. 2008. Philosophy as a Rite of Rebirth: From Ancient Egypt to Neoplatonism. Lindisfarne Books. Wilkinson, Richard H. 2000. The Complete Temples of Ancient Egypt. Thames & Hudson.

Ancient Sources in Translation Attar, Farid al-Din. 1966. Muslim Saints and Mystics: Episodes from the Tadhkirat alAuliya. Translated by A.J. Arberry. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Betz, Hans Dieter. 1992. The Greek Magical Papyri in Translation, Including the Demotic Spells. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Copenhaver, Brian P. 1995. Hermetica: The Greek Corpus Hermeticum and the Latin Asclepius in a New English Translation, with Notes and Introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Guthrie, Kenneth. 1988. The Pythagorean Sourcebook and Library: An Anthology of Ancient Writings which Relate to Pythagoras and Pythagorean Philosophy. Grand Rapids, MI: Phanes Press. Iamblichus. 1988. The Theology of Arithmetic. Translated by Robin Waterfield. Grand Rapids, MI: Phanes Press. Iamblichus. 2003. Iamblichus: On the Mysteries. Translated by Clarke, E., Dillon, J. M., & Hershbell, J. P. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature. Iamblichus. 2008. The Life of Pythagoras (Abridged). Translated by Thomas Taylor. Whitefish, MT: Kessinger Publishing. Lichtheim, Miriam. 1973-1980. Ancient Egyptian Literature. Volumes I-III. Berkeley: University of California Press. Litwa, M. David. 2018. Hermetica II. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Majercik, Ruth. 1989. The Chaldean Oracles: Text, Translation, and Commentary. Leiden: Brill. Plato. 1997. Plato: Complete Works. Edited by John M. Cooper and D. S. Hutchinson. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing. Plotinus. 1984-1988. The Enneads. Volumes 1-7. Translated by A.H. Armstrong. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. Van der Horst, Pieter Willem. 1984. The Fragments of Chaeremon, Egyptian Priest and Stoic Philosopher. Leiden: E.J. Brill.

[templum-solis]

"[...] the anagogic, or elevating, Hermes indeed is the supplier of philosophy, and through this elevates souls, and by the dialectic powers, sends upward both total and partial souls to the good itself. But Aphrodite is the first-effective cause of the amatory inspiration which pervades through wholes, and familiarizes to the beautiful the lives that are elevated by her. And Apollon perfects and converts all things through music, convolving, as Socrates says [in the Cratylus], and through harmony and rhythm attracting to intellectual truth, and the light which is there."

- Proclus' Theology of Plato at Book 6, Chapter 22

[alephskoteinos]

The fact that Shaw uses the term "sorcery" to describe how the Neoplatonists felt about Christianity and that Neoplatonists used the myth of the Titans and Typhon to describe the rise of Christianity kind of tells me that, for Platonists, "sorcery" or goeteia was always just words for religions that they didn't like, whether that be the marginal practices of wandering pagan magicians or even Christianity. That's pretty telling. The irony, of course, is that the Christians ridiculed the theurgists for their "mystical theosophy" and alleged animal worship, and of course the same gods worshipped by the theurgists were among the gods that the Christians interpreted as demons, and these demons were very probably the demons/gods of goetia. The other irony of course is that, insofar as there could have been an actual practice of goeteia, and in this respect Jake Stratton Kent can tell you all about it, Christianity was practically almost nothing like what pagan goeteia was. Perhaps it sort of is as Crowley said: the Devil is the god of a people you dislike. But perhaps both Christians and Neoplatonists were playing a very similar game, and it just so happened that the pagan Neoplatonists lost that game.

[lionofchaeronea]

Current nonfiction reading is Neoplatonism by Pauliina Remes, part of Acumen's very fine Ancient Philosophies series. I freely admit that I find Neoplatonism difficult, at least compared to, say, Stoicism or Epicureanism, but Remes does a superb job of laying out the key issues the Neoplatonists faced--the ontological hierarchy, intellection vs. sensory perception, will and selfhood, etc. She also pays keen attention to the historical development of the school and demonstrates the evolving nature of Neoplatonist thought, as scholars such as Proclus and Damascius responded both to Plato himself and to the gauntlet laid down by Plotinus and Porphyry. And all this within a span of just over 200 pages (!) As a jumping-off point for further study of the topic, you'd be hard-pressed to do better.

[bestworstcase]

okay

let's talk about alchemical readings and rwby.

as the resident crank it would be remiss of me not to begin this little jaunt with a very important disclaimer: like all esoteric lenses, alchemical philosophy is an analytical framework that relies quite heavily on symbolism, and because of that it is really important to be mindful of how you're engaging with the text. symbolism services narrative, not the other way around, and you should always let the narrative guide your understanding of its symbolism. if that doesn't make sense to you, don't worry, because there will be lots of examples to illustrate what i mean.

before getting into the weeds, we're going to lay out some basic alchemical concepts.

in simple terms, the core philosophical idea of alchemy is a gradual process of transformation from base material into the sublime; conceptually the transmutation of lead into gold is also the perfection of human body and soul. alchemy is about change, refinement, rebirth, wholeness.

the prima materia—first matter—is the perfect and formless primordial matter of which all forms of matter are derived. if you're familiar with certain other alchemical readings of rwby you'll have seen it defined as the "raw material" that is transformed into the philosopher's stone through the alchemical process; that is not inaccurate but it must be stressed that the idea here is that ordinary matter comes from the prima materia and the philosopher's stone IS the prima materia, made perfect and whole again through the great work.

<- rwby directly invokes this idea in 'all things must die' ("all bonds dissolve/infinite matter/will always evolve").

yliaster is another name (coined by paracelsus) for the prima materia, which he described as "completely healed human being who has burned away all the dross of his lower being and is free to fly as the phoenix."

the great work is the actual process of alchemy. it is classically broken down into four (or three) stages, each represented by a color:

nigredo, black, involves putrefaction and charring—symbolically, death. decay. rot.

albedo, white, involves purification and separation. the undifferentiated mass of the nigredo stage is clarified and divided into two opposing principles.

citrinitas, yellow, is the "dawn" or reawakening.

rubedo, red, involves coagulation and recombination after the separation undergone in albedo.

citrinitas is not always treated as a discrete stage, instead sometimes being combined into a single stage with rubedo or understood as the transition between albedo and rubedo. hence "four (or three)." there are also a great variety of other stages, mostly given in sets of seven or twelve and listed in myriad sequences, but for our purpose this four-or three-stage model is the most useful.

now!

ordinarily with an alchemical reading, we would begin by finding a narrative pattern of symbolic death and rebirth, but for rwby we first need to interrogate the goliath in the room, namely:

YES, IT'S ABOUT SALEM.

there is a tendency in alchemical readings of rwby to interpret salem's immortality as a lifeless unchanging stasis, and thus to read her as an embodiment of the anti-theme, and surprising absolutely no one i find this to be… well, just not right at all.

rwby initially sets up the pattern through the mantra pyrrha recites when she awakens jaune's aura: "for it is in passing that we achieve immortality. through this we become a paragon of virtue and glory to rise above all, infinite in distance and unbound by death. i release your soul, and by my shoulder protect thee." 'rising' explicitly calls back to this ("we are paragons of virtue and glory/death can't bind our endless story/infinite and unbound") and 'indomitable' reiterates the idea ("when we strive, we transcend/even death cannot end our climb"); this is important to note because the repetition correlates with revelations about salem's story.

the key thing to understand here is that 'the lost fable' is narratively structured around salem's deaths:

first, the god of light bites her and she's drowned in the fountain of life (notice her last breath leaving her mouth; she chokes for air and her eyes rolls back as she loses consciousness, sinking into the depths)…

…and then the god of darkness brings the moon down on her head and she wanders in a haze until finding her way back to the pool of grimm, where she seeks her own destruction and is created anew.

the brothers cast salem into the fountain of life, which pools under the roots of a tree and appears to be infinitely deep. she drowns as she sinks into its darkness—then abruptly reawakens hitting the water again, now only a reflecting pool, and the water-light of aura shimmers over her hands as she rises.

"for it is in passing that we achieve immortality…" the reprisal of "infinite and unbound" in 'rising' draws a line from pyrrha's mantra to the lost fable for a reason; it's to help us understand the truth behind the story jinn is telling. it is not even subtext—it is text. especially after volume nine, which clarifies the symbolic meaning of the tree growing above the waters.

through death, salem became immortal—infinite—and the infinite waters of life and creation became finite.

that water was the prima materia of the brothers' world; it combined with salem—the prima materia changes itself and combined with all imperfect bodies that it touches—and thus she herself became yliaster, "the perfectly healed human being who has burned away all the dross of his lower being and is free to fly as the phoenix."

the dross in her case being the brothers and their divine order, she rebels against them, and they destroy their world. she is all that remains. they leave salem behind in the end of all things and, phoenix-like, she rises out of the ashes of her destruction. yliaster is the prima materia; it contains everything, is everything, and everything is released when it is broken apart.

"this force of pure destruction could not destroy a being of infinite life, so it created a being of infinite life with a desire for pure destruction." destruction exists within creation exists within destruction: salem embraces death, throwing herself into the "blackened pools of annihilation" in the land of darkness. nigredo.

she's torn apart and reborn, and remnant is born with her, a pure-white being clambering into a revitalized new world she cannot touch; after a long separation, her partner returns to her and she experiences love, connection, freedom for the first time in years, until she learns that he seeks the destruction of this world and a return to the old and they burn each other alive in a violent parting. albedo.

salem's arrival in atlas literally at dawn incites the struggle between herself and cinder, which culminates in salem beginning to relinquish control and as her true feelings come to the surface. citrinitas.

thus, what remains of her story is rubedo: reconciliation with cinder, reunion with ozma, peace between humans and grimm (<- unity of opposites), and finally symbolic transcendence over death by convincing the god of light to ascend, with "death" being specifically the threat of annihilation represented by the divine mandate.

ozma's arc, of course, mirrors hers very closely: the god of light breaks him apart, the god of darkness burns him (nigredo)—his reincarnation divides him very literally into two, and symbolically divides him between duty and desire (albedo)—he awakens with the dawn, reconciles with oscar, and begins to face the truth in atlas (citrinitas).

as alchemical readings go, this one is not difficult or arcane or remotely ambiguous. it isn't even symbolic; the deaths and resurrection are explicitly literal and occur onscreen with the accompaniment of helpful explanatory notes. the goliath in the room is making aggressive eye contact.

but we are not done here yet, because i never do anything by halves and we have symbolism to talk about.

THE GREAT WORK.

salem, you will recall, is yliaster, the prima materia of remnant. you will also recall that the prima materia is the formless primordial matter from which all other matter is formed, and thus it is both the raw material of the great work and the philosopher's stone. yes? good. rwby interrogates this contradiction through the idea of balance, which the god of light conceives of as an inviolate order that must be designed and enforced. but, as the blacksmith explains, his understanding is a limited falsehood:

"balance is not two forces locked in never-ending battle. balance is an ecosystem, an organism, a living, breathing thing; thus balance cannot be restored by force or calculation. it only requires love and the patience to see things through to the end."

here is where i think a lot of the fandom—not people doing alchemical readings necessarily, but in general—miss the mark by interpreting this to mean that opposition and balance are antithetical to each other, that a system with two opposing forces is inherently out of balance. rwby's metaphysics are grounded in hellenistic philosophy, plato in particular (<- neoplatonism had a significant influence on the western european alchemical tradition), and the philosophical ideas undergirding the ever after follows herclitus.

(i recommend perusing the category pages for λόγος, justice and strife, the harmony of opposites, φύσις, ψυχή, cosmology, fire, water/the river, life/death, and waking/sleeping—i know that sounds like a lot of reading, but it isn't, as what we have of heraclitus is only fragments and the summaries provided are brief and accessible.)

the two key ideas we're interested in here are flux and strife. the world exists at rest in a continual state of change; a river is always the same river, but its flowing waters change from moment to moment. this conception of the world—"changing, it rests"—is flux. strife incites change through the tension between opposing forces. strife is not discordant but rather harmonious: "men do not know how what is at variance agrees with itself. it is an attunement of opposite tensions, like that of the bow and the lyre." (B51) just as a bow could not fire and a lyre could not sing without tension on the strings, so the world could not be without strife.

this is what the blacksmith means by balance. true balance is not war; it is strife. not two forces locked in never-ending conflict, but opposite tensions in harmony with each other. destruction and creation are opposing forces, but each exists within the other and they are both interdependent and inseparable.

salem embodies this theme. through death, she became life, and by destruction she was created. human and grimm, light and darkness, creation and destruction. she seeks to tear down the huntsmen academies and incite revolution in pursuit of a new world. she is balance—and the god of light inflicted his punishment upon her not because she failed to understand the importance of life and death, but because her dedication to change challenged his false and hollow conception of what balance means.

this guides the alchemical reading of the wider narrative in significant ways. salem is the prima materia of remnant—yliaster, broken apart to release everything contained within—and thus both the subject and the aspiration of the great work. when we examine other characters through this lens, it is in relation to her.

we'll begin by discussing the narrative's big symbols: the rose, the broken moon, the tree, grimm, silver eyes, and fire.

traditionally, the rose symbolizes rubedo. in most alchemical readings of rwby, ruby rose is accordingly presumed to represent this stage for obvious reasons—however, if we pay attention to how the narrative itself symbolically identifies the rose:

ruby's emblem, which she inherited from her mother, is a burning rose.

our first sighting of it is on summer rose's grave, above an epitaph—"thus kindly i scatter"—taken from a poem which uses the death of a rose as a metaphor for the speaker's loneliness and despair.

"red like roses fills my dreams and brings me to the place you rest," and "red like roses fills my head with dreams and finds me always closer to the emptiness and sadness that has come to take the place of you"

adam's emblem is a withered rose.

"the moon will sadly watch the roses die"

"maybe red's like roses? maybe it's the pool of blood the innocents will lay in when in the end you fail to save them"

"the rose will grow to be a seed, from every life another leads" (<- evokes an image of deterioration, rot; the rose going to seed)

"some roses will never bloom, some dreams will rot on the vine"

in rwby, the rose represents death. it burns, it withers, it dies, it is scattered, it never blooms; thus, it does not symbolize rubedo but rather the death and decomposition of nigredo. why then is ruby's primary color red? we'll get to that in a little while.

the moon traditionally symbolizes albedo, which is a process of separation, reflection, and illumination. the god of darkness shattered the moon as he departed after slaughtering humanity, and:

"the moon will sadly watch the roses die"

"the sky is turning black, light is fading fast, but we don't surrender; shattering the night, radiant and bright, armored in splendor, shining forever […] we're rising like the moon"

salem falls into and through the reflection of the broken moon when she casts herself into the pool of grimm

the broken moon symbolizes the death and resurrection of humankind, which—as noted—is the beginning of the albedo stage in salem's story.

so in rwby the broken moon does indeed represent albedo.

the tree, obviously, represents the whole circle of life-death-rebirth, with its symbolic meaning on remnant following its actual function in the ever after, where it is the cosmic tree, the river, and the ever-living fire. thus cinder and salem falling into pools of water at the base of a tree are symbolic (and in salem's case, also literal) rebirths.

grimm are "manifestations of anonymity," "the darkness," hates and feared as soulless monsters, destruction incarnate, thought to have no purpose other than to exist as "mankind's greatest foe." rwby is consistent in using the grimm to symbolize ostracism, persecution, fear of the other or the unknown, and salem's exile is justified (in ozma's mind) by her grimmness. which is to say, the grimm represent the separation undergone during albedo; they are the darkness to humanity's light. (hence, the narrative building toward coexistence between humans and grimm, exemplified by the faunus.)

silver eyes are described in opposition to the grimm and likewise represent the separation of albedo; the light to grimmkind's darkness. salem's experimentation with combining them into one being is a faunus for good reason, and i do not think it is coincidental that cinder has become less vulnerable to the glare as she finds balance with the grimm arm. and speaking of her:

the phoenix is another traditional symbol for rubedo, which naturally calls to mind associations with fire. citrinitas, similarly, is represented by the dawn or the "solar light," overtaking the moonlight of albedo, which again connotes fire. in rwby, fire is used to symbolize hope and wrath, which are thematically intertwined (hope ignites fire -> loss of hope incites wrath -> wrath ignites fire, and is thus a form of hope):

"even the smallest spark of hope is enough to ignite change […] nature's wrath in hand, man lit their way through the darkness"

"a simple spark can ignite hope, breathe fire into the hearts of the weary…" becoming "i can't wait to watch you burn"—salem seeks to smother ozma's hope, and thus rekindle her own.

"the light of hope is taken and discontent is the contagion; the blinding eyes that burn a yellow flame, the embers that remain will light the fuse of condemnation"

"we were destined to light the flame of revolution; consider this the spark" + "i think father may have just provided the spark that's going to set this kingdom on fire"

flame imagery used in relation to cinder and salem in the volume eight opening and jaune throughout volume nine.

cinder being… a spark…

as i noted, the paradigm shift between salem and cinder in atlas represents the transition from albedo to rubedo through the dawn. in rwby, the kindling spark symbolizes citrinitas and the changing flame that follows is rubedo. the role cinder will play in reigniting salem's hope is obvious, and the symbolic use of fire to reawaken first jaune and then neo in volume nine only underscores this meaning. in combination with the dust and ashes motif going on with salem and the grimm, the fire becomes specifically phoenix imagery.

now!

why, if the rose is nigredo, is ruby red?

in order to explain this, we first need to examine team STRQ, because the answer is that the great work is cyclical.

in team STRQ, we have:

summer rose, whose red-and-gold interior is masked by her white exterior

taiyang xiao long, who is all yellow

raven branwen, who is an amalgam of red and black

qrow branwen, who is mostly white except for his red cape

the branwen twins also transform into corvids, traditional symbols for the nigredo stage; qrow's scythe harbinger and raven's allusions to the morrígan underscore their symbolic association with death.

if we consider these color associations through an alchemical lens, the pattern that emerges is—by design—muddled and strange, but not actually that convoluted:

raven "tried to leave," but couldn't. she became the spring maiden by mercy-killing a girl whom she loved as her own family, and never having dealt with that grief or guilt, is trapped in nigredo whilst projecting a hollow image of rubedo—her pretense of strength. she runs away from her feelings, rather than challenging or examining them; what she needs instead is to separate and reflect honestly on herself.

summer did leave. her white outer shell—the phantom she left behind—suggests albedo, but her true colors are what she wears beneath the cloak: red trimmed with gold. she found salem, listened to her and awoke to the truth of this world, and then joined her. but in order to do that, she had to separate from her own family, joining salem exile; thus her individual rubedo brings her into alignment with the grimm in salem's albedo.

qrow, shattered by the dissolution of his team, is undergoing his own albedo. like his sister, he wears the trappings of rubedo—he is the one left standing, ozpin's most trusted agent—but this is a false projection which crumbles once it challenged by the revelations of ozma's deceit. his drinking and reluctance to be around people for fear of bringing them to harm make it impossible for him to move forward until he finds new hope and decides to try again. like his onetime mentor, he experiences citrinitas in atlas and the beginning of his transition into rubedo is marked by the introduction of maroon (desaturated red) and tan (desaturated yellow) into his atlas fit.

tai, lastly, is interesting because in one sense, he is citrinitas in isolation, a dawn with nothing to illuminate because his team left him behind, but in another sense, tai mediates the generational transition between team STRQ (albedo) and team RWBY (rubedo). he is yang and ruby's father and—crucially—he raises both in idealized casts of their mothers. ruby feels compelled to live up to the fairytale idea of summer rose; tai tells yang that he sees all of raven's good qualities in her and warns her to be wary of being too much like her mother, in almost the same breath.

ruby's red and yang's yellow represent the culmination of what tai wishes could have been; the summer rose who returned whole and alive, the raven branwen who chose reflection and reawakening instead of running away. but both colors are only things projected onto them—false images.

in truth, ruby represents nigredo. her scythe and the burning rose both connect her to death; her semblance disassembles her into a swirling formless mass of rose petals; her own identity is lost beneath the idea of summer rose and the first nine volumes of the story are devoted to the long, slow journey to her symbolic death at the roots of the tree.

only with her ascension has she begun to undergo albedo (notice the greater emphasis on her silver eyes and the flaring white light as she comes out of the tree; also, "otherside, did you mean to leave me half or whole? will i ever be complete? when will i become all of me?" and "what is left? i know it's you and i when i look inside"—she is beginning to separate herself from the imaginary paragon.

weiss represents albedo—her story is fundamentally about separation from her family, leading to self-reflection and growth, and in the process she has become an emotionally intelligent, insightful person who consistently helps others draw out and clarify their hidden emotions. her mirror motif and her knight summon further represent this: the self and the reflection.

blake represents citrinitas—her golden eyes, her association with the black king, her identity as a faunus, all support this reading. her time with the white fang was her albedo (she lost herself, gradually began to see herself in a new light, and finally separated herself from everything adam represented) and her personal moment of citrinitas is the removal of the bow and meeting with sun after she reveals herself as a faunus, after which she begins her journey of rediscovering herself and reintegrating with her faunus heritage.

finally, yang represents rubedo—her fire, her red eyes, "scathing eyes ask that we be symmetrical, one-sided and easily processed, yet every misshapen spark's unseen beauty is greater than its would-be judgment," "feel like i'm finally unbroken, feel like i'm back from the dead," the whole thematic conceit of bumbleby being the catalyst and the flame, the dawn and the sun, and so forth, two-in-one, "we're protecting each other."

the team collectively represents rubedo in relation to salem, in that they will be the ones primarily negotiating with her and this will obviously not begin to happen until ruby has her personal moment of citrinitas, which is to say not until ruby meets the real summer rose.

as a final point of interest, the four qualities (and relics) of destruction, creation, knowledge, choice map neatly onto the four-or-three alchemical stages—destruction as nigredo, creation as albedo, knowledge-then-choice as citrinitas-then-rubedo—and given the parallelism between yang and cinder, blake and raven, and weiss and penny+winter, it is probably a safe bet that the summer maiden is a) not summer rose, and b) a character foil to ruby, which i think adds some weight to the gillian theory.

anyways.

the philosopher's stone is ozlem.

[funeral]

The philosopher’s task is to overcome the human bondage to the physical realm by moral and intellectual self-discipline and purification, and to turn inward to a gradual ascent back to the Absolute. The final moment of illumination transcends knowledge in any usual sense, and cannot be defined or described, for it is based on an overcoming of the subject-object dichotomy between the seeker and the goal: it is a consummation of contemplative desire that unites the philosopher with the One.

Richard Tarnas, The Passion of the Western Mind

[madmonksandmaenads]

I regret to inform you that I have become the kind of person who when someone says "Oh yeah [insert game/book/whatever] is kind of gnostic" must respond with "....in what way?"

[porphurios]

"Socrates & Agathodemos" c. 1860 by Simeon Solomon

“Speaking about the main part of the soul that is in us, about the part which occupies, so to speak, the crown of the body, we have to bear in mind that god has given it to every one of us as a daimon; we argue that it lives in the upper part of our body and raises us from the earth towards our heavenly relations, because we are not the earthly but a heavenly plant. And we have every right for that.” — Plato, Timaeus 90a

[ericbenierburckel]

"Il y a deux néants comme il y a deux silences : celui d'où naît la parole et celui en qui elle vient mourir quand il n'y a plus rien à dire." Damascius