SirPalomides

A lot of Daoist teachers routinely recommend- to everyone, strangers included- meditating with deep breaths and attention on the LDT. Do you mean something more specific by LDT breathing?

They look amazing and also kind of scary.

Fine consolation for living in an open air prison where the government can murder your family or flatten your home with impunity. And while you can certainly disagree with me, the accusation of anti-semitism is completely uncalled for and despicable. And I find it pretty amazing that while you are so quick to make this accusation, you unquestioningly accept the wild theories of Alberto Rivera about how the Vatican founded Islam, Nazis, Freemasons, and communism, which at echo the warped reasoning employed by anti-semites. Alberto Rivera’s brand of Christian fundamentalism sees Jews as pawns in an apocalyptic game- the “Christian Zionist” ideology that is in fact deeply anti-Semitic and which influences Trump’s policies toward Israel. As an aside let me be clear that I have no sympathy for the stuff Gendao is posting that suggests that the “Zionists” (and yes in this case it is an antisemitic whistle word) control the US government. The reasoning that criticism of Israel being persecuted proves that Israel controls the US is faulty to say the least. In response to a few of Gendao’s Annunaki shitposts on another thread I posted the fittingly insane rants of Francis E Dec, Esq.

If you’re accusing me of stating that Israel is a racist apartheid state, then no need to dig. I will gladly own that statement because It is true and a fact that has been noted by many Jewish leftists. If you’re going to label folks like Noam Chomsky and Bernie Sanders antisemitic then I’m not going to take you seriously.

I did ask for that. Taomeow could have found it in a fraction of the time she took to write that rant, if it existed.

Ah, and right on cue here is gendao talking about the “zionists” *hint hint*. Taomeow, perhaps you had me confused with this gendao?

I have never posted anti-Semitic crap. So I will continue to make the charitable assumption that this is a case of mistaken identity.

Fair enough, my knowledge of those guys isn’t very deep at all. My foggy memory is that it was Iamblichus’ teacher (Proclus?) who disdained the animated images while Iamblichus defended them; also that Julian the Apostate was convinced of paganism when he saw a statue come to life. But I may well be mixing things up.

Yeah I guess the equivalent is the rite of statue animation as found eg in the Neoplatonist Iamblichus. The Byzantine iconodules also attached significance to the moment the saint’s name was painted on the icon though I’m sure they would vigorously deny any commonality with pagan statues.

The equivalent Chinese term is kaiguang or opening the light. It is used for blessing objects as well as inviting deities to reside in images. I actually don’t know enough about western occultism to say how close the concepts are.

Are jiaobei supposed to be specially empowered?

Welcome, Dame Du Lac.

Elijah Magnier's article on this is, as usual, worth reading: Read the rest here: https://ejmagnier.com/2020/01/08/iranian-messages-behind-attacking-us-bases-in-iraq-and-the-consequences/

Oh, how lovely. Yours?

Also, try explaining to a 5-year old A) what "suicide by cop" is; b ) Why someone would want to do it; c) what it means for a government to commit "suicide by cop"; d) how America is the "cop" in this instance; e) why Iran would want to commit suicide by this "cop" and f) how this is accomplished by launching missiles at an empty base that Iran has forewarned before striking

I suspect you have me confused with someone else. A simple apology would suffice.

Baba Yaga doesn't like all that nylon from the Adidas tracksuits getting caught in her iron teeth.

The Sacred Way, by Angelos Sikelianos Through the new wound that fate had opened in me I felt the setting sun flood my heart with a force like that of water when it rushes in through a gash in a sinking ship. Because again, like one long sick when he first ventures forth to milk life from the outside world, I walked alone at dusk along the road that starts at Athens and for its destination has the sanctuary at Eleusis - the road that for me was always the Soul’s road. It bore, like a huge river, carts slowly drawn by oxen, loaded with sheaves and wood, and other carts that quickly passed me by, the people in them shadowlike. But farther on, as if the world had disappeared and nature alone was left, unbroken stillness reigned. And the rock I found rooted at the roadside seemed like a throne long predestined for me. And as I sat I folded my hands over my knees, forgetting if it was today I’d set out or if I’d taken this same road centuries before. But then, rounding the nearest bend, three shadows entered this stillness: a gypsy, and, after him, dragged by their chains, two heavy footed bears. And then, as they drew near to me, the gypsy, before I’d really noticed him, saw me, took his tambourine down from his shoulder, struck it with one hand, and with the other tugged fiercely at the chains. And the two bears rose on their hind legs heavily. One of them, the larger - clearly she was the mother - her head adorned with tassels of blue beads crowned by a white amulet, towered up suddenly enormous, as if she were the primordial image of the Great Goddess, the Eternal Mother, sacred in her affliction, who, in human form, was called Demeter here at Eleusis, where she mourned her daughter, and elsewhere, where she mourned her son, was called Alcmene or the Holy Virgin. And the small bear at her side, like a big toy, like an innocent child, also rose up, submissive, not sensing yet the years of pain ahead or the bitterness of slavery mirrored in the burning eyes his mother turned on him. But because she, dead tired, was slow to dance, the gypsy, with a single dexterous jerk of the chain hanging from the young bear’s nostril - bloody still from the ring that had pierced it perhaps a few days before - made the mother, groaning with pain, abruptly straighten up and then, her head turning toward her child, dance vigorously. And I, as I watched, was drawn outside and far from time, free from forms closed within time, from statues and images. I was outside, I was beyond time. And in front of me I saw nothing except the large bear, with the blue beads on her head, raised by the ring’s wrench and her ill-fated tenderness, huge testifying symbol of all the world, the present and the past, huge testifying symbol of all the primaeval suffering for which, throughout the human centuries, the soul’s tax has still not been paid. Because the soul has been and still is in Hades. And I, who am also a slave to this world, kept my head lowered as I threw a coin into the tambourine. Then, as the gypsy at last went on his way, again dragging the slow-footed bears behind him, and vanished in the dusk, my heart prompted me once more to take the road that terminates among the ruins of the Soul’s temple, at Eleusis. And as I walked my heart asked in anguish: “Will the time, the moment ever come when the bear’s soul and the gypsy’s and my own, that I call initiated, will feast together?” And as I moved on, night fell, and again through the wound fate had opened in me I felt the darkness flood my heart as water rushes in through a gash in a sinking ship. Yet when - as though it had been thirsting for that flood - my heart sank down completely into the darkness, sank completely as though to drown in the darkness, a murmur spread through all the air above me, a murmur, and it seemed to say: “It will come.”

I don't know anything about mopai or martial arts really but I'm definitely getting a sense of a Mopai hivemind from these interactions. Can we please let this thread die?

For what it's worth, Taomeow, I think your contributions to the forum are valuable and I respect you. But accusing me of anti-Semitic crap... well, I've only made 150 posts to the forum, so it should be pretty easy to produce examples of that.

…. I'm sorry? Where did I post any anti-Semitic crap?

Okay then. So have you explained Alberto Rivera's theories about the Jesuits to any 5-year-olds lately?

Yes, but even in that war Saudi Arabia is toast. The Persian Gulf is narrow and thoroughly mapped- you can be sure every desalination plant and every oil facility has ballistic missiles precisely targeted at it just in case. This goes for the UAE too. And even if the US missile defense systems hadn't already been proven ineffective (which they have) Iran has enough swarms of missiles to overload these systems. This is before we even mention Hezbollah, PMU, the Houthis, and other allies that we probably don't even know about, along with a large Saudi Shia population who really, really hate their government. This is why, even if Iran gets crushed, they will take the rest of us with them. That is why this war is such a stupid and crazy idea.

I have to say something here: No. No they are not. Saudi Arabia's military is a joke. Yes, they have some very expensive gear but they can't fight. They have already been humiliated by half-starved, lightly armed Yemeni militia who run circles (sometimes quite literally) around Saudi troops and bypass their expensive air defense systems with cheap drones. Many of Saudi's infantry are mercenaries from the Sahel or elsewhere. For a Saudi citizen, a job in the military was until recently just a way to respectably collect a paycheck. Actual fighting is not supposed to happen. A war simply between Saudi Arabia and Iran would be quite one-sided and Saudi Arabia would be finished in a matter of weeks. That's why that war will never happen, and Saudi Arabia needs American backing.

And Egypt is on course for a proxy war with Turkey in Libya. Fun times.