amadeus@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Susan Harwood Kaczmarczik) (03/06/91)
Repeat: The peace symbol is a combination of the two semaphores for
"n" and "d", and it originally stood for Nuclear Disarmament. It is
*not* any kind of mutilated cross -- that is either made up after the
fact, as the moderator suggested, or maybe someone was pulling's
someone's chain ("Yeah, sure, it's a cross; lemme tell ya how they got
it!"). This has happened once or twice in history, I suspect.
The swastika was an ancient Germanic symbol for the Wheel of Life. It
was used for centuries long before it became the symbol for Nazi Germany.
The pentacle, or pentagram, is *very* old. It has been used by a
number of religions besides Witchcraft and, unfortunately it has been
adopted by Satanists and turned upside down (much like they also
invert the Cross). The pentagram has been a sacred symbol for many,
and was even used in the early Christian Church to symbolize the Five
Wounds of Christ.
Summary: Peace Sign does not indicate Satanism. Swastika does not
indicate Satanism. Pentacle/pentagram does not indicate Satanism.
Although Satanists and other miscreants may use and pervert them, they
are not automatic signals of evil.
--
-----Susan Harwood Kaczmarczik-------------------------------*<:-)-------------
"The whims that we're weeping for our parents would be beaten for."--Kate Bush
----------amadeus@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu---------The University of Texas @Austin---tp0x+@cs.cmu.edu (Thomas Price) (03/14/91)
In article <Mar.5.23.06.07.1991.22730@athos.rutgers.edu> amadeus@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Susan Harwood Kaczmarczik) writes: >The swastika was an ancient Germanic symbol for the Wheel of Life. It >was used for centuries long before it became the symbol for Nazi Germany. It even predates the ancient Germanics. It is an ancient "Aryan" symbol, meaning it was used by the people living in central Asia before the hieratic city-states of Mesopotamia (4th millenium BC) and a piece of ivory with a swastika on it, found in Southeastern Siberia, has been dated at 40,000 years old, if I remember correctly. A clockwise swastika represents creation of the world of transient forms, as in the Amerindian creation myth where the Creator made a duck out of mud and then, to save time, whirled it around and around until it looked as if there were many ducks and behold! there were many ducks. A counterclockwise swastika represents meditation on the eternal, a reversal of the process of perception of transient forms, and is significantly found in conjunction with meditating figures, mainly on artifacts from the Indian sub-continent. Source: _the Masks of God, Vol.1: Primitive Mythology_, by Joseph Campbell. >The pentacle, or pentagram, is *very* old. It has been used by a >number of religions besides Witchcraft and, unfortunately it has been >adopted by Satanists and turned upside down (much like they also >invert the Cross). The pentagram has been a sacred symbol for many, >and was even used in the early Christian Church to symbolize the Five >Wounds of Christ. One of the interesting things about the pentagram is that a shockingly large number of the intersections of the lines within the figure divide one or more of those lines into two segments related to one another according to the "Golden Ratio," a recurring feature of geometry in both nature and ancient art and architecture. Source: _the Geometry of Art and Life_, Matila Ghyka (Dover Books) Tom Price tp0x@cs.cmu.edu Disclaimer: We are trapped within our notion of what is right.