U2I@NIHCU (01/15/90)
Trivial remarks follow about symbols (swastikas, etc.). Serious-minded readers may delete. As already remarked, the swastika was once a thoroughly respectable symbol, occurring in American Indian art, Tibetan art, and the art of many cultures throughout the world. When not purely decorative, it was usually a variation on a circle divided into quarters, and as such stood for the sun, or the earth, or the four seasons, or the Wheel of Life, the cycle of birth and death, or whatever. As far as I can tell, the Nazis picked it up because they wanted a conspicuous, easily identifiable symbol that was not already spoken for, and that had been used by the ancient Germanic peoples. The Boy Scouts have an honorary organization called the Order of the Arrow. It used to be called the Order of the Swastika, but of course this had to be changed with the rise of Naziism. (Along similar lines, schoolchildren, when saluting the flag, used to extend the right arm to point to the flag from the occurrence of the word "flag" to the end of the pledge. This was discontinued in the summer of 1942.) According to a political newsletter that I used to receive in the late 60's, the Peace Sign as drawn by Keith but without the circle (chevron point up with a vertical stroke through it) was also used by the Nazis, and also found in pre-Christian Germanic art, where it occurred as a symbol of the Hero sacrificing his own interests for the good of the community. More recently (I am no longer quoting the newsletter) the symbol was revived in Britain as the logo of the Nuclear Disarmament Campaign, In semaphore code (used for signalling at a distance when the signaller can be seen -- uses two flags, held out like the hands of a clock, except that there are only eight positions instead of twelve -- Boy Scouts used to learn it), one flag up and one down is "D", while one flag at 4:30 and one at 7:30 is "N", so that the two together stood for ND, or Nuclear Disarmament, a cause which became associated with other causes. The crescent, or crescent and star, is used by Moslems, but is not a universal symbol with them, or a particularly sacred one. I have heard a Moslem astronomer I know speculate that it may reflect an ancient tradition about the position of the moon in the sky relative to one of the brighter stars of the zodiac on the night when Mohammed received his call to be a prophet. (Moslems use a lunar calendar.) It is my understanding that the Islamic use of the symbol cannot be traced back to the the earliest years of Islam. It owes much of its current popularity to extraneous conditions, such as the need to have a symbol to use instead of a cross in certain contexts. The International Red Cross is known in Moslem countries as the Red Crescent, and in Israel as the Red Mogen David (shield of David -- six-pointed star). One would expect the moon to occur (as it does) as a popular symbol in many Nature-religions, as a symbol of death and rebirth (because the moon disappears and re-appears each month), or of femaleness and fertility (because of the resemblance, and arguably the causal connection, between its cycles and the human fertility cycle). ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** Thanks to ??? [sorry, I hit a wrong button and just destroyed my mail] for reminding us that "An idol is nothing in this world" KJV or "An idol has no real existence" RSV (I Corinthians 8:4). It seems to me clear that every material object is a part of the creation that God looked upon and called good. It can be mis-used by rebellious creatures, whether human or angelic, but it has no evil inherent in itself. Likewise, no symbol is evil in itself, though it may be used to express an evil intent. Where that intent is missing, I see no grounds for worry -- just as I see no reason to accuse someone of anti-gypsy, or anti-Egyptian, bigotry if he uses the verb "to gyp," especially given that the chances are very good indeed that he does not know and has never thought about its origin. I once heard someone warn against Transcendental Meditation on the grounds that the "word" that the meditator silently repeats as a supposed aid to relaxation is not really nonsense syllables, but rather the name of a Hindu demon, who is likely to enter the meditator when thus called. This reminds me of the old Irish custom of pointing directly at a person or animal when saying, "Come here," on the grounds that the fairies deliberately adopts names of persons or domestic animals, and that if you simply say, "Come, Spot!" a fairy named Spot will be enabled to appear and carry you off. Friends, our Saviour has not left us as unprotected as all that. Yours, James Kiefer