Showing 256 articles
Grace
Author: Tarini VaidyaJanuary 13, 2019
Grace has become an old fashioned word, graciousness and courtesy have become old world values, almost valueless in today’s environment. The world has gone über brash. Billboards extoll the ‘virtue’ of Attitude, with a capital A: “Wear your Attitude,” screams one, as though attitude were an aspirational achievement! A young generation has grown up with [...]
Rodin and the Art of Ancient Greece: the transcendent reality of sculpture
Author: Siobhan Cait FarrarSeptember 14, 2018
This Spring, the British Museum opened the exhibition ‘Rodin and the Art of Ancient Greece’, which formed a poetic tripartite tribute to the artist, his love of ancient Greek sculpture and of the British Museum itself − Rodin famously spent hours studying the museum collections. Side by side were maquettes, marbles and famous bronzes of [...]
How Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism shaped Chinese Culture
Author: Julian ScottSeptember 14, 2018
In the beginning, so the Chinese legends say, there was only chaos and from this chaos emerged Yin and Yang, two primordial opposing forces which, when they interacted with one another, brought forth the universe. The continuing interaction of these two opposites produced the constant change that characterizes life. For Chinese thought, it is necessary [...]
The Magic of Thoth-Hermes
Author: Agostino DominiciSeptember 14, 2018
The Western esoteric tradition has its roots deeply embedded in a distant past. An important part of this ‘tradition’ has been preserved in the so-called Hermetic teachings also known as Hermeticism. In this article I am going to highlight some basic aspects of the Hermetic teachings focusing especially on its magical aspect. The main sources [...]
Gnomes in Folklore and Fairy Tales
Author: Ania HajostSeptember 14, 2018
Folklore and fairy tales are well known for describing all sort of incredible creatures: gnomes, dwarfs, mermaids, pixies, giants and speaking animals and birds. The famous alchemist Paracelsus made a classification of these mostly invisible beings and called them ‘elementals’ or ‘nature spirits’. He said that they can be found within the Earth (gnomes, fairies [...]
Ethics and The Value of Sport
Author: Suhail ChandhokSeptember 14, 2018
Despite our uniquely personal DNA there is one facet that arrives with each and every one of us, within days of our opening our eyes to the world for the first time – our innate nature to want to PLAY! Whether it is a doll, a ball, cars, rattles or imaginary battles, we are given [...]
The Art of Devotion
Author: Kanika MehraJuly 29, 2018
In the wee hours of the morning, Emperor Akbar awoke to the sweet melodious singing of Haridas, guru of the celebrated singer of his court, Tansen. Haridas had been singing a dawn raga. Overwhelmed, Akbar inquired why Tansen was not able to sing like his guru Haridas. Tansen replied that there was one big difference [...]
Haiku: Abundance in Brevity
Author: Trishya ScrewvalaJuly 29, 2018
The Japanese poetic form of haiku, is a very succinct poem that exemplifies simplicity. It is one of the most recognizable and popular forms of poetry today and has travelled far beyond Japan’s shores, with writers composing haiku in Spanish, English and even Bengali as seen in the works of Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore. It [...]
The Power of the Photograph
Author: Tom MoranJune 3, 2018
Photography is a process of image-making that is less than 200 years old, yet at the time of its invention, no one could have imagined the impact it would have on the global population, becoming a form of communication that could rival the English Language for its universality. What is it that obsesses us about [...]
Rome and its Esoteric Origins – Part I
Author: Agostino DominiciJune 3, 2018
Many historians have highlighted the immense legacy that the Romans left to ‘modern’ man. With a bit of exaggeration, we could even say that mentally, politically, administratively, legally and artistically we Westerners are all pretty much Romans. This legacy, contrary to the still current ‘theories’, which portray the ancient Romans as a rough, warmongering people, [...]
Cupid and Psyche
Author: Miha KosirJune 3, 2018
So much has been written about love that another article would seems to be almost unnecessary. But then again, do we really know what love is? Where does it come from, is it external or internal, do we need to awaken it or do we earn it? It has such tremendous powers that we can [...]
The importance of culture and why ‘no’ is the new ‘yes’
Author: Sabine LeitnerJune 3, 2018
The health and quality of a seed is not enough to ensure its flourishing. It also needs the right environment to do so: good soil, enough water and the right amount of light and warmth according to the needs of its nature. Using this image as an analogy, we could say that for human beings [...]