The Logistics of Raising the Dead.

The actual process and logistics of raising the dead in terms of a judgement day are far more considered in Zoroastrianism than any other derivative Apocalyptic religion. According to Ahura Mazda it is actually far easier to recreate the dead than it was to create them in the first place, which makes sense.

...each one of them, when created by me, was herein more difficult than causing the resurrection, for it is an assistance to me in the resurrection that they exist, but when they were formed it was not forming the future out of the past.

Observe that when that which was not was then produced, why is it not possible to produce again that which was?

The actual raising of the dead in physical terms is considered to take place over a periodic of fifty seven years correspondent with the life of Soshyant, the end time renovator, so they're not all raised at once but through natural means reborn, such that the final number corresponds to all that have lived over the 12,000 year period of development.

Soshyant will lead the forces of good on earth into a last great battle, in which gods and demons will also take part. This battle and what attends it will last for fifty-seven years; and then in the world year 12,000 Frasgird will come, with eternal bliss.

Soshyant will converse with the Spiritual beings for thirty years, and the action of Renovation will spread throughout the Seven Climes in fifty-seven years.

in the fifty-seven years of Soshyant they prepare all the dead, and all men stand up; whoever is righteous and whoever is wicked, every human creature, they rouse up from the spot where its life departs

Soshyant will perform five yasnas. In each performance he will raise one fifth of the dead and at the fifth yasna he will raise all the dead. That is to say that the Frasgird will take place during the five epagomenae so that the eternal life will begin on the last Norouz.

So it was a great assembly of all that have lived that they envisioned both good and evil this accomplished by Ahura Mazda, it might be expected that people would sort of notice that the dead were being raised, but not necessarily so as this relates only to their physical re-construction.

Then is the assembly of the Sadvastaran, where all mankind will stand at this time; in that assembly every one sees his own good deeds and his own evil deeds

Afterwards, they set the righteous man apart from the wicked; and then the righteous is for heaven , and they cast the wicked back to hell.
As it says that, on the day when the righteous man is parted from the wicked, the tears of every one, thereupon, run down unto his legs

There is also the factor of spiritual restoration whereas the physical raising is of Ahura Mazda it is Soshyant that facilitates the spiritual through a curious ritual involving Gochihr which relates to a conjectural serpent that joins the intersection points of the ecliptic and galactic planes, from Gemini above Taurus to Scorpio-Sagitarrius.

Gochihr is not easily understood but involves the release of souls bound within the moon, as it were through the slaying of the sacrificial bull of Taurus.

As Gochihr falls in the celestial sphere from a moon-beam on to the earth, the distress of the earth becomes such-like as that of a sheep when a wolf falls upon it

Soshyant with his comrades will perform the rite for the restoration of the dead; and they will slay the Hadayos bull for that rite; from its fat and the white Hom they will prepare the immortal beverage, and give it to all mankind and all men will become immortal for ever and ever.

Those who had lived up to maturity will be restored as if they were forty years old, and those who had died young will be restored as youths of fifteen years. There will be no more hunger, thirst, old age, or death and there will be sexual satisfaction without procreation.

Spiritual judgement then takes place, the righteous are restored and the unrighteous dismissed. There is the notion of the resurrection body but this doesn't seem functional, more a case of poetic metaphor.

The resurrection body is described as follows : “their bones through light will shine like crystal among gems, the flesh on their bones will be like the coral on trees, the tendons on their bones will be like golden chains on carved crystal, the blood will course in their veins like perfumed wine in a golden glass, and the humours in their bodies will be more fragrant than musk and ambergris and camphor”

The renovation involves the termination of negative spiritual forces and obviously those who associate with them, the final battle understood taking place also at the cosmological level thus having astrological association, the role of Soshyant is similar to that of Sumerian Ninurta in that regard.

After the Frasgird there will be no demons because there will be no deceit, no lies because no lying, no Ahreman because no destructiveness, no hell because no sin, no strife because no wrath, no vengefulness because no injury, no pain because no sickness, no grief because no fear, no need because no greed, no shame because no ugliness, no deceit because no desire to deceive, no irreligion because no false doctrine, no evil because its source will have been destroyed.

The origins for the basis of all of this are totally obscure, the first suggestions for such a plan only date back to the time of the writing of the Gathas around 1,200-1,000 Bc, the Soshyant archetype does trace back to Sumeria but there is no suggestion from there he would take part in an end time scenario, the figure of Ahura Maza bears correspondence to the High God Anu within his white Temple in Uruk, but in that tradition physical reconstitution would certainly have been of Enki, the Zoroastrian tradition is far more simplistic than the Sumerians would have envisioned such a scenario.

When Soshyant accomplishes the Renovation, the luminaries will return to the original perfection of stasis in their exaltations. “The sun, moon, and stars will exist, but there will be no need for day light or turning or shinning of light, for the whole world will be light and devoid of darkness,and all creatures will be light.

Being light, they will be full of bliss. And all creatures will have one will and one *desire. Individual men will feel no envy at the joy of the totality of creatures, but will rejoice together with it”

It's a good starting point though and one that is little known, of course given the general lateness of most extant zoroastrian texts it is always open to debate who has influenced who in terms of similarity to Christian and Islamic apocalyptic tradition.

The important thing in all of this is that nobody believes any of it, or at least not too many...

The Coming of Soshyant

a reply to: Kantzveldt

There is the notion of the resurrection body but this doesn't seem functional, more a case of poetic metaphor.
. . .
The important thing in all of this is that nobody believes any of it, or at least not too many...

I would state it as many believe parts of it, specifically The Light.

Three different times last night I wrote this poem as thread replies. Three different times I closed the browser without hitting reply. The threads didn't seem worthy.

Into the darkness
you called my name.

Into my bedroom
the darkness came.

It gibbered and danced
calling out "Hark!"

Oh get real.
I'm not afraid of the dark.

There seems to be a race on, a competition to be the highest and brightest in the light. Comparing each other to each other, boasting of spiritual superiority.

My people evolved on this functioning world. My people are older than immortality itself. I will be gathered to my people.

a reply to: pthena

Perhaps in theory everyone will have come to believe and also everyone will have come not to believe, a certain balance.

I wonder about the highest and brightest light when compared to the yearly cycle of the Sun, even though it's generally presumed that the advancement of knowledge and reason will continue ad infinitum perhaps that isn't the case, that the Sun requires a winter vacation, though maybe that's a somewhat subjective perspective.

The Zoroastrian perspective though doesn't carry through into natural phenomena except in the metaphorical sense, darkness isn't in any serious peril, it's only spiritual insight.

a reply to: Kantzveldt

A very hard nut to crack!

At first, I thought to lecture upon primitive animist worldview, and how metaphor must be a metaphor of something or it has no meaning.

Example: A man says of another "He is a bear" - a metaphor. But how was the metaphor label earned?

A man lay down and went to sleep. Six or eight days later he woke up and went for a drink of water. What had he done for six or eight days? He partook of bear-ness and hibernated. Not five months like a bear, but neither was it like a normal human.

Perhaps in theory everyone will have come to believe and also everyone will have come not to believe, a certain balance.

But I can't expect a non-animist to speak like an animist. However, I discovered last night that Ovid by mistake, gave a name to the liminal goddess of door hinges ( see Fasti Chapter 6 on June, it's quite entertaining ) The smallest of deities, yet the foundation of Roman civilization. But then, I've known and seen since 5 years of age the essence of door knob-ness.

Modern minds can comprehend as-if-ness. May Carnea Goddess of Door Handles, Bodily Organs and the Heart help me here.

The Zoroastrian perspective though doesn't carry through into natural phenomena except in the metaphorical sense

Zoroastrian Ethics very much do carry through for the animist and the modernist alike, it's the acting out and living in the phenomenal.

The big question: What is immortality the metaphor of?

Here's the as-if-ness. Imagine being immortal. What manner of life must be lived in order to be satisfying and pleasant as a permanent mode of existence? Live that way.

That's the best answer I can give, I think.

a reply to: pthena

Immortality relates to strength through sustenance and is directly associate with the plant of life which Ameretat is the personification of, this also relates to the winged disk as i outlined in Dilmun and the secret of immortality.

Ameretat is a case then were Sumerian correspondence can be seen and Enki is the facilitator of immortality through the water-plant-carnal transitions.


Amərətāt, "Immortality"

Amərətāt → Amurdād of plants

Already in the Gathas, Ameretat is closely allied with Haurvatat, the Amesha Spenta of "Wholeness" and health. Addressing Ahura Mazda in Yasna 34.11, the prophet Zoroaster exclaims that "both Wholeness and Immortality are for sustenance" in the Kingdom of God. In the same verse, as also in Yasna 45.10 and 51.7, parallels are drawn between Ameretat and Haurvatat on the one hand and "endurance and strength" on the other.

Through the association with plants and water, Ameretat and Haurvatat are consequently identified with food and drink


The antithetical counterpart of Ameretat is the demon (daeva) Shud "hunger", while Haurvatat's counterpart is Tarshna "thirst". Ameretat and Haurvatat are the only two Amesha Spentas who are not already assigned an antithetical counterpart in the Gathas. In the eschatological framework of Yasht 1.25, Ameretat and Haurvatat represent the reward of the righteous after death


Ameretat is invoked on the seventh day of each month together with the Gaokarena (the "White Haoma"). This Younger Avestan allusion to immortality is properly developed in Bundahishn 27.2, where White Haoma is considered to be the "death-dispelling chief of plants." From this White Hom, the ambrosia of immortality will be prepared at the final renovation of the world

Ameretat

In Sumeria it was actually Ninshubur first minister to Anu that had all of this covered, not only resurrection in terms of arranging emergence from the underworld through provision of a substitute, one in one out, but also in preparing the sacred beverage through her inter-actions as Orion with the bull of Heaven and Canis Major as the plant Goddess spider Uttu which related to the eight ingrediants of the brew, she was the intermediary between Heaven and the people and had her own version of strength through joy.

Anunnaki and the cultivation of Opium

Ninshubur and the magical brew

a reply to: Kantzveldt

once you attempt to address the " logistics " of raising the dead - it opens up a lot of very interesting questions

a few of my thoughts are :

1 - where do the dead go ? TBH i find the established religious explainations farcical - you are alive - then you are dead and [ some variant of " limbo " ] then you are brought back to be with god for eternity


2 - what is the actual point of death ? - see above . a 1 ~ 10 thousand year ` gap ` in eternity means nothing -= why bother ?

3 - once " reborn " you are ` with god ` in " paradise " for eternity - err yeah right - to actually aprreciate this - the human psyche would have to change so drasticaly that a person [ well former person ] would bear zero semblence to thier former self

4 - whoes benefit is this for ? why do we need an " after life "

a reply to: ignorant_ape


1- In physical terms the dead go into the Earth from which they can be physically reborn, in spiritual terms they don't go anywhere in particular because spirituality is a non-existential phenomena related to pattern which can also be related to information, thus the spirit or soul has the potential to be translated into the great data-base in the sky.

2-There is no point to death, the only point in retaining information would be if you wanted to restore it at some point.

3-Once rejoined with the physical body it's a case of as you were.

4-The after life only provides the potential for the full restoration of life.

a reply to: pthena

Humans and their imagination =)

a reply to: Kantzveldt

1- In physical terms the dead go into the Earth from which they can be physically reborn, in spiritual terms they don't go anywhere in particular because spirituality is a non-existential phenomena related to pattern which can also be related to information, thus the spirit or soul has the potential to be translated into the great data-base in the sky.

Back in the old days, pre-Akkadian, the priests, priestesses, kings, queens, etc. had to pass knowledge of their roles in society orally and ritually. Through ritual, the priests and priestesses became the physical manifestation of the deities. Without the proper instruction the ritual would be useless. Like the scene from:

His campaign manager did his job of getting the candidate elected but that's it. The Senator had no clue as to what a Senator was.

We get more information about the ancient world as a result of physical evidence; buildings, art, artifacts, writings, than we do from spiritualists doing séances. (but then you know this better than I do and I feel rather awkward even writing anything, student instructing teacher sort of scenario )

Thanks to Enheduanna and archeologists and translators we know a lot. And Ninshubur was forgotten until you remind us

So the new teachers like Zarathustra tell us that we can be remembered just like the goddesses and gods of old. And then mystery cults start springing up, common people huddled together, separate from the society at large, secretly gaining "immortality".

My Calculus teacher told a story about when she went to a costume party once all wet with strands of kelp draped over her, it went over everyones heads. She was the guy who was drowned for oath-breaking by exposing the secret Pythagorean knowledge of irrational numbers, exposing that those who taught that all numbers were able to be portrayed as ratios knew that to be false. Therefore rationality has its limits.

Uh Oh! I'm rambling. I forgot what point I was trying to make. Better take a break.

Remember the old priesthood. In a sense Zarathustra was teaching priesthood of all believers, maybe Jesus did too.

Without understanding what immortality means it's quite counterproductive to even mention it to the untutored. I think.

ETA

That makes me sound like an elitist suppressor of knowledge , maybe there's a balance.

a reply to: Kantzveldt

I just noticed that this thread is in Paranormal, that should give some latitude in telling strange stories.

Once upon a time in Okla-hom-a I did drink a tea made from the local variety of Ephedra, as a treatment for cold symptoms, it was the custom of the people I was living with. At the time, I was suffering from dysentery due to bad water from a highway rest stop. I don't know if the dysentery wasted the tea or if the tea eventually stopped the dysentery.

There is another story that is quite strange that I hesitate to relate.

a reply to: pthena

Strange stories about strange brews probably should be kept secret...

a reply to: Kantzveldt

Okay. Here's some mood music in case you need cheering up.

a reply to: Kantzveldt

Perhaps some point in the future it will be possible to revive the dead? Perhaps cryogenic freezing is an option. Perhaps taking a DNA sample can rebirth that person...but I dont know if it would be the same consciousness...probably not. Also potential maybe to create simulation of DNA in computer, to maybe regenerate a person... I dont know. But imagine if the same exact DNA was some how revived back to life... as a body, even if it had no memory of its past life, I wonder if it would interact with itself the same way as it did in its past life, like 'grow into its truest, highest self'... which is an interesting thought, primarily because the notion of limitation, related to anything potentially considered essential (as in essentialism), as in, theories of soul. What I mean is; if my soul was in a different body, would I behave differently? If my soul was in a different body would my soul be able to achieve things better? I personally cannot imagine with my mind and body in this life, ever doing the appropriate learning or cultivating the proper hand stillness and abilities to become a brain surgeon, I dont know if I had 100 incarnations if I could focus continuously in each of them if I could ever be a brain surgeon, so that I think says something fundamentally about my essence, that my essence, my spirit has intrinsic limits perhaps, that are not body dependent. I also must wonder how much of my minds abilities are thanks to my body and genetics, how much of my talent is my spirit truly responsible for? That got a bit ranty, but interesting topics are interesting!

Eliphas Levi says it's pretty straightforward. It's sort of tough to meet the conditions unless you can bury the decedent on very flat ground.

You have to mark out a perfectly straight line 4500 paces long from the tomb using some sort of surveying equipment so you don't wander off the line more than a pace. Then, starting at the tomb, you walk off the 4500 paces exactly (can't miss a beat!), then you lie down as if in a coffin and state loudly "Let the dead rise from their tombs!" Then stand and call the decedent's name three times.

Levi swears it works every time.

a reply to: ImaFungi

It's true of course that a clone wouldn't have the same memories and therefore soul, same person but different, the ancient Egyptians entrusted their consciousness to Ba birds which could go to and fro from the tomb ascending to the Heavens and returning, i don't know how reliable they are though.

Ba


a reply to: Bedlam

That sounds more like a Masonic ritual...

a reply to: Kantzveldt

Not one I'm familiar with. But you know I'm not sure if Levi was one or not.


eta: yep he was

a reply to: Kantzveldt

I looked at the title again, Logistics. That's the actual from here-to-thereness, the carrying, the one-in-one-out-ness.

Strange stories about strange brews probably should be kept secret...

So I will fictionalize, that way no one will know.

So I typed into google, "Show me the link to an essay which will explain at least most, if not all that this thread is about."

And like magic, a link appeared:

Interpretation of Inanna’s Descent Myth
The essay as a whole explains everything. All the characters are there, even the moon and the bull and even the food and drink of life. The characters who are most important to understand are Ninshubur on Inanna's behalf and Geshtianna on behalf of her brother Dumuzi.

This essay should be read in toto, but here's an important part:

The Return

With the dye cast, the realization that Dumuzi is no longer welcome on earth, Inanna, Dumuzi’s mother and sister begin to weep for his fate. Inanna has been denied her beloved consort, even if by her own willful act. But the “very nature of earth’s life, and of the goddess herself, prevents the possibility of her having an undying, single partner.” [1] Geshtinanna, who is also mortal, is even more grief stricken.

Being very close to Dumuzi, Geshtianna offers to take his place in the underworld. This is not the grand gesture of a Christ on the cross, but much more personal and deeply feminine. “He gave his life for all men, a grand gesture. She offers herself, courageously accepting her own destiny, for one man she cares for, her brother.” “Her motivation is human passion -- love and grief.” [1]

Geshtianna, whose name means “vine of heaven”, is thought of in the myths as a “wise woman”. In service to the human dimension, she does what she can to redeem the one lost to the underworld. “She acquiesces to her own cutting down.” “She does not flee from her fate, nor does she denigrate the goddess of fate as do Gilgamesh and the patriarchy. She volunteers. And in this courageous, conscious acquiescing, she ends the pattern of scapegoating by choosing to confront the underworld herself.” [1]

Geshtianna “is the result of, and an embodiment of, the whole initiation process.” “She feels personally and can be lovingly related as partner of the masculine. She is also willing to serve both the light and dark aspects of her own depths and of the goddess.” [1] She has not yet made the descent, but there is no struggle “between her instincts to relate to her beloved, and her instinct to stand alone and for her own depths.”

Geshtianna’s offer moves Inanna as the two sides of the feminine meet -- passion and compassion, willfulness and feeling. It is the presence of her earthly sister, Geshtianna, that completes Inanna’s journey on earth, and reconnects her to Dumuzi, an other, and so to all of life.

Inanna decrees that each will spend half the year in the underworld. At Arali, a stopping place on the way to the Great Below, Inanna blesses the brother and sister with both eternal life and death. Dumuzi is thus married to the composite goddess Inanna-Ereshkigal, and as such is to experience all of the woman. Not only is he to know the love goddess, but the goddess of death as well.

In the end, Ereshkigal is praised.

This pretty much explains everything people need to know, I think. There is another part of the essay:

In the Descent myth, “Ereshkigal is described first as enraged, due to Inanna’s invasion of her realm; secondly, as actively destructive; third, as suffering; and finally as grateful and generous.” “There is a quality of primal rage about her. She is full of fury, greed, the fear of loss, and even of self spite.” “And she sends her gatekeeper to deal with the intruder, a male to defend her.” “These images suggest that chaotic defensive furies, such as rage, greed, and even the unleashing of the animus, are inevitable aspects of the archetypal underworld. They are the ways the unconscious reacts to unwelcome visitation.”

Some more fiction:

One-in-one-out-ness. If someone actually believed in resurrection, they must also have the willingness to carry another within their own unconscious. That's the only logical logistics. I read that in a book somewhere, just can't remember the name off hand.

a reply to: Bedlam

So is that the raising of Hirim Abif?

a reply to: pthena

Yes lets look at that further, Ninshubur as First Minister to Anu was the intermediary between the High God and the people, in that capacity she wanted people to see their God, hence her involvement with the opiate containing sacred brew that facilitated insight into the Divine and the immortal.

The evidence for this is all pre-Dynastic to early Dynastic, it was either suppressed during those first Dynasties or by the Akkadians and this practise is no more seen in Southern and Central Mesopotamia, variants of this practise continue elsewhere to the North and West, it is the basis for Soma or Haoma and remains the essential sacrament of the Apocalyptic tradition in Zoroastrianism.

Usage of Haoma

Ninshubur had the association with the double doors of Heaven, the opening of the doors of perception, her role in the Necronomicon made her the darling of the counter culture, though her role there was based on the texts of returning Inanna from the Underworld, which she also had full access to, the only Deity with such a Multi-pass.

Ninsubur, the minister of the great place, the underworld, greeted Nergal: "You are the lord who has made the bandits come forth from the mountains. As with Enlil , no part of a foreign land escapes your grasp. Hero, for Enlil you piled up Enlil's enemies in a single day. Hating Nergal, as fire, you rise up in the lands where the sun rises.

Sumerian conceptions of the Afterlife

Because of her Underworld capacity she was associated with Meslamtaea one of the twins of Gemini in the sense of the opening door of that portal into the Underworld as consort, or Nergal the God of Death who assimilated his cult, the point being that Ninshubur accessed all areas and could even turn her hand to organizing the Underworld, and certainly facilitating the process of one in one out, she was credited with running the Universe on behalf of Anu.

So a complex role, and the opening of the doors of Heaven and the Gates of Hell will always source back to her and nobody better to orchestrate the Apocalypse, and finally allow people to see their God, which is all she ever wanted.