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Edited Hubble Space Telescope image of the globular cluster M4. Color/processing variant.
Image source: www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2017/messier-4
See also: www.flickr.com/photos/nasahubble/sets/72157687169041265
Original caption: This sparkling picture taken by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope shows the centre of globular cluster M 4. The power of Hubble has resolved the cluster into a multitude of glowing orbs, each a colossal nuclear furnace. M 4 is relatively close to us, lying 7200 light-years distant, making it a prime object for study. It contains several tens of thousand stars and is noteworthy in being home to many white dwarfs — the cores of ancient, dying stars whose outer layers have drifted away into space. In July 2003, Hubble helped make the astounding discovery of a planet called PSR B1620-26 b, 2.5 times the mass of Jupiter, which is located in this cluster. Its age is estimated to be around 13 billion years — almost three times as old as the Solar System! It is also unusual in that it orbits a binary system of a white dwarf and a pulsar (a type of neutron star). Amateur stargazers may like to track M 4 down in the night sky. Use binoculars or a small telescope to scan the skies near the orange-red star Antares in Scorpius. M 4 is bright for a globular cluster, but it won’t look anything like Hubble’s detailed image: it will appear as a fuzzy ball of light in your eyepiece. On Wednesday 5 September, the European Southern Observatory (ESO) will publish a wide-field image of M 4, showing the full spheroidal shape of the globular cluster. See it at www.eso.org on Wednesday.
Other original caption: M4, located in the constellation Scorpius, is a huge, spherical collection of stars known as a globular cluster. Just 5,500 light-years away, it is the closest globular cluster to Earth. Because of its apparent magnitude of 5.9 and proximity to Antares, one of the brightest stars in the night sky, M4 is relatively easy to find with a small telescope. The cluster is best spotted in July.
M4 was discovered in 1746 by the Swiss astronomer Jean-Philippe Loys de Chéseaux. Home to more than 100,000 stars, the cluster is predicted to contain up to 40,000 white dwarfs — the cores of ancient, dead stars whose outer layers have drifted away into space. As white dwarfs age, they grow cooler, fainter, and more difficult to detect. Therefore, a globular cluster’s age can be inferred from the age of its faintest white dwarf. Because the stars in these clusters are some of the oldest in the universe, up to 13 billion years old, astronomers are able to use them to estimate the age of the universe.
The white dwarfs in M4 are less than one-billionth the apparent brightness of the faintest stars that can be seen with the naked eye. Even the brightest of the detected white dwarfs are no more luminous than a 100-watt light bulb seen at the moon’s distance. The faintest are comparable to a 2.5-watt night-light at the same distance.
The ancient orbs comprising M4 were captured by Hubble in both visible and infrared light. The resulting image offers a view into the center of a cluster that is more than twice the age of our solar system.
St Nicholas, Landwade, Suffolk
An elusive church, difficult to pin down, difficult to find and difficult of access. For a start, St Nicholas isn't a parish church at all. It sits beside the remains of Landwade Hall, which was partly destroyed by a German bomb during the Second World War. Pevsner isn't very kind about the bit that was left, but it looks lovely to me. The Landwade Hall estate was part of the parish of Fordham in Cambridgeshire, but the church had long been a chapel of ease for the parish of Exning in Suffolk.
Exning and the part of Newmarket north of the town centre were an island of Suffolk within the county of Cambridgeshire until as recently as 1895, when the Cambridgeshire parish of Newmarket All Saints was moved into Suffolk to join the two bits together. One of the options at the time of the revision of English Counties in 1974 was to move Newmarket and Exning completely into Cambridgeshire. However, this was voted down in a local referendum, and Newmarket and Exning remain semi-detached parts of Suffolk. The corridor connecting them is only a hundred yards wide.
A further attempt to tidy up the border between the two counties came in 1994. The changes affected a number of parishes, but the amount of land changing hands in each case was actually very small. In total, two people were moved from Suffolk into Cambridgeshire, and ten people came the other way. These were all living in the former grounds of Landwade Hall, and with them came their church.
One of the curiosities here is that you can sense the border, new as it is. Landwade Hall is secret and wooded, you can hear the call of pheasants and the impatient whinny of horses in the adjacent paddock. Back on the road, you cross the railway bridge into Cambridgeshire and are immediately confronted with the vast Turners distribution warehouses, and beyond them the nightmarish A11 and A14. No county in the British Isles has been affected so much by human habitation as Cambridgeshire. 92% of the land area is under buildings, industry or farming. Of the remaining 8%, hardly any of it is covered by trees, since Cambridgeshire is also the least wooded county in Britain. Even Greater Manchester and the West Midlands have more wild areas. Cambridgeshire is even less wooded now that it has lost Landwade.
The lane through the woods up to the cottages is not sign-posted, apart from one reminding Turners' drivers that it wouldn't be a terribly good idea to go up there, and when you get up to the cottages the driveway to the Hall is also not signposted. From this point you are on a private road without a public right of way. There is, however, a public footpath which runs up to the church from the road. This leaves the main road about 100m further north of the lane to the cottages. Beside it is the former gatehouse, but I am told that the gate there is quite often locked.
Reaching the Hall is like stepping out of time. The church sits behind the Hall, you are on private land, and at this point it is worth saying that St Nicholas church is in private ownership. This is an unusual state of affairs, but not unique - in Suffolk the same is true of the Estate churches at Ickworth and Hengrave. For centuries, Landwade Hall was the home of the Cotton family, and that is why you will want to come here, for the church is also their mausoleum.
The exterior of the church is not particularly pretty, since it has been cemented over, but it is interesting as an example of a small church that was all built in one go. It dates from the mid-15th century, but is not ennobled with a clerestory and nave aisles like its contemporary at Denston. The window tracery is Perpendicular, but that is about it.
The church is kept locked, but if you can gain access you step into an open, light, aisleless space. A small image niche is set beside the opposite door. There are some 15th century benches which must have been installed when the church was built. The rood screen retains its rood beam, and rises full length to it. However, it is hard to see where a rood loft might have been, and there is no surviving evidence of a stairway up to it. Indeed, because there are two chancel aisles, it is strung between two pillars. Further, there is very little clearance space between the rood beam and the ceiling.
The nave windows contain a sequence of heraldic shields commemorating the various marriages of the Cottons. Several also have good 15th century figures in them, and there are more in the chancel aisles. None are complete, and there must once have been more, but they are rather striking in their surroundings of clear glass. The only modern glass is Francis Spear's east window, a 1966 depiction of St Nicholas calming the waters from a boat, with a barrel full of children at his feet.
All this provides the setting for the Cotton memorials, some of the best in Suffolk. They are in the chancel and in the chancel aisles. In the south aisle is the biggest, to Sir John Cotton, who died 1620. His inscription reads: Here lyeth the bodye of Sir John Cotton knight the son and heire of Sir John Cotton he married three wives the first Elizabeth daughter to Sir Thomas Carrell esq of Warneham in Sussex, the second Elizabeth daughter to Sir Humfrey Bradburne knight of Bradburne in the county of Darby, by whome he had noe issue, the third was Anne daughter to Sir Richard Haughton Baronet of Haughton Towre in the county of Lancaster by whom he had issue, James, John and Katherine, which James and Katherine died in the life time of there father, he departed this life in the 77th year of his age Anno Domini 1620 and lieth in a vault in the south ile of this church made by himself. Sir John lies in front of it with one of his wives, presumably Anne. The monument is surrounded by its original iron railings, as is the one to its right to Sir John Cotton of 1689, presumably the son of the first Sir John, given that he must have been quite old by the time he married his third wife. Given that the two monuments are from either side of the Commonwealth, they are surprisingly similar. A third Sir John, who died in 1712, is quite different, being very white and classical.
In the north aisle, there is a grand six-poster memorial to a still earlier Sir John, who died in 1593. There are other memorials here too, but like those in the chancel they have mostly lost their inscriptions. The most striking chancel memorial is the long altar tomb endways on to the east, as at Burgate. You have to keep your wits about you so that you don't fall over it. There is also a brass inscription in the chancel, in the south east corner to another Cotton, this one for a change called William.
Perhaps most memorable for me on this beautiful sunny day in February 2018 was the vast sea of snowdrops and aconites sprawling across the grounds of Landwade Hall, perhaps the most spectacular display of them that I have ever seen.
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This video shows a number of methods of feeding bees during the inevitable periods when drought or absence of flowering trees make it difficult for bees to maintain colony strength.
One of the introduced pest species that now impact beehives is the Small Hive Beetle (Aethina tumida). It can be seen in this video.
If not controlled it contaminates the hive by laying its eggs in the cells of the comb. Ultimately these eggs hatch to be maggots which develop into beetles. Small Hive Beetle can be difficult to eliminate entirely however installation of a tray in the base of the hive containing vegetable oil is as effective a method as is currently available. The hives do however need regular maintenance to keep the numbers of beetles manageable. Out of control infestations ultimately could result in colony collapse.
My family were among the first white settlers on the NSW Mid North Coast and no doubt survived much hardship in establishing homes and businesses. Survival depended on having a range of personal attributes, stoicism and resilience being among them. However without knowledge of the climate, soil, land and forests as well as the skills to plan, farm and build effectively early pioneers would inevitably certainly have been defeated.
From the outset the early pioneers would certainly have recognised the importance of beekeeping as a necessary contribution to their survival effort. Therefore its no surprise that beekeeping has been passed down through the generations.
My brother, seen here in this video, is an enthusiastic amateur beekeeper (Planet Nectar) and he manages about 25 hives, as does another brother.
They both came by their interest in beekeeping having grown up in the business, as I did, having been expected to lend a hand in our parents commercial beekeeping business.
As commercial beekeepers (Honeygold Apriaries) they operated with up to 1000 hives at various times.
My father, soon to turn 98, continued to maintain at least 100 hives until well into his 80's and while my bothers have no intention of becoming commercial beekeepers they at least keep the family tradition alive.
An uncle's family are also commercial beekeepers having drifted into it when dairying declined. They are nowadays migratory beekeepers managing in excess of 1000 hives. They follow the honey flows right across the Australian east coast and hinterland no matter where trees or crops are flowering.
Another uncle also ran up to 100 hives as a sideline and several cousins also operated smaller numbers of hives as amateur beekeepers.
Drought and increasing disease issues associated with commercial beekeeping in recent years have certainly tested the skills and resolve of beekeepers across NSW and elsewhere.
While honey production remains the core business of large beekeeping operations many commercial beekeepers survive by transporting their hives long distances overnight to various fruit growing areas to help pollinate commercial orchards, without which, hand pollination would be an enormously costly and inefficient way of growing fruit or other crops.
In some countries this process of placing pollination hives in commercial orchards and food crop growing areas has managed to keep whole food producing industries viable.
In those countries where bee killing diseases exist they ultimately sound a death knell to the hives and beekeepers know that their hives will not survive the season due to disease killing their hives (colony collapse disorders).
These beekeepers need to operate at scale to ensure they have a regular turnaround of hives to meet the annual increasing demand for bees as vectors of pollination.
Climate change, drought and disease have increasingly impacted the beekeeping industry the world over and stringent biosecurity measures are now both urgent and essential if the industry is to survive and see global food security guaranteed.
Space travel is difficult and expensive – it would cost thousands of dollars to launch a bottle of water to the moon. The recent discovery of hydrogen-bearing molecules, possibly including water, on the moon has explorers excited because these deposits could be mined if they are sufficiently abundant, sparing the considerable expense of bringing water from Earth. Lunar water could be used for drinking or its components – hydrogen and oxygen – could be used to manufacture important products on the surface that future visitors to the moon will need, like rocket fuel and breathable air.
Recent observations by NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) spacecraft indicate these deposits may be slightly more abundant on crater slopes in the southern hemisphere that face the lunar South Pole. "There’s an average of about 23 parts-per-million-by-weight (ppmw) more hydrogen on Pole-Facing Slopes (PFS) than on Equator-Facing Slopes (EFS)," said Timothy McClanahan of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.
This is the first time a widespread geochemical difference in hydrogen abundance between PFS and EFS on the moon has been detected. It is equal to a one-percent difference in the neutron signal detected by LRO's Lunar Exploration Neutron Detector (LEND) instrument. McClanahan is lead author of a paper about this research published online October 19 in the journal Icarus.
Read more: 1.usa.gov/1uaa8s2
Photo caption: LRO image of the moon's Hayn Crater, located just northeast of Mare Humboldtianum, dramatically illuminated by the low Sun casting long shadows across the crater floor.
Image Credit: NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.
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Difficult to imagine that this is a scene beside a "wave pool". We enjoyed in that pool with artificially generated waves till evening.. and they turned on lights it became so calm.. after it became dark. It was so beautiful view and great to have dinner on the other side watching it. Enjoyed our office "family day"
I couldn't carry my tripod. Used a chair for longer shutter. No processing except crop & copyright.
~Bill Dana
Very true quote *lol*
This was actually the first picture I made of our kitty when we got her last Friday.
She has been sick a bit and we went to the doctor yesterday, hopefully she'll be okay again soon!!!
Happy Pink Tuesday =^.^=
(-: Please no huge glittering group awards and invitations :-)
All my pictures are copyright protected. Please do not use without my written permission
being a teacher in a high school is such a problem! it's hard to find a common language with pupils. Miss Tracey graduated from college not so long time ago and she still cannot get used to their behavior. Martin tries to show his strength to girls by beating shy Kris, girls gossiping about guys, there are only love and parties in their heads..poor, poor miss Tracey!..
;D
About 30 minutes from Hobart, Tasmania. A really nice spot for some evening shots. Incredibly windy evening - it was difficult to keep the camera and tripod upright!
The Kendall Katwalk trail is part of the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT). This section of PCT has a rating of "Most Difficult". Our trip was eleven miles in length with less than 3,000 feet of elevation gain.
500mm lenses are difficult things to aim, especially when the thing you're trying to find is against a featureless background, and almost impossible if the thing is moving fast, such as a bird in flight. Like a big telescope they need some kind of sighting aid. A red dot gun sight with no magnification is very good, because it allows you to look with both eyes open and see a red dot projected on your target (an optical illusion, not a laser beam :-).
They're designed to clamp onto a gun sight wedge mount, so some kind of adapter is required. I played with the hot shoe mount, but it was too flexible -- the sight needed re-zeroing at every mount, and was easily knocked out of calibration. The degree of precision required to aim the central focus sensor at the target via the dot also made parallax error a problem on the hot shoe. So I decided to mount it directly on the lens. Least parallax error, plus the geometry of the lens barrel and the sight mount naturally lines it up with the lens. To protect the lens barrel I glued the sight clamp to a cardboard tube slightly too small, slit open to provide a sprung grab on the lens body. The slit also handily accommodates the focus hold button on the lens barrel.
It works amazingly well! It's now trivially easy to aim the lens at anything very quickly indeed, including birds in flight. Getting the lens to lock focus on a bird is a bit trickier. Without bothering to zero the sight carefully I found that If the flying bird occupies at least 1/10th of the image the AF manages to lock focus quite soon. But tiny birds, or distant birds, often fail to lock just using the red dot sight, and if you drop to viewfinder or live view the view becomes so narrow the bird is easily lost. So experiments with careful calibration and technique are required.
But initial results are very encouraging! This has suddenly become a VERY much more useful and easily used lens! Although having a gun sight on top of it does reduce one of the advantages of a 500mm reflex lens -- it doesn't look like a long lens, so people are less nervous of it than a foot long lens with a dinner plate objective.
Of course if you feel a little inferior at having a much smaller 500mm lens than the big boys you can always add a long lens hood to it. This one is threaded at both ends so allows you to remount the original short rubberised hood on its end. Lengthening the hood is supposed to improve the contrast of reflex lenses, which are inherently flatter and greyer than refractors. in part due to the increased diffraction edge length created by the hole in the middle. So far I've failed to verify this effect, but I haven't yet tested it in provocatively difficult conditions.
DSC05981X
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karma is complex and difficult to define. It is a concept whose meaning, importance and scope varies between Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism and other traditions that originated in India, and various schools in each of these traditions.
Now as a man is like this or like that,
according as he acts and according as he behaves, so will he be;
a man of good acts will become good, a man of bad acts, bad;
he becomes pure by pure deeds, bad by bad deeds;
And here they say that a person consists of desires,
and as is his desire, so is his will;
and as is his will, so is his deed;
and whatever deed he does, that he will reap.
—Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, 7th Century BC
I see many 127 Format cameras for sale on the internet but it is difficult to find fresh film: in fact since the efke factory went out of commission (apparently it went on fire and burned down) the only available 127 film available is Rerapan which is said to be ILFORD HP5+ 120 which has been cut down to 127 size. Apart from Rerapan cutting down 120 Format roll film to 127 Format now seems to be the only option left for 127 camera users: this photo sequence shows how I do it. I did this as a Covid-19 ‘lockdown’ project though I had been thinking about it for well over a year prior to the outbreak of the pandemic....in the photograph the 120 film is sitting between the rails (weighted down to stop it curling) Note the tool which sits over the left hand end between the rails. This is the straight edge along which the 120 film is cut into two pieces.I don’t intend to describe the making of these different tools but they are all designed so that the whole process can be performed ‘blind’ ie in total darkness.I had to think the whole process through; nothing complex as such all very logical in fact.I have cut and re-spooled about forty 120-127 film now (giving 80 127 films of eight 4x4 exposures each). I notice that the 127 film that IS available for purchase is also of eight exposures. Surely this is cut down 120 film. Making all this does take time but look at the advantages.
1) saves money
2) any 120 film that is available can be converted to 127.
3) you can use your 4x4 Baby Grey Rolleiflex or Yashica 44 or Ikonta 520/18 etc. cameras again!
Which one would you take! I personally would take the Lamborghini Murciélago LP670-4 SuperVeloce. :)
Sninnin' on that dizzy air
I kissed you face I kissed you hair
-Just like heaven
Another first for me today, I made clones!
It appears Im taking over the page one spin at a time.
I had sooo much fun taking these, I was so mad I had to stop just to go to work.
Explore 322
..at Cinta Costera in Ciudad de Panamá. A difficult angle and somehow difficult decision between posting or not this picture. I preferred to show it to you as an architectural curiosity.
Difficult passing up a antique shop, always hunting for that one thing you never knew you needed probably because you didn’t.
Ruffed Grouse are difficult for me to photograph. They are truly ghosts of the woods. After three days of scouting RG habitat in the Adirondacks, I finally discovered one or two on an abandons and centuries old logging road. The RG would come out into the open just before dark to pick up grit.
to get a decent flik at this gaff, sun coming over the top of the wall. paint and caps didn't work properly but was a good day with sound people!
Sally really wasn't in the mood for a photo session. I clicked off fifty shots with little success even though I enticed her with a milk bone and squeaked her favorite toy. Oh Sally, we love her every day regardless of her mood.
Difficult to believe...but yes, I took this photo at Portinho da Arrábida.
Today it's raining cat's and dogs.
Difficult lighting here so not sure about this, but it shows a family of Great Crested Grebe seeing off a young gull that was getting too close. The youngsters are being carried on the back of the adult on the right.
Difficult to get a good shot of the Bird of Paradise flower as I am never sure which way round to take it!v Then this idea seemed to work quite well, as more of a silhouette, against the beautiful Spanish sky and lamppost. A classic feature of this current holiday, was the sound of the House Martins morning and night. We only hear these in the UK in the height of summer, so it is a lovely sound to us.This shot caught a fly by of one of these little flitty birds!
It is difficult today to imagine the audacity of these posters produced by a handful of visionary artists in imperial Vienna before 1914!
With Kokoschka, Kalwach, Oppenheimer, Schiele, it is an aesthetic avant-garde spitting in the face of an official art pampered by power to confine itself to a backward-looking academicism whose primary function, through the choice of its subjects, was the negation of social reality.
* * *
Il est difficile aujourd'hui d'imaginer l'audace de ces affiches produites par une poignée d'artistes visionnaires dans la Vienne impériale d'avant 1914 !
Avec les Kokoschka, les Kalwach, les Oppenheimer, les Schiele, c'est une avant-garde esthétique crachant au visage d'un art officiel choyé par le pouvoir pour se cantonner dans un académisme passéiste dont la fonction première, par le choix de ses sujets, était la négation de la réalité sociale.
OPENING OF THE EURELIA INSTITUTE HALL
EURELIA November 27
Last Wednesday was a red-letter day in the annals of this district, when the opening of the Eurelia Hall took place. The hall is 50 ft by 20 ft, with stage 14 ft by 20 ft, while at the back of the building is an anteroom 13 ft by 20 ft.
The stage is provided with scenery and piano, and there is seat accommodation for over 200 people.
The school children rendered the “Song of Australia” after which Mr Michael Manning, one of the oldest residents, who throughout has taken a keen interest in the work, declared the hall open.
Mr F Kaerger, a local resident, presented the ground.
A concert was held, followed by dancing and supper. [Ref: Chronicle Saturday 4-12-1909]
Each year on Christmas Day a programme of sports is held in the town to remove some of the building expense of the Institute Hall. This year an attractive programme of foot and bicycle races will be held. A concert and dance will be held in the evening. [Ref: Daily Herald 2-12-1913]
Australia Day was held on August 21. A procession led by the school children, followed by decorated vehicles, motor cars and fire brigade made a tour of the town to the grounds at the institute. A concert in the evening, and a fancy dress ball followed. Day’s takings were about £115 – a very creditable effort for a small district like Eurelia. [Ref: Quorn Mercury 6-9-1918]
Great damage was done by the recent floods. Miles of fences were washed down, and some completely destroyed. Several graziers lost sheep in the flood. [Ref: Chronicle 1-3-1919]
The town of Eurelia, 16 km north of Orroroo, surveyed by J C Hawker, was proclaimed 12 September 1878.
The Eurelia school opened in 1881 and closed in 1943: the Hundred of Eurelia school opened in 1919 and in the same year its name changed to ‘Hill View’. Eurelia West school was opened by Nellie Francis in 1888, closing 1922.
The Terowie to Quorn narrow gauge railway line was planned to go through Morchard and Coomooroo Corner but with the help of several petitions from Eurelia residents, Michael Manning, John Stott and Patrick McNamara, the line eventually went via Walloway, Eurelia and Carrieton. The first trains were running by 1881.
Thomas Shepherd was the first Postmaster at Eurelia. R Wylie was appointed on 26 February 1879.
In April 1883 the Post Office was shifted to the railway station and the Station Master, W Pryor, also became the Postmaster.
The railways provided employment. A reservoir was constructed, as well as a station master’s residence, railway workers’ cottages, office, waiting room, goods shed with weighbridge, large overhead water tank, porter’s room and platform complete with crane.
By the late 1880s there were 19 houses: a bootmaker, storekeeper and hotelkeeper.
Lack of good rains and surface water, an excess of kangaroos, dingoes and rabbits plus the regular short or long term droughts made successful farming very difficult and sometimes impossible.
Difficult timed return vintage trains private charter around Leeds .York to Manchester Piccadilly return 47773 passing the White Rose Center at Cottingley 14/05/22
Sharing Grief
I find it difficult to cry in front of people, and I’m not even sure why.(1) Even when I want to cry, I can’t. Behind closed doors I dissolve into a fountain of expression. But as I listened to Anna’s story, mutinous tears escapes my eyes, and I made no effort to wipe them away. I ached inside for this woman who had suffered one of the greatest kinds of loss in life. How was she still so graciously soft instead of hardened with bitterness?
She was his mother. She had carried him inside of her for nine months. She had felt the exhilaration of her child’s arrival into the world. She had held him, fed him, protected him, dreamed for him, cherished him. She would have given her very life for him.
As she held Jonathan’s tiny body in her arms sobs spilled from the depths of her soul. She carried him into the living room and looked desperately at her husband, pleading for him to fix what she knew could not be restored. Wordlessly, her husband gently took Jonathan from her arms. He looked at his son’s face, a face that resembled his own. He kissed the top of his head and then slowly, slowly raised his arms to lift the baby up to the heavens. Tears streamed down his face as he lifted his eyes upward in an act of submission to a fate that broke his heart.
Anna cried out in protest. No, no, no! She was not ready to give him back to God. He was an extension of her heart. She was not ready to part with him, not ready to accept what had been tragically forced on her.
For some time, she couldn’t bear to visit his grave. But in a sense, she visited it every day. There may have been a site where marble was engraved for everyone else to see, but his life and death were engraved on her heart. In that way, he stayed with her.
People tried to comfort her, but there is no comfort for such a loss. In an effort to console her, they said, “You’re young. You’ll have other children.” Perhaps, but she needed to grieve the loss of this child.
Over the years, Anna brought three more children into the world, but her family did not go to South America as missionaries as they planned. The call to South American had included Jonathan, and the idea of going without him brought with it enormous pain that was too much to bear. Twenty years passed before she returned to that calling and began to carefully unwrap it again. I want to believe that God understood this. Somehow, for me, it would seem to uphold the integrity of grief.
Anna had allowed space for healing, for a process that is complicated and needs the grace of time for authenticity. She allowed it to bring her to a place where deep sorrow and a kind of peace learn to live together in the same heart. And when she was ready, she began to dream again.
But the dream evolved into something of a different shape, and after the children were grown, she and her husband moved to a country she had never visited before.
Peace discovered will never minimize what was lost, but experiencing peace does afford us the ability to finally disengage from the battle of resisting what had already happened and what we cannot change. It is that place of acceptance called healing.
We sat now in her home in Central America, glasses of cold Sprite sweating in front of us. I was a guest in her home and she had shared with me her grief. And isn’t your deepest pain the greatest gift you can give to anyone—when you slowly release the fingers from what you hold so tightly and invite someone into your vulnerability? I remembered a line from a beloved book, Shantaram. Author Gregory David Roberts writes that shared wounds, when pinned to the sky, become stars in the night that help us navigate a pathway home.(2)
Anna smiled sadly. Life had brought remarkable pain, but she spoke of its richness too. “Every now and then, God brings somebody incredibly special across your path. That’s one of life’s gems. You must remember those things and hold on to them,” she said peacefully. I wondered if she knew that she was one of those gems to me.
The Gospel of John tells the story of the death of Lazarus, the brother of Martha and of Mary—the one who would later pour perfume on Jesus’s feet and wipe them with her hair in an act of worship. Jesus would defend her and honor her. But first came another encounter.
Lazarus became sick, and the sisters immediately sent word to Jesus. They believed in him and knew he could do miracles. They must have thought he would come right away, but he didn’t. He waited. And during that time, Lazarus died.
When the sisters heard that Jesus was finally coming, Martha ran out to meet him, but Mary stayed inside. I wonder if she felt betrayed. She had believed in him; she had called on him. But he didn’t show up in time for something that meant life to her.
The Bible tells us that Martha returned inside and told Mary that Jesus was calling for her. Instantly, Mary stood up and ran out to him.
I picture this weeping woman, feeling abandoned by the one person she put her faith in. She’s hurt, perhaps even angry. She hears he’s near, but she doesn’t go to him. After all, he had forgotten her. But then he calls for her by name, and she runs to him. Maybe she knew that the one she had felt betrayed by was the only one who could comfort her. Maybe she knew he had not forgotten her.
And so Mary goes to Jesus and falls at his feet, weeping. One day, she would fall at his feet in humility, knowing he had saved her, but first, she would fall at his feet, pouring out a broken heart, thinking he had betrayed her. She had experienced enormous loss—a loss that he could have prevented. Jesus takes one look at her as she weeps, and he was deeply troubled. And what did he do? He cried, even though he knew that life was about to be resurrected and her pain relieved. But first, he wept right along with her.
How much then would Jesus grieve with one who must endure loss? Would he also say, “Where have you put him?” And would she show him, not the grave, but her heart? And he would come and sit by this tomb and weep. For twenty years—for ever.
Naomi Zacharias is director of Wellspring International at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries in Atlanta, Georgia.
(1) The following essay is an excerpt from Naomi Zacharias’s The Scent of Water: Grace for Every Kind of Broken (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2010).
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This is my dog, Daisy, who is not very easy to photograph at all!
This is the best of dozens of shots I took of her.
Have a nice weekend everybody!!!
Canon XSi + Canon EF 50mm f/1.4 USM
In the extremely difficult and stressful time that we are all in now, please do remember to be patient and to be kind and thankful to everyone who still has to work, especially Health Care workers - my daughter is one of them, and she said that she is overly stressed and exhausted, partly because of families and visitors who lose their temper over restrictions that have been put in place in the hospital.
A few days ago, I finally made a trip to a couple of stores, that I really didn't want to do. I knew that if there were a lot of people, I would instead turn around and go home. I needed food and I did buy an extra one of various items - but no hoarding. The cashier at the food store told me that one of the younger cashiers had been in tears because of being yelled at by some customers. At the drug store, the young woman cashier told me that she was so stressed out, again partly because of angry, yelling customers, that she was about to burst into tears. We had a good talk, as there was no one waiting behind me in line, and I made sure to thank her for meticulously sanitizing the work space at the till. A few kind words can make all the difference, people! There were no line-ups at either store, for which I was extremely thankful. I know I do need to be very careful myself - I have 3 of the risk factors; age, high blood pressure, and the most concerning being a chronic cough that I have had for maybe 10 or so years, which sometimes turns into a coughing fit where I can't breath. Went through all sorts of tests but no one could find a cause. So, here I am, still coughing! The last thing I would want is the Coronavirus cough on top of it! Stay safe and well, everyone!!
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CORONAVIRUS UPDATE, 16 March 2020: 74 confirmed cases in Alberta, 342 in Canada. 4 deaths in Canada - so far, all have been in British Columbia.
CORONAVIRUS UPDATE, 17 March 2020: 97 confirmed cases in Alberta, 447 cases in Canada. 70 confirmed cases in the Calgary Zone. 7 deaths in Canada.
CORONAVIRUS UPDATE, 18 March 2020: 119 confirmed cases in Alberta, 83 confirmed cases in Calgary Zone, 591 in Canada. 8 deaths in Canada.
CORONAVIRUS UPDATE, 19 March 2020: 146 confirmed cases in Alberta, 101 confirmed cases in Calgary Zone, 736 in Canada. 9 deaths in Canada, 1 death in Alberta.
CORONAVIRUS UPDATE, 20 March 2020: 195 (up from 146!) confirmed cases in Alberta, 101 confirmed cases in Calgary Zone, 846 in Canada. 10 deaths in Canada, 1 death in Alberta.
CORONAVIRUS UPDATE, 22 March 2020: 259 (up from 226) confirmed cases in Alberta, 1,302 (up from 1,048) in Canada. 19 deaths in Canada, 1 death in Alberta.
CORONAVIRUS UPDATE, 23 March 2020: 301 (up from 259) confirmed cases in Alberta, 1,432 (up from 1,302) in Canada. 20 deaths in Canada, 1 death in Alberta.
www.alberta.ca/coronavirus-info-for-albertans.aspx
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Monday, 23 March 2020: our temperature this evening is -1C (windchill -8C). Sunrise is at 7:28 am, and sunset is at 7:57 pm. Sunny for most of the day, but clouding over later, and now the snow has returned this evening.
The 8 photos posted this evening were all taken on Day 11 of our 13-day birding trip to South Texas, in March 2019. The first place we went to was the Birding and Nature Centre, on South Padre Island. The afternoon before, we had spent two hours there, but our "proper" visit was for three hours in the morning of Day 11. Such a great place!
Someone told us about a different location, and a short drive south from the Centre took us to around W Sheepshead St and Laguna Blvd, where we saw a Ruby-throated Hummingbird, Monarch butterflies, and a Green Anole (lizard).
We had our picnic lunch at the nearby Convention Centre, which is near the Birding and Nature Centre, and then looked for a Yellow-throated Warbler near the Centre. Amazingly, we did see it, along with a Black-and-white Warbler and a Wilson's Warbler. Not easy trying to photograph these fast-moving little birds that get hidden among the branches.
Driving north again, we called in at a beach that was part of the Laguna Atascosa National Wildlife Refuge, where we could enjoy seeing the ocean waves and Laughing Gulls. This was our last stop before returning to our hotel, the Holiday Inn Express & Suites, Brownsville.
The next day, 30 March 2019, we had to drive from Brownsville to Houston, where we stayed for one night at La Quinta Inn & Suites Houston. The following day, we flew from Bush Intl Airport back to Calgary. What a fantastic holiday!
Lake Elsinore, California - March 22, 2019: Lines of cars as far as the eye can see, shows the difficult traffic and parking situation of tourists at Walker Canyon to see the wildflower poppy super bloom
-Here you have the other session that I made in Ibiza with Juan and Cora. It was in the Migjorn Suites Hotel because we stayed there three nights.
-Aquí os dejo la otra sesión que realizé en Ibiza con Juan y Cora, fue en el hotel Migjorn Suites ya que nos quedamos allí tres noches.
Model: Juan Paramio and Coraima Seda
MUA: Cora
Styling: Pablo Ronald
Photographer: Pablo Ronald
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It wasn't difficult to find natural beauty, even in a small Alaskan town that was touristy. Ketchikan was the first town that we visited, and one of the most isolated. It can only be reached by water or plane.
© 2015 Thousand Word Images by Dustin Abbott
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A Warrior light tank with increased armour. This vehicle was taking part in the Urgent Operational Requirement (UOR) Equipment Demonstration at Salisbury Plain in September 2008.
The Warrior Infantry Fighting Vehicle has the speed and performance to keep up with Challenger 2 Main Battle Tanks over the most difficult terrain, and the firepower and armour to support infantry in any assault.
The demonstration displayed the complete range of equipment that is in use by the Army, on operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Involved in the display were actual soldiers who had used the equipment in an operational environment.
This image is available for non-commercial, high resolution download at www.defenceimages.mod.uk subject to terms and conditions. Search for image number 45149018.jpg
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Photographer: Cpl Russ Nolan RLC
Image 45149018.jpg from www.defenceimages.mod.uk
Never have I dealt with anything more difficult than my own soul, which sometimes helps me and sometimes opposes me.
Al-Ghazali
At first glance, the comparison of these two monuments seems only to be a source of antithesis; however contradictory the suggestion may seem, it will only be a question of analogies. In an ingenious and documented study, Mr Knauth, architect of Strasbourg Cathedral, demonstrated that, under an absolutely different appearance, the basilica entrusted to his care and the Great Pyramid of Egypt, known as Cheops, were designed according to an identical formula.
After the work of Colonel Howard Vyse and John Taylor, Piazzi Smyth did further research. At the entrance to the antechamber of the royal tomb, in the middle of a granite slab, a round button protrudes a fifth of its thickness. Smyth claims to find there the unit of measurement of the master builder of the pyramid; he calls the meter pyramidal five times the thickness of this button, that is to say a measure of 0.6356 m, and for this meter he adopts a division into twenty-five inches of pyramid; this mysterious detail would thus have a thickness of five inches and a projection of one inch. "It is hardly doubtful, writes Smyth, that this measure served as a unit to the builder as well in his project as in the execution, because all the measurements of lanes and chambers give rise to the most surprising relations, if they are carried out by means of this measure. "The pyramidal metre represents exactly the twenty millionth part of the earth's diameter. The latter has 12 712 178 meters[8]. The pyramidal metre is therefore worth 0.6 356 089 metre.Faced with these similarities, one naturally begins to wonder whether certain architectural principles dating back to the highest antiquity have not been perpetuated by tradition through the ages. As a result of the frequent surveys required by the floods of the Nile, the Egyptians were familiar with the surveying and geometric layouts; the Gothic masters were not inferior on these points; the marvellous monuments of all sizes they left us prove this overabundantly.
Were the rules put into practice kept by each other in the construction workshops as mysterious secrets? So many questions that it is easier to ask than to solve.
Thus reduced to his mathematical data alone, Mr. Knauth's work takes on a categorical appearance that he does not have in the original work. The eminent architect does not attempt to draw absolute and reckless consequences from his study. He only hopes that the same surveying process will be applied to other medieval édifices. In the future now to tell us if new experiences will come confirmer his thesis.
In the records of the city of London, the term "alchemy" appears as early as 1375. In those days, this referred to working fith fire permitted to freely travel the country at a time when the feudal system shackled most peasants closely to the land. They gathered in groups to work on large projects, moving from one finished castle or cathedral to the planning and building of the next. For mutual protection, education, and training, they bound themselves together into a local lodge - the building, put up at a construction site, where workmen could eat and rest. Eventually, a lodge came to signify a group of macigians based in a particular locality. The premier alchemist lodge was formed in England in 1717, the official date of the organization of the various lodges and the start of Alchemy proper. Although the style of Alchemic ritual suggest Egyptian, Greek, Roman, Templar, Rosicrucian and qabalistic origins, nothing less is true. A historical link cannot be established and given the fact that in those days no alchemists was able to read Egyptian, no direct connection with Egyptian spirituality was available. Unmistakably, the Founding Fathers of Alchemy incorporated Egyptian symbols in their various rituals and grades, as every one dollar bill makes clear. These archaisms prove the need of Alchemy to root its teachings and practices in a nonexistent, fictional historical past in order to give itself, its rituals and precepts an air of antiquity. This is especially the case in the Romantic era, when exotic tastes became fashionable. With egyptomania no longer served isolated individuals & groups, but fed the ruling classes, who were desperately trying to cope with the antagonisms and lack of humanity of emergent capitalism and the religious wars raging in Europe since the days of Luther (1483 - 1546). Alchemy and its founding myth was deemed the alternative of the educated. The God of revelation was also the "Great Architect", and in every lodge a Bible or a Koran was present. This to show the "God of the philosophers" was not a priori in conflict with the God of revelation. But the Roman Church was antagonistic, as could be expected. As a system of personal growth within a closed community of kindred spirits, alchemy survived to this day, divided between those who accept God and those who do not, between those who see symbols as instruments of growth and those who use them as gates to occult regions of the universe. Alchemy has become (or has always been ?) conservative and opaque. Its non-transparant and non-democratic (military) features may run against non-strategic, open communication, which is the foundation of social-economical justice and equality. Philosophy is more of an interest group than a spiritual organization, although some lay claim to precisely the opposite. As none of the original Egyptian teachings were available to its Founding Fathers, Alchemy, in order to accommodate the new times ahead, is bound to be reformed.
► the Rosicrucian Order...As a system of belief, Rosicrucianism came to the notice of the general public in the 17th century. In the two Rosicrucian Manifestoes, a mysterious personage called "Christian Rosenkreutz" is mentioned. But according to legend, the symbolism of the Rose and the Cross was first displayed in 11th century Spain. During a fierce battle against the Moors, an Aragonese Knight named Arista saw a cross of light in the sky with a rose on each of its arms. A monastery to commemorate his victory was erected and time later an Order of Chivalry with the emblem of these Roses and the Cross founding the monastery. The Rose and the Cross appeared in the banner of Raymond VI, Count of Toulouse when he tried to defend the Cathars against the armies of Pope Innocent III. It was in the form of a cross, described as "de gueules à la croix et pommettée d'or" ("gueule" means "red", derived from the Arabic "gul", which means "rose"). The emblem of the Cross with the red Rose in the middle square became the emblem of the Rosicrucian movement and its many orders, lodges and societies. In the Fama Fraternitatis (or Laudable Fraternity of the Rosy Cross), Christian Rosenkreutz is said to have journeyed to Damascus, Damcar, Egypt and Fez. He met those in possession of "secret teachings". He synthesized the best of these teachings and went to Spain. Finally, he returned to Germany and chose three men with whom he founded an order, meant to instruct its members in the knowledge he had obtained in the Middle East. So the typical founding myth goes. After the publication of the Manifestos, the Rosicrucians influenced the culture of Western Europe. Rosicrucianism developed along two lines, on the one hand, the scientists, intellectuals and reformers in the social, political and philosophical fields (like Descartes and Boyle) and, on the other hand, those (like Fludd, Dee, Comenius and Ashmole) concerned with occultism and mysticism (cf. the distinction between philosophical and technical Hermetica). In France, Rosicrucianism had a revival climaxing in the early 19th and the first years of the 20th century. Especially Martinez de Pasqually (1727 - 1774), Louis-Claude de Saint Martin (1743 - 1803) and Papus (1865 - 1918) are noted. ► the Golden Dawn...In 1865, and Englishman named Robert Wentforth Little founded an esoteric society, the Rosicrucian Society in Anglia. Membership was limited to Master Masons. When Little died in 1878, three men took over, a retired medical doctor, William Woodman (1828 - 1891), a coroner, Wynn Westcott (1848 - 1925) and Samuel Liddell "MacGregor" Mathers (1854 - 1918), who, as a young man, spent much of his time in the British Museum, working through piles of dusty manuscripts. He translated three Medieval magical texts : The Greater Key of King Solomon, The Kaballah Unveiled and The Book of the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage. In 1887, so the story goes, Westcott received from Reverend Woodward, an elderly parson and author on Alchemy, a set of cipher manuscripts. He asked the clairvoyant and inspired Mathers to assist him (one legend says both men forged the document, in another Westcott found it on a bookstall in Farringdon Street, and in yet another the document was inherited). Both men found the code of the cipher was contained in a work of Trithemius, the influential Steganographia extolled by John Dee (1527 - 1608), the Elizabethan scholar and astrologer of Queen Elisabeth I. It concerned "angel-magic" and Dee had secured a copy of it in Antwerp. They uncovered skeletons of rituals and Mathers expanded them. Together they started the Golden Dawn (GD), a secret Victorian society aiming to harbor true Rosicrucianism and allow its members to accomplish the Great Work. A complete system of ritual magic based on the history of Western occultism was practiced. In contrast with the Theologic policy of the Rosicrucian Society, the order admitted women members as equals. Its members were recruited from every circle of life. In these rituals, Egyptian, Jewish, Greek & Christian elements were combined. However, the combination of these various traditions led to depletion. A spiritual tradition is as strong as it is pure, i.e. devoid of notions, ideas, concepts, symbols, beliefs, rituals etc. foreign to it. Although syncretism may be intellectually satisfying, it hinders spiritual emancipation. This is certainly true if the elements combined are very different, as is the case here. Because Mathers was unable to read Egyptian texts, he could not make the crucial distinction between the Egyptian approach and the Hellenistic view (incorporated in Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hermetism and Hermeticism). Neither could he isolate the native Egyptian elements present in historical Hermetism. By nevertheless incorporating Egyptian deities (in particular the Osiris-cycle), the GD walked the path of egyptomania.
► Aleister Crowley...Aleister Crowley (1875 - 1947) entered the GD in 1898, introduced to the order by George Cecil Jones (1873 - 1953). The influence of this "Hermetic Order" shaped his life. He continued to ferment the teachings of the GD until he died. In fact, he considered himself and his Thelemic Order of the Silver Star to be its lawful heir. The problems between Crowley and the Adepts of the order started in December 1899 (the first time he met Mathers), i.e. by the time he had taken his Portal grade, the preliminary to the crucial Adept Minor degree. When, in September 1900, he applied to be advanced to the level of Adepthood, the College of Adepts refused. They disliked Crowley, his attitudes and way of life. Some of them probably did not believe an adept should drink, have fun, fornicate and raising hell with enthusiasm. His scandalous reputation won the disapproval of his seniors, who were in their right to refuse him. So, in the same month, Crowley went to Paris, and was initiated in the Ahathoor Temple by Mathers himself ! Between Paris and London a deep schism had been in the making and now tensions truly exploded. When the London adepts heard Mathers had initiated him, the breach was complete. When applying for the lectures he was now entitled, he was again refused and physically thrown out. To Florence Farr, Yeats and many others, Crowley was an outcast, an opportunist who had endangered the link with Mathers. He promptly notified Mathers and the latter arranged a meeting with the "rebels" in London. Crowley acted as Mathers' plenipotentiary, and to protect himself, dressed up in the garb of Highland chieftain, concealing his face with a heavy black mask. Clearly Mathers had been a poor judge of characters, raising lunatic power freaks to Adepthood ...The GD did not recover from the insanity and within a few years became a dispersed organization, with several Temples conducted by different groupings of men, each appointing their own Chiefs. Waite kept the Isis-Urania Temple, but in 1914 he closed it down. Next, Crowley invented his own egyptomanic movement. In Cairo in 1904, the "minister" of Re dictated a new revelation to him, the "Book of the Law" ! Crowley became the "prophet" of the New Age of Horus ! The two major Egyptian deities he incorporated were the sky-goddess Nut and Horus of Edfu ("Hadit"). Had he known the cults of Ancient Egypt well enough, he would have realized they had no revelation or dogma, and certainly no "holy" books (for hieroglyphic writing itself was sacred). Was Crowley's "law" a concoction of his own power driven subconscious mind ? In 1909, he called in the "demon of demons" and turned Satanic. The psychosis had become irreversible ...Do these highlights show the scope of the phantasies, fictions and lies incorporated into the Western Tradition since the start of the Renaissance ? Indeed, to identify the backbone of this Tradition with the Qabalah was the outstanding mistake prompted by the fraud of Moses de Leon. This has perturbated thousands of excellent minds, causing them to constantly replay their own illusions, and loose, unlike Rabbi Akiba, after entering the "garden of delights", their sight, reason or faith in God. "The impeding turn of the millennium nourishes hopes of a new spiritual light for humankind in the aspirations of many. Egypt will surely play a role in such developments in both its forms : pharaonic Egypt and the esoteric-Hermetic Egypt. There has been increasing talk of the relevance of the Hermetic Weltanschauung as a point of view that can contribute to making sense of our modern world by seeking a direct connection with the original wisdom of the oldest cultures and with the core idea of all esoteric thought, according to which the ancient wisdom continues to be valid even in a world that has been transformed."
Can we today turn the page ? Can a spiritual movement emerge which focuses on a thematical reconstruction of Ancient Egyptian spirituality, and this based on the evidence of contemporary science regarding Ancient Egyptian religious practice in general and its basic ritual matrix in particular ? Several individuals work along those lines, coupling study with ritual practice (Hope, 1986, Schueler, 1989, Clark, 2003, Draco, 2003). In such a "Kemetic" reconstruction, no Jewish, Greek, Hermetic, Christian or Hermeticist elements should persist. Is this really possible, and if so, is such spirituality indeed the true backbone of our Western Tradition ? The advantage being the isolation of a tradition untouched by what today may be called "foreign elements". Such an exercise is not easy (not to speak of the contextual limitations of any author). For Hermetism did retain parts of the Egyptian Mystery Tradition, and in a lesser degree, the same goes for Hermeticism, and yes, even for the revealed religions, Christianity first. The thematical reconstruction sought is approached in two steps :
the influence of Egyptian spirituality on Alexandrian Hermetism ; the form of the basic matrix of native Egyptian religion.
In this paper, the first step is dealt with. The second will only be touched in the Epilogue. In the following ten paragraphs, we study ten basic notions of Hermetism (in other forms present in the mix of Hermeticism and in the "mystical" traditions of the religions). We try to find their Ancient Egyptian equivalent "in embryo" :mentalism : the gods, the world and humanity are the outcome of Divine thought ;correspondence : the same characteristics apply to each unity or plane of the world ;
change : nothing remains the same, everything vibrates, nothing is at rest ; polarity : everything has two poles, there are two sides to everything ; rhythm : all things have their tides, rise and fall, advance and retreat, act and react ; cause & effect : everything happens according to law, there is no coincidence ; gender : male and female are in every body and mind, but not in the soul ; timing : everything happens when the time is ripe, things start at the right time ; intent : nature works according to a purposeful plan, pure will masters the stars ; transformation : everything can be transformed into something else, opposites meet. In earlier studies, the special cognitive features of Ancient Egyptian thought, language & literature have been explained. Grosso modo, these imply the difference between rational thought, initiated by the Greeks, and ante-rationality. The latter is the mode of thought of pre-Greek Antiquity and of societies untouched by the linearizing streak of the Hellenes. Before the advent of rationality, three modes of thought prevailed, as Piaget, genetical epistemology and neurophilosophy made clear. These are mythical, pre-rational and proto-rational thought, in which the Ancient Egyptians excelled. Clearly Hermetism was codified using Greek conceptual rationality (giving birth to the influential systems of Plato and Aristotle). Hence, if we try to correlate these concepts with their native Egyptian equivalent, this cognitive difference has to be taken into account, and the multiplicity of approaches characterizing Egyptian thought has to be made an integral part of the equation. So because of this crucial difference, in all my translations of Egyptian texts and commentary, terms related to the Divine are not capitalized (i.e. god, gods, goddess, goddesses, divine, and pantheon), while in Hermetism and all rational discourses they are. This in accord with the contextualizing feature of anterationality, while rationality always puts context between brackets, and by doing so articulates an abstract, theoretical concept of the Divine.
Both Memphis and Alexandria underline the importance of the spoken and written word. Already in the Old Kingdom, Pharaoh was the Great Speech and his magic powerful, and dreaded, even by the deities. But in Late Ramesside Memphite theology, Ptah was the true primordial "god of gods", superceding Atum, in who's "image" (of totality) the universe was created (as demiurge), and establishing the supremacy of the divine word and speech. Memphite theology is explicit : every thing was made by Ptah's mind and spoken words.
Likewise, in Hermetism, the Divine Logos is the "son of God" coming forth from the Light of the Divine Nous, the teacher who, not unlike the one evoked in the Maxims of Good Discourse, gives his pupil access to the Divine Nous, a direct experience (gnosis) of the Godman Hermes. The idealist notion of the universe as a mental creation of The All, making all mind, being typical for Hermetism. The fact this teacher is "Ogdoadic" and not "Hebdomadic" (as was Pharaoh), may refer to the Greek escape from fate and the physical world (whereas the Egyptians saw the divine at work in all planes of creation).
The magical power of words is acknowledged by both traditions. Magic involves the power of efficiency (effectiveness) and the ability to counter every possible inertia and opposition, executing intent to its full capacity.
Especially Pharaoh is the "Great Magician", who is able, like the gods, to create by means of speech. He alone was the "son of Re", divine and able to encounter the deities face to face. His voice-offerings to Maat ensured the continuity of creation. By speaking the right words, the whole of creation could be rejuvenated. Likewise (but on another ontological level), the "son of God", the Ogdoadic teacher, brings the pupil directly in contact with the Enneadic Light of Nous.
The parallels drawn do not allow for an identification of both traditions, as major category-shifts occur. Indeed, together with the rejection of the physical bodyn (cf. infra), mentalism is an outstanding feature of the Hermetica. Nevertheless, in the overall semantic pattern major points overlap. The mentalism of Hermetism was not implanted on the native Egyptian intellectuals part of the Hermetic lodge "from above", but could make use of the available, longstanding verbal tradition of Egypt, linearize and "perfect" it in Greek style ...and more later in Strassburg and suitable in the city of London?