hugh nibley – Page 6 – Temple Study

Orson Scott Card on Hugh Nibley & C.S. Lewis

February 19, 2009 by Bryce Haymond 12 Comments

Dr. Hugh Nibley lecturing

Orson Scott Card wrote a great article today on Mormon Times, highlighting the tremendous influence that Hugh Nibley and C.S. Lewis have had on his “Christian education” over the years, but particularly when he was younger.

I couldn’t agree more with his feelings about the impact that these two scholars have had. I’ve particularly been influenced, even fundamentally changed, by the writings of Hugh Nibley, and I’m just beginning to get into Lewis. Like I’ve said in the past, in a way I’ve felt personally mentored by Nibley through reading his work, a sentiment shared by Orson Scott Card: [Read more…]

Living the Law of Consecration – Part 2: The Law & The United Order

November 29, 2008 by Bryce Haymond 14 Comments

(Continued from Part 1)

One of the common misconceptions concerning the law of consecration is that it is often conflated with the United Order. When we think that these two are one and the same thing we run into difficulties understanding them. When we don’t properly understand the law, we can’t live it. When we don’t properly understand the United Order, we can’t learn from it. The law of consecration is not the United Order. The United Order was an economic and administrative method of living the law of consecration, but even as such is commonly misunderstood and blended with the law of consecration. President Benson explained: [Read more…]

Living the Law of Consecration – Part 1: The Mythic “Folk Memory”

November 17, 2008 by Bryce Haymond 25 Comments

“Some day we will live the law of consecration again, but until then we must be ‘willing’ to live it.”

“It is Church doctrine that the full Law of Consecration was suspended by the Lord through the Prophet in 1834.”

“My belief is that things will get progressively worse until the actual Second Coming when Christ will institute the law of consecration.”

Have you ever heard these types of statements before? Each one comes from active, church-going, temple-attending, members of the Church. Each of them was said to me in conversation over the past two weeks. Each one is also, unfortunately, untrue. [Read more…]

The First and Oldest Temple in the World? – Göbekli Tepe

October 22, 2008 by Bryce Haymond 9 Comments

One of the excavated enclosures at Göbekli Tepe, Turkey, with massive T-shaped megaliths forming ancient stone circles thought to be up to 12,000 years old. (Click for a larger view)

Grandpa Enoch over at Pronaos wrote a few days ago that Archaeology Magazine‘s latest issue has a cover article by Sandra Scham entitled “The World’s First Temple” ((Archaeology Magazine, Volume 61 Number 6, November/December 2008, abstract)). The magazine Science also did an article on the same subject back in January 2008 ((Science, Vol. 319. no. 5861, p. 280, abstract)). There are many articles that are being published, all focused on one archeological dig in southeast Turkey (see this map) which has come to be known as Göbekli Tepe, a Turkish name meaning “navel hill/mountain” or “hill with a belly” ((Wikipedia – Göbekli Tepe.)).

What makes this excavation so unique? Why all the hype? Because evidence is showing that this may be the world’s first man-made monumental structure ever built, even before agriculture developed. Archeologists didn’t believe that Neolithic hunter-gatherers were capable of building such an enormous complex at such an early date, but this site is starting to redefine our understanding of the beginnings of mankind. What else is interesting is that this appears to have been some sort of ritual center or ceremonial complex – a temple. [Read more…]

Nüwa and Fuxi in Chinese Mythology: Compass & Square

September 17, 2008 by Bryce Haymond 37 Comments

An ancient painting of Nüwa and Fuxi unearthed in Xinjiang, holding the tools of creation - compass and square.

Hugh Nibley gave a lecture in 1975 on “Sacred Vestments” which was later transcribed and included in the collected works volume Temple and Cosmos (pgs. 91-132). The entire paper is fascinating, and highly recommended reading. One of the things he wrote about were certain Chinese artifacts which had been found depicting two mythological gods, Nüwa and Fuxi, and the tools they hold:

Most challenging are the veils from Taoist-Buddhist tombs at Astana, in Central Asia, originally Nestorian (Christian) country, discovered by Sir Aurel Stein in 1925… We see the king and queen embracing at their wedding, the king holding the square on high, the queen a compass. As it is explained, the instruments are taking the measurements of the universe, at the founding of a new world and a new age. Above the couple’s head is the sun surrounded by twelve disks, meaning the circle of the year or the navel of the universe. Among the stars depicted, Stein and his assistant identified the Big Dipper alone as clearly discernable. As noted above, the garment draped over the coffin and the veil hung on the wall had the same marks; they were placed on the garment as reminders of personal commitment, while on the veil they represent man’s place in the cosmos. (pg. 111-12)

Nibley included drawings of this depiction found on veils in the Astana Tombs in Xinjiang, China, with a caption that reads:

In the underground tomb of Fan Yen-Shih, d. A.D. 689, two painted silk veils show the First Ancestors of the Chinese, their entwined serpect bodies rotating around the invisible vertical axis mundi. Fu Hsi holds the set-square and plumb bob … as he rules the four-cornered earth, while his sister-wife Nü-wa holds the compass pointing up, as she rules the circling heavens. The phrase kuci chü is used by modern Chinese to signify “the way things should be, the moral standard”; it literally means the compass and the square. (pg. 115)

See the photos at the end of the post for more examples of this icon. The veil redrawn in Temple and Cosmos is shown photographed in the second row, fourth from the left. [Read more…]