New and unfamiliar religions can look strange, but are they dangerous? Image courtesy David Silverman / Getty Images
Naw-Ruz, the Persian New Year, is celebrated by both Zoroastrians and Baha'is at the time of the Spring Equinox, March 21. Read about traditions surrounding this holiday. Image courtesy Mario Tama / Getty Images
The Baha'i fast for most of the month of March, up to the new year's celebration of Naw-Ruz on March 21.
Why do people fast? Lots of reasons. For some it is a show of humility. For others it is a time of contemplation and spirituality, which is often seen as assisted by the denying of physical wants.
I don't know about anyone else, but I've gotten very tired of the suggestion that religious people have to be anti-science. Personally, I find my faith to be instructing me to better understand the world, and a primary way of doing that is through science.
There are a couple reasons why this idea is so prevalent. For one, increasing numbers of people see religion as superstitious, and science being the opposite of superstition. Ergo, it would make no sense to embrace both superstition and anti-superstition.
Second, Biblical literalist Christians are very vocal in their rejection of several mainstream scientific concepts. but they are the minority even within Christianity, much less among all religious folk.
So, do science and religion really conflict? And if not, what about common arguments to the contrary? And what religions claim to actively embrace science?
A new image gallery went up this week centered around the alchemical idea of the chemical marriage, the union of the Red King and White Queen which ultimately produces The Rebis. In addition to the previous article on the Rebis (from the Rosarium Philosophorum), I have now added another Rebis image from a separate source, the "Book of the Holy Trinity and Description of the Secret of the Transmutation of Metals". I have also added the first image of the Red King and White Queen, also from the Rosarium Philosophorum.
The Great Work is the ultimate goal of alchemy, a refining and transmutation of the soul into something pure and without contradiction. The result of this Great Work is sometimes represented in images as the Rebis, a two-headed person representing the union of opposites. here I discuss one such image, with a new image gallery in the works.
While many occultists talked in terms of four elements - fire, earth, water and air, plus sometimes spirit - alchemists often talk of three elements: sulfur, salt and mercury.
