(time index set to the Delphi segment)Mysteries of the Ancient World - Myths and Legends (at 43:15)
March 13, 2016 | Questar Entertainment
Posted on 06/03/2020 7:50:34 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
Numerous classical authors report that natural phenomena played an essential part in one of their most sacred religious rituals: the oracle at Delphi. According to the geographer Strabo (c. 64 B.C.–25 A.D.), for example, "the seat of the oracle is a cavern hollowed down in the depths … from which arises pneuma [breath, vapor, gas] that inspires a divine state of possession" (Geography 9.3.5). Over the past five years, a team of researchers -- a geologist, an archaeologist, a chemist and a toxicologist -- has put that claim to the test, making it much more likely that we will actually understand what happened at Delphi...
Unlike itinerant prophets and omen-interpreters, the Pythia derived her power from the place -- she could only prophesy while seated in the adyton within the Temple of Apollo. According to Strabo, the pneuma arose from a small opening (chasma ges) in the adyton: "Over the mouth [of the opening] a high tripod is set. Mounting this, the Pythia inhales the pneuma and then speaks prophecies in verse or in prose. The latter are versified by poets on duty in the temple" (Geography 9.3.5.).
Strabo was not the only ancient source to describe the adyton and the intoxicating gas. The second-century A.D. traveler Pausanias told of a spring in the temple’s adyton that made the Pythia prophetic. Also, in On the Obsolescence of the Oracles, the biographer Plutarch (c. 46–120 A.D.), who served as a priest of Apollo at Delphi, described an exhalation of vapor in the adyton that sent the Pythia into a trance.
Despite these testimonies, no serious scholar over the last 50 years has accepted the idea that the Pythia’s trance was caused by a gaseous emission.
(Excerpt) Read more at biblicalarchaeology.org ...
Think of them as CIA analysts or TV pundits.
Some prophecies were ambivalent, like saying if a king invaded his enemy a great empire would fall, but the invader forgot to ask which empire, and he lost.
But other prophecies sound like they had intelligence and military knowledge behind their prophecy.
And when Athens was in danger from a Persian invasion, the first prophecy told them to flee they were doomed.. which happened, and it didn't take a prophet to for see that.
But when the Athenians demanded a second prophecy, they were told to rely on their wooden walls, which was interpreted by the Athenians as their ships. I always figured they were influenced to make that one up by someone who knew that there were too many Persians to live off the land, so figured they could block his supply line.
My pleasure.
“All green of skin... 800 centuries ago, their bodily fluids include the birth of half-breeds. For the fundamental truth self-determination of the cosmos, for dark is the suede that mows like a harvest.”
“I’m so stuned” she was often heard to say.
(time index set to the Delphi segment)Mysteries of the Ancient World - Myths and Legends (at 43:15)
March 13, 2016 | Questar Entertainment
And couldn’t the source of the vapors simply exhausted over time?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
