Ògbóni
From Myth to Physics
Yorùbá Esotericism at the Matrix of Disciplines
A Response to Olayinka Agbetuyi
2
Part 11
Collage by myself evoking matter and energy transformations in the earth, in nature in general, in the human being and in machines, mediated through images of CERN ( the European Organization for Particle and Nuclear Research) research and Ògbóni, Yoruba esoteric order, iledi,Ògbóni sacred space ritual structure, all centered in the figure of Onile, Owner of earth and of Human habitation on earth, centre of Ògbóni veneration.
Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju
Comparative Cognitive Processes and Systems
"Exploring Every Corner of the Cosmos in Search of Knowledge"
Abstract
This essay is a development of the philosophical and mystical potential of the Yorùbá origin Ògbóni esoteric order. This effort is carried out by demonstrating intersections between Ògbóni cosmology, in its ritual activity, and scientific cosmology within the framework of its technological expression, particularly in particle physics, the study of the smallest constituents of matter.
These conjunctions are demonstrated in the context of relationships between an account of the ritual construction of the Ògbóni iledi, the order's sacred meeting house, and the activity of the Large Hadron Collider at CERN, the European Organization for Particle and Nuclear Research, both creativities described as contrastive ways of engaging with varied conceptions of energy.
This essay is a response to queries raised by Olayinka Agbetuyi, in the USAAfrica Dialogues Series Google group, as a rejoinder to my article, "Ògbóni: From Myth to Physics : Yorùbá Esotericism at the Matrix of Disciplines: A Response to Olayinka Agbetuyi", which reacted to his engagement with my earlier essay published in the same group, "From a Horned, Naked Woman to Cosmological Physics and Explorations of Consciousness: Developing the Wisdom of the Yorùbá Origin Ògbóni Esoteric Order through its Multi-Cultural and Trans-Disciplinary Associations : A Voice from the Universal Ògbóni Fraternity".
Contents
Abstract
Between Hindu Myth and CERN Physics
Shiva's Cosmic Dance and the "Dance of Subatomic Particles"
The Diffusion of Hindu Mythology and Philosophies into
the Thinking of Modern Scientists
Erwin Schrodinger and Julius Oppenheimer
Between Hindu Myth and CERN Physics
Shiva's Cosmic Dance and the "Dance of Subatomic Particles"
Agbetuyi earlier described myth as belonging with metaphysics and as having no relationship with physics.
He accurately described Ògbóni ritual as mythic action like the Shiva statue on the CERN grounds is also a mythic expression, leading him to question the basis for associating two such vastly different cultural forms as myth and science, and even more so, the ultra-sophisticated world of the nuclear and particle research facility that is CERN with the ritual universe of Ògbóni, and the art of Shiva, asking to what degree scientists identify with the CERN-Shiva conjunction in spite of the presence of that statute on the grounds of the research centre as a gift from the Indian government commemorating the country's association with CERN.
He declares-
"There is no relationship between CERN and Ògbóni rituals; practitioners never met."
And
"Shiva's dance does not involve physical collision of matter; CERN''s experiment does."
An imaginative correlation is not an exact but a general conjunction.
Thus, mythic explanations of reality, such as Shva's dance and the Ògbóni ritual configuration, may be understood as imaginative images that underlie all possibilities of human conception, even ideas that were not conceivable in their specificities by the creators of the ritual systems, being developments predating by centuries the scientific conceptions the mythic forms may imaginatively evoke without being identical with them.
Thus, one may interpret the motion of sub-atomic particles in terms of Shiva's cosmic dance in the understanding that the mythic image is more fundamental, because more general, more open to imaginative identification with various phenomena, than the scientific, even though they are not referring to the same specific concept, but simply to the idea of motions of creation and regeneration within the most fundamental aspects of existence-matter and energy in scientific cosmology, divine consciousness working on all aspects of being, including matter, in Hindu myth.
The Diffusion of Hindu Mythology and Philosophies into the Thinking of Modern Scientists
Erwin Schrodinger and Julius Oppenheimer
Hindu mythology and philosophies are actually among the best known and appreciated in the world, with pioneer of quantum mechanics Erwin Schrodinger drawing significantly on Hindu philosophy in developing his world view, as stated in his book My View of the World and nuclear physicist Julius Oppenheimer famously invoking a line from Hindu Bhagavad Gita on watching the first test denotation of the atom bomb, the project he headed, "If the radiance of a thousand suns were to burst at once into the sky, that would be like the splendor of the mighty one...I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds."
Oppenheimer invokes a mystical text, a story depicting a vision of an ultimate cosmic power, in terms of an atomic explosion, inspired as he was by the then unprecedented scope of power released by the scientific device.
At the link above, he is also described as responding to the ethical dilemma represented by the mystical narrative, an exploration of the justice of combat in the light of its creation of death, in the context of a dialogue between Arjuna, the warrior, and Krishna, his charioteer and embodiment of ultimate deity, at the battle of Kurukshetra.
Oppenheimer's later career, as that link states, demonstrates his internalization of this ethical dilemma, in his response to the use of the atomic bomb on Japan, particularly perhaps since the tide of the war had turned in favour of the Allies before the Hiroshima and Nagasaki denotations, and perhaps because he was confronted with the human reality of the child he was central to creating.
The Gita was written centuries before the atom bomb, but it reflects the paradoxes of war that have existed since those earlier days to the present, while its celebration of cosmic power evokes the human capacity to conceive of power at the grandest scales, represented by ultimate cosmic force in the Hindu context of the Gita and nuclear energy in Oppenheimer's time, hence the ancient text spoke to him on that historic day in 1945.
What is at stake in this context is imaginative multicultural and multi-disciplinary correlations, not exact identity between diverse phenomena.
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