Nature Worship: Separating Delusion from Reality (PART-2)

Nature Worship

CHAPTER- 1

Nature worship

 Stars and constellations

In the present world, star and constellation worship exists only in a corrupted or concealed form. True star worship was only practiced by a few ancient cultures, most of which were affiliated with Mesopotamia. Mesopotamia was the birthplace of astral religions and mythology that influenced faiths all over the world. Both astronomy and astrology achieved high levels of sophistication in Mesopotamia, especially following a Hellenizing revival of astronomy. Mesopotamian astral worship and influence may have reached Central and Andean America, despite the fact that this is a contentious theory (by way of China or Polynesia). Not only Mesopotamia, Asia Minor, Egypt, Iran, and India were influenced by Sumerian, Elamite, and Hurrian stargazing, but also other areas. 

The Pythagoreans and Orphic (mystical philosophers) in the Mediterranean area, as well as astrological mystics in India, Indonesia, China, and Polynesia, all had knowledge of the zodiac and planets and observed precession. The spirit of ancient Mediterranean and Oriental understanding of the stars, for example, was greatly affected in western Sudan. Except for Sudan, northeast Africa, and what is now Zimbabwe (Mwene Matapa), very little of Africa has any significant understanding of the stars. 

Forest peoples: awareness of the stars is restricted unless traditional hunting cultures have persisted, as indicated by an Ekoi man in southeast Nigeria: "Ekoi people do not bother themselves with the stars since the trees constantly obscure them." The Ituri's scavengers. Forest dwellers have never attained the level of astronomical knowledge that African steppe dwellers have. The study of the stars almost never leads to adoration of the stars. Star gods, for example, are uncommon in much of Africa. There was rarely real religious worship of the stars in Polynesia, where substantial knowledge of the stars was gained in regular schools of astronomy by seafaring people and fisherman. 

The hunting peoples of the Southern Hemisphere still place a high value on astronomical knowledge. However, the economic value of the rising and setting of the stars considerably outweighs their mythological significance. Usually, stars are said to be living entities, especially animals that have been transported to the sky. They are obviously regarded seriously, since their rising and setting signify the advent of wildlife to be hunted or fruits to be harvested.

The widespread African interpretation of Orion as a hunter, game, or hound (from East Africa to the lower Congo and the Niger region) is most likely a holdover from an earlier hunting phase that has survived in agricultural societies. Orion is still renowned as a hunter in Europe, northern Asia as a hunter of reindeer and elk, and North America as a bear hunter in a different form. Outside the Andean empires, a number of old hunting culture's astral beliefs have been retained throughout South America: the notions of stars and constellations as lords of the animals, as hunters' assistants, or as animals themselves.

The image of the Mesopotamian goddess Inanna-Ishtar is arguably the most prominent personification of the planet Venus. She was perceived as female at times and as having characteristics of both genders at other times. Inanna-Ishtar, the queen of heaven, persists in Roman Catholic imagery as the Virgin Mary with the moon under her feet, thanks to her association with the Greek Aphrodite and the Roman Venus. This planet also has a considerable impact on African civilizations, not only in the unusual figure of a Zulu celestial goddess who regulates the agricultural work of the women, but also as the evening and morning stars, who are the moon's brides.

The king is associated with the moon in Mwene Matapa (Zimbabwe) royal culture and its influences in Buganda (Uganda) and southern Congo, and his marriage to the Venus ladies is a sort of hieros gamos (Greek: "holy marriage"). The notion of "Venus women of the moon" is still prevalent in many parts of Africa, despite the fact that the moon is traditionally regarded as the sun's wife (or sister). This idea was most likely dominant at a period when the moon-king worldview was prevalent in the eastern part of Africa, from the Nile to South Africa, perhaps showing South Arabian influences. The Pleiades, a cluster of six or seven nearby stars in the constellation Taurus, is depicted as maidens sought by men in various places of the world.

The Pleiades are also shown as a mother hen with her chicks, particularly in Eurasia, where the star Aldebaran, which is near to the Pleiades, is frequently represented as part of the constellation. The arrival of the Pleiades marks the start of the agricultural year in Africa. As a result, in many Bantu languages, the word kulima ("to hoe") serves as the basis for the Pleiades' appellation kilimia. Aside from eastern and southern Africa, there is still a tiny area in western Sudan where this concept persists. The Finno-Ugric and Turkish Tatars regard Polaris (the North Star) as the “nail of the globe “or” pillar of heaven. Polaris is regarded as the negotiator of the god of heaven Ülgan by the Altai Tatars, whereas the Japanese regard Polaris as a deity of heaven above the ninth layer of clouds.

The Milky Path Galaxy was sometimes called after hunting or domestic animals, depending on a group's economics and lifestyle: way of the tapir, donkey, or camel. It's also known as a water stream or the seam of the celestial tent. The Milky Route exposes previous legendary notions, such as the world (cosmic) tree, as the footprints of God or the road of God, as the way of the dead, or as an abandoned way of the gods. The aurora borealis, or "northern lights," of the north Polar Regions, is widely interpreted by Arctic and subarctic peoples (e.g., Eskimo, Athabasca, and Tlingit) as a reflection of the ghosts' or peoples' farther north's dancing fire, as "meat frying" or a ball game. Northern Germanic tribes saw the glories of Valkyrie's shields in it (warrior women).

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