Putin says that the Russian Federation may seize EU-related ships operating under a flag of convenience, in response to EU actions against the Russian "shadow fleet". Well, at least he isn´t threatening to nuke us! Always something.
It would be ironic if the war in Ukraine would lead to the effective collapse of flags of convenience...
 |
| Credit: Charles J Sharp |
Moderaterna låtsas vara upprörda över ett vanligt debattinlägg från Håkan Juholt. Tänker alla köra Annie Lööf-kortet och "jag-är-(lätt)kränkt" i den här valrörelsen?
Jag betvivlar inte att denna historia är "sann" på något sätt, men den är ju inte hela sanningen. Från en sajt som promoterar "Boken om hopp: NT", omnämnd i förra inlägget.
Något som heter Bible for the Nations har skickat ut gratisex av Nya Testamentet till...jag vet inte...alla hushåll i Sverige? Fick den i brevlådan för några dagar sedan. Den heter "Boken om hopp: NT". Tydligen baserad på Svenska Folkbibeln. Som jag haft länge. Men tack ändå...antar jag.
 |
| Credit: Nicor |
50,000 North Korean soldiers may be deployed in Russia soon, according to Ukrainian president Zelensky. Something tells me they´re not there on vacation! Their end destination may very well be Ukraine itself.
That Russia needs cannon fodder from *North Korea* does show that Putin´s war isn´t going entirely according to plan. On the other hand, nobody cares where the soldiers come from if the trick turns out to work...
Last time around, Russia and their original ally (then about 15,000 strong) did manage to take back control over the portions of the Kursk region which had been captured by Ukraine during a surprise offensive. However, this obviously wasn´t enough to defeat the Ukrainian military overall.
I assume this is another "trial balloon". And since the Korean People´s Army is supposedly two million men strong, Putin could potentially keep up the pressure for years. Assuming Kim Jong-un is interested, obviously.
We live in "interesting" times.
I don´t reeeeally believe in astrology, but surely a total eclipse of the Sun in the Sun sign Leo must mean something? I don´t know, the end of the world or shit of that nature? Or at the very least the end of Leo!
Yet, there is relatively little apocalyptic speculation on YouTube related to the eclipse - at least as far as I can see. OK, let me guess. The eclipse isn´t visible in the United States? And "America" is the world. Or the universe?
Is the next lunar eclipse (28 August) visible in the US of A? If so, I suppose *that* will be the next doomer extravaganza, hah hah.
 |
| Credit: Alejandro Bayer Tamayo |
Inga direkta nyheter, ärligt talat. Läs innan AB låser artikeln.
ChatGPT interprets the story of Siruttondar a bit too nicely, in my opinion, but it´s still an interesting conversation...
How did the Nayanars and Shaiva Siddhanta look at human sacrifice?
Yes, and the Nāyanār tradition gives us a particularly revealing answer, because it contains an apparently shocking story that could easily be mistaken for an endorsement of human sacrifice.
The short version is:
*Śaiva Siddhānta did not teach human sacrifice as a legitimate ordinary religious practice. But the Nāyanār hagiographies sometimes use the imagery of sacrifice—including human flesh—to dramatize absolute devotion to Śiva.
The most important example is Siruttoṇḍar (Sirutondar) Nāyanār.
Siruttoṇḍar was one of the 63 Nāyanārs, and his story is found in the medieval Periya Purāṇam of Cēkkiḻār.
Śiva appears to him disguised as a frightening Bhairava-like ascetic and asks for an extraordinarily disturbing meal: the flesh of a five-year-old only son. Siruttoṇḍar and his wife, rather than refusing, sacrifice their own son and prepare the flesh for their guest. When the ascetic then asks them to call the boy, the child miraculously appears alive; the ascetic disappears and Śiva reveals himself.
This is not presented as a successful human sacrifice to Śiva.
The crucial narrative fact is that the sacrifice is ultimately undone. The child is restored, the supposed flesh disappears, and Śiva reveals that the entire episode was a test of devotion.
That makes the story very different from something like the Kālikā Purāṇa's explicit ritual prescriptions for narabali.
The story is testing the proposition:
Is there anything that a devotee loves more than Śiva and Śiva's devotees?
Siruttoṇḍar's defining virtue is dāsya—servanthood. His regular practice is to feed Śiva's devotees before eating himself.
The Bhairava figure takes this principle to an impossible extreme.
The devotee effectively says:
"If this is genuinely what Śiva's devotee requires, I will give even what is most precious to me."
And then Śiva reveals that he never actually wanted the child dead.
So the "sacrifice" functions as a test of attachment, not as a prescription for ritual killing.
This is very similar structurally to stories such as Abraham and Isaac: the apparent demand for a human sacrifice is a test, and the human victim ultimately survives.
The fact that Śiva appears as a terrifying ascetic/Bhairava is not accidental.
Bhairava represents the side of Śiva that stands outside ordinary social boundaries—death, cremation grounds, skulls, impurity, radical asceticism.
So the story asks the devotee to confront the ultimate taboo:
Can you recognize Śiva even when he appears in a form that horrifies you?
And there's a second layer:
Can you surrender even your most cherished possession to Śiva?
The answer ultimately turns out to be:
Yes—but Śiva does not actually require you to destroy it.
That is quite different from saying:
"Śiva wants human sacrifices."
This is where we should distinguish the Nāyanār movement from other Śaiva traditions.
The historical Nāyanārs flourished approximately between the 6th and 9th centuries, and their devotional hymns—the Tēvāram and related works—became foundational for Tamil Śaivism.
Their characteristic religious emphasis is:
rather than sacrificial violence.
The Periya Purāṇam, written much later in the 12th century, elaborates their lives into elaborate hagiographical narratives.
So we should not read every bizarre event in the Periya Purāṇam as a historical description of what Śaiva devotees actually did.
Classical Śaiva Siddhānta is not a religion of ritual human sacrifice.
Its basic framework is traditionally expressed as:
Pati — Śiva, the Lord
paśu — the individual soul
pāśa — the bonds that bind the soul
The soul is liberated through Śiva's grace, together with appropriate knowledge, conduct, ritual and devotion.
The ideal sacrifice therefore becomes increasingly internal and devotional.
Rather than:
"Kill another human being for Śiva."
the theological trajectory is:
"Offer yourself to Śiva."
And "yourself" increasingly means:
This is quite compatible with the broader transformation of sacrifice we were discussing earlier.
Śaiva Siddhānta developed out of a religious environment that included Āgamic and Tantric Śaivism, and those traditions were not uniformly nonviolent.
Meanwhile, the Kāpālika world—whose imagery overlaps considerably with Bhairava worship—was considerably more transgressive.
So medieval India could simultaneously contain:
Kāpālika/Bhairava traditions
→ cremation grounds, skulls, blood, transgression, and in some texts human sacrifice
and
Tamil devotional Śaivism
→ Śiva temples, hymns, devotion, service and grace
Yet both could regard Śiva/Bhairava as the supreme divine reality.
That's actually a very interesting example of the diversity within Śaivism.
The story doesn't merely say:
"Human sacrifice is okay because Śiva likes it."
Its ultimate message is almost the opposite:
The devotee must be willing to surrender everything—but the compassionate Śiva ultimately restores what was surrendered.
So the literal human sacrifice turns out to be a dramatic metaphor for total surrender.
That is also why I wouldn't use the Nāyanār story as evidence that medieval Tamil Śaivism practiced human sacrifice. It is evidence that human sacrifice was powerful enough as a religious symbol to be used in Śaiva devotional storytelling.
And the choice of Bhairava makes the connection to your earlier questions particularly striking: the Bhairava figure here represents the terrible demand that takes ordinary devotion beyond its limits, while Śiva's final revelation shows that the true object of the test was the devotee's attachment, not the child's life.
