1.
Demon
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A demon is a supernatural, mythological and often malevolent being prevalent in religion, occultism, literature, fiction, mythology and folklore. The original Greek word daimon does not carry the negative connotation initially understood by implementation of the Koine δαιμόνιον, the Ancient Greek word δαίμων daimōn denotes a spirit or divine power, much like the Latin genius or numen. Daimōn most likely came from the Greek verb daiesthai, the Greek conception of a daimōn notably appears in the works of Plato, where it describes the divine inspiration of Socrates. To distinguish the classical Greek concept from its later Christian interpretation, the Greek terms do not have any connotations of evil or malevolence. In fact, εὐδαιμονία eudaimonia, means happiness, far into the Byzantine period Christians eyed their cities old pagan statuary as a seat of the demons presence. It was no longer beautiful, it was infested, the term had first acquired its negative connotations in the Septuagint translation of the Hebrew Bible into Greek, which drew on the mythology of ancient Semitic religions. This was then inherited by the Koine text of the New Testament, the Western medieval and neo-medieval conception of a demon derives seamlessly from the ambient popular culture of Late Antiquity. The Hellenistic daemon eventually came to include many Semitic and Near Eastern gods as evaluated by Christianity, the supposed existence of demons remains an important concept in many modern religions and occultist traditions. Demons are still feared largely due to their power to possess living creatures. In the contemporary Western occultist tradition, a demon is a metaphor for certain inner psychological processes. According to the Jewish Encyclopedia, In Chaldean mythology the seven evil deities were known as shedu, storm-demons and they were represented as winged bulls, derived from the colossal bulls used as protective jinn of royal palaces. From Chaldea, the term shedu traveled to the Israelites, the writers of the Tanach applied the word as a dialogism to Canaanite deities. There are indications that demons in popular Hebrew mythology were believed to come from the nether world, various diseases and ailments were ascribed to them, particularly those affecting the brain and those of internal nature. Examples include catalepsy, headache, epilepsy and nightmares, there also existed a demon of blindness, Shabriri who rested on uncovered water at night and blinded those who drank from it. Demons supposedly entered the body and caused the disease while overwhelming or seizing the victim, to cure such diseases, it was necessary to draw out the evil demons by certain incantations and talismanic performances, at which the Essenes excelled. In mythology, there were few defences against Babylonian demons, the mythical mace Sharur had the power to slay demons such as Asag, a legendary gallu or edimmu of hideous strength. As referring to the existence or non-existence of shedim there are converse opinions in Judaism, there are practically nil roles assigned to demons in the Jewish Bible. In conclusion, Jews are not obligated to believe in the existence of shedim, the word shedim appears only in two places in the Tanakh
2.
Folklore
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Folklore is the body of expressive culture shared by a particular group of people, it encompasses the traditions common to that culture, subculture or group. These include oral traditions such as tales, proverbs and jokes and they include material culture, ranging from traditional building styles to handmade toys common to the group. Folklore also includes customary lore, the forms and rituals of celebrations like Christmas and weddings, folk dances, each one of these, either singly or in combination, is considered a folklore artifact. Just as essential as the form, folklore also encompasses the transmission of these artifacts from one region to another or from one generation to the next, for folklore is not taught in a formal school curriculum or studied in the fine arts. Instead these traditions are passed along informally from one individual to another either through verbal instruction or demonstration, the academic study of folklore is called folkloristics. To fully understand folklore, it is helpful to clarify its component parts and it is well-documented that the term was coined in 1846 by the Englishman William Thoms. He fabricated it to replace the contemporary terminology of popular antiquities or popular literature, the second half of the compound word, lore, proves easier to define as its meaning has stayed relatively stable over the last two centuries. Coming from Old English lār instruction, and with German and Dutch cognates, it is the knowledge and traditions of a particular group, the concept of folk proves somewhat more elusive. When Thoms first created this term, folk applied only to rural, frequently poor, a more modern definition of folk is a social group which includes two or more persons with common traits, who express their shared identity through distinctive traditions. Folk is a concept which can refer to a nation as in American folklore or to a single family. This expanded social definition of folk supports a view of the material, i. e. the lore. These now include all things people make with words, things they make with their hands, Folklore is no longer circumscribed as being chronologically old or obsolete. The folklorist studies the traditional artifacts of a group and how they are transmitted. Transmission is a part of the folklore process. Without communicating these beliefs and customs within the group over space and time, for folklore is also a verb. These folk artifacts continue to be passed along informally, as a rule anonymously, the folk group is not individualistic, it is community-based and nurtures its lore in community. As new groups emerge, new folklore is created… surfers, motorcyclists, in direct contrast to high culture, where any single work of a named artist is protected by copyright law, folklore is a function of shared identity within the social group. Having identified folk artifacts, the professional folklorist strives to understand the significance of these beliefs, customs, for these cultural units would not be passed along unless they had some continued relevance within the group
3.
Seduction
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Strategies of seduction include, conversation and sexual scripts, paralingual features, non-verbal communication and short term behavioural strategies. The word seduction stems from Latin and means literally leading astray, as a result, the term may have a positive or negative connotation. Famous seducers from history or legend include Lilith, Giacomo Casanova, the emergence of the Internet and technology has supported the availability and the existence of a seduction community, which is based on discourse about seduction. This is predominately by pickup artists, Seduction is also used within marketing to increase compliance and willingness. Seduction is a motif in history and fiction, both as a warning of the social consequences of engaging in the behaviour or becoming its victim. In the Bible, Eve offers the forbidden fruit to Adam, Eve herself was verbally seduced by the serpent, believed in Christianity to be Satan, later, Chapter 7 of Proverbs warns of the pitfalls of seduction. Sirens of Greek mythology lured sailors to their death by singing them to shipwreck, famous male seducers, their names synonymous with sexual allure, range from Genji to James Bond. If her father refuse to give her unto him, he shall pay money according to the dowry of virgins. The Second Book of Samuel in the Old Testament describes King David seducing Bathsheba, King David has sexual relations with this woman, and then sends her husband to the front lines of battle with near certainty of death. Once Uriah is dead, King David takes Bathsheba as his wife, males and females both implement the strategy of seduction as a method of negotiating their sexual relationships. This can often involve manipulation of other individuals and this is primarily based on desire, normally physical, as well as attraction towards them. Popular phrases often used include, ‘the language of love is universal’ and these phrases help to demonstrate the extensively pervasive and ubiquitous strategy use within love and relationships amongst humans. Research has indicated that seduction could substitute or equate to a form of collapsed or condensed courtship, evolutionary psychology suggests that this form of sexual enticement can be used in order to cajole desired individuals to engage in sexual intercourse and ultimately reproduce. This behaviour is also aimed at persuading someone to develop a short-term or long-term sexual relationship with them, males declare that they adopt the strategy of seduction statistically more frequently than females. From an evolutionary perspective this is due to higher parental investment. Females therefore need to be seduced more prior to engaging in sexual intercourse, men more commonly wish to engage in more frequent short-term mating, which may require this strategy of seduction used to access the female for intercourse. However, this finding has been contradicted by non-verbal seduction results which indicate that females have more control within this area, other potential strategies individuals employ to gain access to a mate include courting or having relatives select mates for socioeconomic reasons. Ultimately, both males and females have reported preferring seduction above all other strategies, such as the use power or aggression, Seduction is related to human mate poaching
4.
Incubus
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An incubus is a Lilin-demon in male form who, according to mythological and legendary traditions, lies upon women in order to engage in sexual activity with them. Its female counterpart is a succubus, salacious tales of incubi and succubi have been told for many centuries in traditional societies. Some traditions hold that repeated sexual activity with an incubus or succubus may result in the deterioration of health, the word incubus is derived from Late Latin incubo, from incub. One of the earliest mentions of a comes from Mesopotamia on the Sumerian King List, ca.2400 BC. It is said that Lilu disturbs and seduces women in their sleep, while Lilitu and these demons were originally storm demons, but they eventually became regarded as night demons because of mistaken etymology. Incubi were thought to be demons who had relations with women. Succubi, by contrast, were thought to have intercourse with men. Debate about the demons began early in the Christian tradition, st. Augustine touched on the topic in De Civitate Dei. There were too many alleged attacks by incubi to deny them and he stated, There is also a very general rumor. Questions about the capabilities of the demons continued. If a demon could extract the semen quickly, the transportation of the substance could not be transported to a female host. This explains his view that Succubae and Incubi were the same demonic entity only to be described based on the sexes being conversed with. Being abused in such a way caused women at nunneries to be burned if they were found pregnant, the second method was the idea that a dead body could be possessed by a devil, causing it to rise and have sexual relations with others. This is similar to depictions of revenants or vampires and a spirit taking deceased corpse to cause some mischief and it became generally accepted that incubi and succubi were the same demon, able to switch between male and female forms. A succubus would be able to sleep with a man and collect his sperm, even though sperm and egg came from humans originally, the spirits offspring were often thought of as supernatural. Some sources indicate that it may be identified by its unnaturally large or cold penis, though many tales claim that the incubus is bisexual, others indicate that it is strictly heterosexual and finds attacking a male victim either unpleasant or detrimental. Incubi are sometimes said to be able to conceive children, the half-human offspring of such a union is sometimes referred to as a cambion. An incubus may pursue sexual relations with a woman in order to father a child, There are a number of variations on the incubus theme around the world
5.
Magic (paranormal)
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Magic or sorcery is the use of rituals, symbols, actions, gestures, and language with the aim of exploiting supernatural forces. The term magic has a variety of meanings, and there is no agreed upon definition of what it is or how it can be used. Religious scholars have defined magic in many different ways, one approach, associated with the anthropologists Edward Tylor and James G. Frazer, has magic and science be opposites. Many scholars of religion have rejected the utility of the term magic, the term magic comes from the Old Persian magu, a word that applied to a form of religious functionary about which little is known. This meaning of the term was adopted by Latin in the first century BCE. The concept was incorporated into Christian theology during the first century CE. This concept was pervasive throughout the Middle Ages, although in the modern period Italian humanists reinterpreted the term in a positive sense to establish the idea of natural magic. Both negative and positive understandings of the term were retained in Western culture over the following centuries, throughout Western history, there have been examples of individuals claiming to be practitioners of magic and referring to themselves as magicians. This trend has proliferated in the period, with a growing number of magicians appearing within the esoteric milieu. Scholars of religion have failed to agree on a definition of magic is. The subject has one of intense dispute, with some scholars criticizing the validity of the term in the first place. Even among those throughout history who have described themselves as magicians, there has been some debate among scholars as to whether to use the term magic at all. The scholar of religion Jonathan Z. Smith for example argued that it had no utility as a term that scholars should use. Religious historian Wouter Hanegraaff agreed, stating that the magic is an important object of historical research. Since the 1990s its usage among scholars has declined, within Western culture, magic has been linked to the idea of the Other. Using the term magic when discussing non-Western cultures or pre-modern forms of Western society raises problems, alternately, this term implies that all categories of magic are ethnocentric and that such Western preconceptions are an unavoidable component of scholarly research. Magic is one of the most heavily theorized concepts in the study of religion, the intellectualist approach to defining magic is associated with two prominent British anthropologists, Edward Tylor and James G. Frazer. This was an approach that viewed magic as being the theoretical opposite of science, in his 1871 book Primitive Culture, Tylor characterized magic as beliefs based on the error of mistaking ideal analogy for real analogy
6.
Late Latin
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Late Latin is the scholarly name for the written Latin of Late Antiquity. The English dictionary definition of Late Latin dates this period from the 3rd to the 6th centuries AD and this somewhat ambiguously defined period fits between Classical Latin and Medieval Latin. Although there is no consensus about exactly when Classical Latin should end, nor exactly when Medieval Latin should begin. Being a written language, Late Latin is not identical with Vulgar Latin, the latter during those centuries served as proto-Romance, a reconstructed ancestor of the Romance languages. Although Late Latin reflects an upsurge of the use of Vulgar Latin vocabulary and constructs, it remains to a large extent classical in overall features, some are more literary and classical, some more inclined to the vernacular. Nor is Late Latin identical to Christian or patristic Latin, the writings of the early Christian fathers. While Christian writings are considered a subset of Late Latin, pagans wrote much Late Latin, serving as some sort of lingua franca to a large empire, Latin tended to become simpler, to keep above all what it had of the ordinary. Neither Late Latin nor Late Antiquity are modern terms or concepts, instances of English vernacular use of the term may also be found from the 18th century. The term Late Antiquity meaning post-classical and pre-medieval had currency in English well before then, Imperial Latin went on into English literature, Fowlers History of Roman Literature mentions it in 1903. There are, however, insoluble problems with the beginning and end of Imperial Latin, politically the excluded Augustan Period is the paradigm of imperiality, and yet the style cannot be bundled with either the Silver Age or with Late Latin. Moreover, in 6th century Italy, the Roman Empire no longer existed, subsequently the term Imperial Latin was dropped by historians of Latin literature, although it may be seen in marginal works. The Silver Age was extended a century and the four centuries represent Late Latin. Low Latin is a vague and often pejorative term that might refer to any post-classical Latin from Late Latin through Renaissance Latin depending on the author. Its origins are obscure but the Latin expression media et infima Latinitas sprang into public notice in 1678 in the title of a Glossary by Charles du Fresne, the multi-volume set had many editions and expansions by other authors subsequently. The title varies somewhat, most commonly used was Glossarium Mediae et Infimae Latinitatis and it has been translated by expressions of widely different meanings. The uncertainty is understanding what media, middle, and infima, low, the media is securely connected to Medieval Latin by Canges own terminology expounded in the Praefatio, such as scriptores mediae aetatis, writers of the middle age. Canges Glossary takes words from authors ranging from the Christian period to the Renaissance, in the former case the infimae appears extraneous, it recognizes the corruptio of the corrupta Latinitas Cange said his Glossary covered. The two-period case postulates a second unity of style, infima Latinitas, Cange in the glossarial part of his Glossary identifies some words as being used by purioris Latinitatis scriptores, such as Cicero
7.
Zohar
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The Zohar is the foundational work in the literature of Jewish mystical thought known as Kabbalah. It is a group of books including commentary on the aspects of the Torah and scriptural interpretations as well as material on mysticism, mythical cosmogony. Its scriptural exegesis can be considered a form of the Rabbinic literature known as Midrash. The Zohar is mostly written in what has been described as a cryptic, Aramaic, the day-to-day language of Israel in the Second Temple period, was the original language of large sections of the biblical books of Daniel and Ezra, and is the main language of the Talmud. The Zohar first appeared in Spain in the 13th century, and was published by a Jewish writer named Moses de León and this accords with the traditional claim by adherents that Kabbalah is the concealed part of the Oral Torah. In the Bible the word Zohar appears in the vision of Ezekiel 8,2 and is translated as meaning radiance or light. It appears again in Daniel 12,3, The wise ones will shine like the radiance of the firmament and she confessed that her husband himself was the author of the work. The story indicates that shortly after its appearance the work was believed by some to have been written by Moses de Leon. Over time, the view in the Jewish community came to be one of acceptance of Moses de Leons claims. Rav Kaplan concludes saying this was the series of events. The Zohar spread among the Jews with remarkable swiftness, scarcely fifty years had passed since its appearance in Spain before it was quoted by many Kabbalists, including the Italian mystical writer Menahem Recanati and by Todros Abulafia. Certain Jewish communities, however, such as the Dor Daim, Andalusian, the Zohar instead declared Man to be the lord of the creation, whose immortality is solely dependent upon his morality. Conversely, Elijah Delmedigo, in his Bechinat ha-Dat endeavored to show that the Zohar could not be attributed to Shimon bar Yochai and they found it unsurprising that bar Yochai should have foretold future happenings or made references to historical events of the post-Talmudic period. However R Soloman Luria admits in responsa 98 that the zohar cant override a minhag, in the Ashkenazi community of Eastern Europe, religious authorities including the Vilna Gaon and Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi believed in the authenticity of the Zohar. Especially controversial were the views of the Dor Daim on the Zohar, as presented in Milhamoth Hashem, instead, they intermarried, sat together in batei midrash, and continued to sit with Rabbi Qafeḥ in beth din. Most of Orthodox Judaism holds that the teachings of Kabbalah were transmitted from teacher to teacher, in a long and continuous chain, the greatest acceptance of this sequence of events is held within Haredi Judaism, especially Chasidic groups. R Yechiel Michel Epstein, and R Yisrael Meir Kagan both believed in the authenticity of the Zohar, Rabbis Eliyahu Dessler and Gedaliah Nadel maintained that it is acceptable to believe that the Zohar was not written by Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai and that it had a late authorship. Some claim the tradition that Rabbi Shimon wrote that the concealment of the Zohar would last for exactly 1200 years from the time of destruction of the Holy Temple in Jerusalem
