Daily Practices for Those Short on Time

[Shine]

Define your terms, and then you'll be able to find your answer.

(Big Red gotcha'ed me on this one.  Someday I may forgive him.)

 
Thanks. This helps quite a bit.

[Darkhawk]

Thanks. This helps quite a bit.

 
Really?  (I mean, it was meant to, but a lot of people get frustrated by 'this question is too generic to respond to; be more specific' kinds of answers.)

[Shine]

Really?  (I mean, it was meant to, but a lot of people get frustrated by 'this question is too generic to respond to; be more specific' kinds of answers.)

 
Yeah, it really was. XD Your short answer nudged my brain onto the right thinking track.

I kind of took your answer as a, "here's your general direction, but you're going to have to think for yourself."

[Devo]

You've got your hands full.

Do you think maybe there's the possibility of being another kind of priest other than a temple priest? (Not in ancient terms, but in modern terms.) I've wondered about this, but despite reading some great articles on it, haven't been able to come up with anything that sounds . . . right, yet still leaves a good balance between spiritual and mundane.

 
Thing is, there were many many many types of priests within the temple back in AE. And that is something else that makes it difficult to do things at home- we don't have a whole staff. Someone to hold the offerings, a group to dance, a lector priest, etc... so then, if it's possible to be another kind of priest really depends on how you look at it- since there were so many back then, and that's just while in teh temple- who knows what all they did during their time off.

-Devo

[Shine]

Thing is, there were many many many types of priests within the temple back in AE. And that is something else that makes it difficult to do things at home- we don't have a whole staff. Someone to hold the offerings, a group to dance, a lector priest, etc... so then, if it's possible to be another kind of priest really depends on how you look at it- since there were so many back then, and that's just while in teh temple- who knows what all they did during their time off.

-Devo

 
Good point. If you want to have some kind of modern priesthood (without the staff), you may have to figure out how to combine several roles in a harmonious way in one person. Or, like Darkhawk said, define your terms. I'm not sure how closely we have to or are able to follow the ancient definition of priest/ess, even if we give several roles to one person.

[Devo]

Good point. If you want to have some kind of modern priesthood (without the staff), you may have to figure out how to combine several roles in a harmonious way in one person. Or, like Darkhawk said, define your terms. I'm not sure how closely we have to or are able to follow the ancient definition of priest/ess, even if we give several roles to one person.

 
I really have no clue. I have spent many an hour trying to figure out what the modern format would be- hell, I even said I'd write a blog post on it once, but I have yet to actually get something down that I'm happy with. More and more, I really think we need a new term for people who a dedicants to the gods.

-Devo

[veggiewolf]

I really have no clue. I have spent many an hour trying to figure out what the modern format would be- hell, I even said I'd write a blog post on it once, but I have yet to actually get something down that I'm happy with. More and more, I really think we need a new term for people who a dedicants to the gods.

-Devo

I could tweak an old response and say Tool?  The connotations of the other terms used sometimes squick people.

Seriously, though, I wonder if we'll ever be able to move beyond hm(t)-ntr.  Of course, I also wonder if we've reached the limit to which the translation of the term can go.

[Shine]

I really have no clue. I have spent many an hour trying to figure out what the modern format would be- hell, I even said I'd write a blog post on it once, but I have yet to actually get something down that I'm happy with. More and more, I really think we need a new term for people who a dedicants to the gods.

-Devo

 
I've been calling myself a servant in training more and more instead of a priestess in training. (Someday I want to be a servant/priestess to Bast.) It basically involves attending to cult regularly with offerings and such, as well as going out into the world and becoming a better person. Become a better person, hopefully become more useful to the Netjer in the process. Or at least less annoying. Heh.

I can't tell you what the difference is between the two words in this context. Not exactly, anyway.

Were you thinking of anything specific to call dedicants? It's an interesting question and it may become more important as Kemeticism gets more and more converts who are happy to be onion-hoers, but would love to do some "priestly" stuff for their gods.

[Shine]

I could tweak an old response and say Tool?  The connotations of the other terms used sometimes squick people.

 
Actually, this sounds pretty good.

[Darkhawk]

I really have no clue. I have spent many an hour trying to figure out what the modern format would be- hell, I even said I'd write a blog post on it once, but I have yet to actually get something down that I'm happy with.

 
Honestly, at this point in my completely non-temple-oriented practice, I'm working my way around to a usage of "priest" that is far more similar to a religious witchcraft approach than anything else.  Not in the usual r.w. "we are all priests" way, but in the sense that a priest is an initiate of the mysteries of a god.

What that means in its fullest sense is not something I know either, as I'm not one (yet).

[Sobekemiti]

Honestly, at this point in my completely non-temple-oriented practice, I'm working my way around to a usage of "priest" that is far more similar to a religious witchcraft approach than anything else.  Not in the usual r.w. "we are all priests" way, but in the sense that a priest is an initiate of the mysteries of a god.

What that means in its fullest sense is not something I know either, as I'm not one (yet).

I've been wrestling with this too. I'm not interested (or called) to temple priesthood either, because as a solitary, I don't ... see the point in that sort of focus (for me; others may choose to disagree).

At the same time, though, Sobek keeps reminding me that if anyone's going to be His priest, it's going to be me. I just haven't quite figured out what on earth that will mean, yet, apart from a magician specialising in protection magic/heka which is what Heru-sa-Aset wants from me. Separating out priest and magician is more of the problem for me in trying to sort out what a non-temple priest might do. I think in that sense I have a different focus to just 'religious'/God-tending conceptions of priesthood that I need to think about.

I like the idea of an initiate in a God's mysteries, though. It's not a definition I'd considered, though I had thought about someone who keeps a God's secrets or something like that. I was thinking more along the lines of lay priesthood, with crossovers with the kind of things a village witch/wise woman might do and the services she might provide, even if it's not a particularly good equivalent. At the moment, though, it's just an idea I'm playing around with while I try to figure all this out. I'm nowhere near ready to put any of this into practice yet.

[Darkhawk]

Separating out priest and magician is more of the problem for me in trying to sort out what a non-temple priest might do. I think in that sense I have a different focus to just 'religious'/God-tending conceptions of priesthood that I need to think about.

I think in the context of AE separating out "priest" and "magician" is likely to stall out in complicated ways, given how tightly intertwined those things were.  I mean, there were amuletmakers and so on who weren't priests, but....

[Sobekemiti]

I think in the context of AE separating out "priest" and "magician" is likely to stall out in complicated ways, given how tightly intertwined those things were.  I mean, there were amuletmakers and so on who weren't priests, but....

 
Yeah, I know, and this is why I'm not inclined to bother trying. But it is something I think about anyway in spite of this, because the words have such different meanings in English. But words fascinate me like that. In my head, I can conceptualise them as being the same sort of thing, and it makes sense to me, but putting that into actual words is hard, let alone trying to figure out what it means in a non-temple, modern day context.

[Shefyt]

Honestly, at this point in my completely non-temple-oriented practice, I'm working my way around to a usage of "priest" that is far more similar to a religious witchcraft approach than anything else.  Not in the usual r.w. "we are all priests" way, but in the sense that a priest is an initiate of the mysteries of a god.
What that means in its fullest sense is not something I know either, as I'm not one (yet).

In Kemetic Orthodoxy, we use the term heri-sesheta, which means "one who is over the secrets of." It's a title that KO priests can acquire; it means that one has a certain level of knowledge regarding one's Parent(s) and a responsibility to do Their work. (I'm Heri-sesheta Bast.) I don't know if it works to split that title off from the rest of the functions of priesthood, or if it's a useful label for anyone else, but there it is.

-Shefyt

[Bezenwepwy]

In Kemetic Orthodoxy, we use the term heri-sesheta, which means "one who is over the secrets of." It's a title that KO priests can acquire; it means that one has a certain level of knowledge regarding one's Parent(s) and a responsibility to do Their work. (I'm Heri-sesheta Bast.) I don't know if it works to split that title off from the rest of the functions of priesthood, or if it's a useful label for anyone else, but there it is.

 
You know, I think that's the first time anyone from KO has ever stated what being heri-sesheta entails in such a down to earth way. It is what I suspected it must be, but there has been this habit of KO priests being very hush-hush and vague about it whenever it has come up.