Deep Psychological Origins Of CAT CULT

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

I practice the active imagination technique in a group form. This allows me to get acquainted with the images of the collective unconscious of ordinary Russians without regularly sitting on local forums or referring to nonsense feeds of social networks. One day, the Bast archetype came into the mind of one of my clients

He did not know that this was a former ancient Egyptian goddess. For him, it was just a graceful girl with the head and paws of a cat. She gave him more Japanese-anime associations. Although he, like many Russian tourists, bought himself a figurine of a thin cat in Egypt. But, as it should be Bast behaved as the patroness of joy, fun and love, female beauty, fertility and home. True, at times she turned into her aggressive avatar-predecessor, the lioness Sekhmet. This part is somehow going to exterminate all of humanity. But I drank red beer with hibiscus, and fell asleep as it should be for a cat.

She showed up not only with different sides of her multifaceted nature, but also with her entire family. She was accompanied by a moderately well-fed dwarf of a cheerful disposition. He was almost human, if not for the long protruding tongue, reddish hair, cat ears, thick legs and a lion's tail. The Egyptians did not erect temples to this jester of the gods, the patron saint of the hearth, the deity of happiness and luck, as well as the main protector of the poor, old people and children. He was venerated directly in the homes, and the poorest. His name was Bes.

He does not at all look like a familiar, Slavic demon, who, if not for the horns, would be a real monkey. Or a relic hominid like a yeti. But I leave speculations on this score for fans of the theories of the origin of speech and man from Professor Porshnev. Slavic demons caused minor harm to people, could cause bad weather and send troubles that lead people astray. The pagan Slavs believed that the earth remained under the power of demons throughout the winter. Demons were the personification of darkness and cold. And they are completely devoid of the hypnotic abilities of Porshnev's characters. The Slavs attributed them to a completely different mythological character.

So the consonance is rather accidental. The names "Bes" and "Bast" are usually associated with the Nubian word "demon" meaning "cat". Most likely, the original cult of this god was associated with the worship of the cat, who was considered the protector of the house from mice, rats and snakes (hence the role of Bes as the patron saint of the hearth).

Their son did not at all resemble the Egyptian god of war Mahes, except perhaps the habit of devouring prisoners, to which we will return. After all, he was not the son of Bes, but the sun god Ra.

But if you follow the consonances and associations of native speech, a completely different character will appear before your imagination. His prophet and adoptive father Mikhail Afanasyevich Bulgakov, the most Ukrainian of Gogol's heirs. After all, it was from the mystical Gogol Overcoat that all Russian literature grew. But Gogol had a difficult relationship with cats, which, as a believer, he considered a product of evil spirits.

Whether it is Bulgakov. Remember the cat Behemoth. Does it remind you of anything? By the way, all over the world a huge dangerous African beast is called a hippo. And only Russians consider him a good-natured fat man and call him by the name of the biblical demon Behemoth.

But Mikhail Afanasyevich, although he used various kinds of tabloid esotericism in the creation of the Master and Margarita, was also a completely Russian person. And Russians have their own feline archetype or evil spirits, if you like.

Even uneducated psychologists from the Israeli military registration and enlistment office know him under the nickname "khatul madan" or a scientist cat. In our tales, he survived, like a huge black cat in the house of Baba Yaga. But if you read Afanasyev, it turns out that he is a completely independent character. Bayun the cat not only sits on a pole or walks along a chain with fairy tales and songs. He also treats passers-by with them. True, those who have the imprudence to succumb too much to their charms and fall asleep, he eats. Here is such a Slavic answer to the overseas Hypnozhab.

But apparently, from the Egyptian relative, he inherited a penchant for practical jokes. At one of the meetings of the Russian coalition to fight poverty, I heard what a joke he threw out with our liberal economists. They seriously argue that there are no poor in Russia because we are the world's largest market for cat food producers. Besides the primitivism of thinking and pedagogy, it is necessary to demonstrate such a separation from national roots? Well, we are also the largest market for producers of kvass, Easter cakes or colored eggs.

Is it really impossible to turn to at least the masterpieces of the Soviet cultural tradition? You don't need to take into account the religious version. But even Gennady Khazanov, in the miniature "Coded", described a family of alcoholics, where there was only a cat of domestic cattle. After each regular castration, he pretty much put on weight, which, undoubtedly, should be interpreted by liberal economists as a great help in housekeeping. That is, the descendants of Russian peasants, not only at the first opportunity, put on red jackets instead of red shirts, but also got themselves "geldings". And who is poorer - that cat.

There is also a sad interpretation of this Russian habit. Any projective diagnostician, besides the fable about the Russian conscript and Khatul Madana, also knows that in the drawing of a family, pets often mean a younger brother or sister. Even if they were not born, but exist only in fantasies or vague desires. Our dominance of cats and other pets on social networks is the unborn Russian children devoured by the recent wicked witch Depopulation.

So I strongly welcome the construction of a cat litter factory in the Nizhny Novgorod region. The case is undoubtedly necessary. What else to do with processed products at home, brought to us from all over the world of cat food? Although, if the market for cat food begins to decline, it could be a good demographic omen. But this is still far from it.

So, reading the fairy tale "The Cat and the Fox" to your child, you can now safely talk about the further adventures of its protagonist.

Although about Lisa Patrikeevna, a close relative of the princes Khovansky, you can tell in more detail next time.