Hypothetical situation

[kyrene]

Say you had a dream in which you were instructed by the gods to build an oracle. How would you do it?

Let's assume you didn't take any funny pills and you're pretty sure that based on various other details that the dream is legit and get that question out of the way. How would one go about building an oracle in this day and age?

Come on, put on your thinking caps! :D

Comments

[justben.livejournal.com]

Do you mean oracle as in "people who talk to the Gods" or as in "device/mechanism/process that people use to communicate with Them"?

The former's pretty straightforward: start doing it, and find other respectable people who are doing it along with you. Rally around your shared devotion to oracular activities, and use that energy to organize and name yourselves so that the hoi polloi have something to latch hold of. It's part action, part marketing[1].

The latter has a lot more leeway, but is probably no simpler. Depends on how "traditional" you want to take it. Guessing from what I know of you, I suspect cleaving to historical accuracy is not a super-high priority. Given that, lend your well-informed and mature understanding of the Gods to a tool that's already easy for average people to get started in: cartomancy. Design a new deck, with symbolism drawing deeply from whatever aspects of Hellenic mythos and ethos the Gods would have you bring to the people.

--
[1]: The marketing reference may seem a bit frivolous, but it's completely serious. I hope you'll indulge me for a brief tangent; the relevance will be clear shortly.

An acquaintance recently blogged refference to an article from Joel Spolsky, in which Joel talks about the role of management in a software organization. One of Joel's points was that many developers recognize that they can write software that's better than most out there, and they create a new company to do just that. They often fail, and a large part of the reason is because they fail to give adequate consideration to all of the things that go into a software development enterprise besides good code. The rest they lump into "marketing" in much the same way I'm doing here.

I'm sure the relevance is clear to you, but for those not as familiar with the pagan -- and particularly Hellenic -- community as you are, let me explain. Organizations pop up all the time in the pagan community to do this or that better than the other organizations. Many of them fall down, explode, or just peter off, and often (though certainly not always), this is due to lack of consideration for all of that "extra" stuff that has to go into a successful organization. If you believe the Gods are asking you for an oracular organization that's going to outlive you and your efforts, I recommend paying some attention to that "extra" stuff.

Anyway, my apologies if I got lectury. I must be off to lunch.

[kyrene-myste.livejournal.com]

The former.

And wow, I think this is the sole sane response I've gotten so far other than to do a divination.

Thanks for the thinking cap! :D

[justben.livejournal.com]

I get to be sane! Yay!

[ysathora.livejournal.com]

Well, I'll be sure to keep my advice to myself in the future.

[kyrene-myste.livejournal.com]

I had responses ranging from "this would be expensive" to "I should build a website". Not exactly what I had in mind, no.

Keep also in mind that I didn't see all responses when I post things. So taking things personally is rather jumping the gun.

[ysathora.livejournal.com]

Gotcha. I was in kind of a touchy mood when I got home last night, anyway. After I posted that comment, I decided my time would be best spent away from the internets :)

[kyrene-myste.livejournal.com]

All good :)

(I recommend breaks from the Internets myself for periods of time...)

[daeron.livejournal.com]

Question: what's your preferred method of divination? I know I've heard you talk about using Tarot before, and if that's the answer, my suggestion would be to get (if one is out there) or design (which I suspect would be more fun for you anyway) a Tarot desk based on Hellenismos (get someone to help you with the artwork, if needed).

You could make the whole creation process an offering to Apollon, which fits for this.

[kyrene-myste.livejournal.com]

I actually have a blank tarot deck that I will be using my own knowledge of Qabalah, Golden Dawn, and the Limyran Oracle to devise my own--and that would be cool. :D

[cktraveler.livejournal.com]

*thinks VERY, VERY carefully*

I'm ... not certain. I think there may not be enough information yet to know what to do. Are you trying to build an oracle that will bring wisdom where it's needed or to the world in general?

The former is a matter of being watchful, conscious, and involved, and putting yourself in the right place and time to be near the people who need the service or impart the things you've seen.

The latter is going to be much more difficult because you're going to have to be thinking organizationally. One person, by herself, is going to have a very hard time doing it; essentially it sounds like you'd have to found a temple, a small one at least, so that there is A Place To Go for those who are seeking an oracle.

This is probably going to be easier in Massachusetts than elsewhere, but frankly (assuming that you're talking about yourself becoming an oracle -- if not adjust pronouns) you're going to need assistant priestesses, an apprentice, and most likely a place other than your home to do it.

Your oracular method is going to make a big difference, too; if you're getting visions while using standard divination means (Tarot, runes, etc.) than a small storefront and one assistant may be sufficient. If you're getting visions in fire you will need to be set up for that. If you're talking about a complete "dark cave through which the mists of wisdom pour" setup it's going to require mucho dinero to secure the right place.

Then, as justben said, you're going to need a marketing machine so people know you're out there. I don't know if it's the case any more but in many cities fortunetelling used to be a "racket," controlled by specific individuals who make sure to keep the competition low (since, after all, it only takes time to learn how to tell fortunes correctly; you can teach basic cold reading in an hour, making it seem like an easy business). I don't know whether this is still true, whether it was ever true in Boston, or whether it would be a problem if you're setting yourself up as specifically a religious organization.

Finally there's the potential backlash to consider from openly calling yourself an oracle, but you know the community here better than I do.

[kyrene-myste.livejournal.com]

Where it's needed. The world isn't ready for this, but I bet the general Pagan community might be.

[cktraveler.livejournal.com]

Maybe. I'm not so sure.

I do have visions (you've probably already read a few of them on yunaduelist) and if they continue and show their accuracy for about a year I'll be willing to think of myself as a seer, as opposed to how I think of myself now (as "for real" at Tarot but still a novice, sometimes getting really good readings).

But there's no way I'd ever feel comfortable doing this for strangers -- it's a gentle push at the right moment, preferably without the person ever realizing there was a vision behind it.

That's how She works. I know that He works differently.

[kyrene-myste.livejournal.com]

I've always thought of myself as a seer, but this would be broadening my scope a bit more than "show up at psychic faires in VT and do readings for friends when they need it" type of a thing.

I know of a group that does oracular rituals. That may be a good start. I could host them at my place to start and invite people whom I know and talk about it online.

[cktraveler.livejournal.com]

*nods*

*furrows her brow in confusion*

Group oracular rituals?

[kyrene-myste.livejournal.com]

yup, get together as a group, make offerings to the gods, have one or more people perform divinations.

[cktraveler.livejournal.com]

Ah, yes, that makes sense. I was reading it as "circle of people doing a single divination together," which is probably possible but which is really, REALLY outside my experience.

[kyrene-myste.livejournal.com]

It's possible if each of them do a separate one on their own or some such.

The only ways I know of to do divs are tarot, Limyran Oracle, geomancy, and trance state/channeling.

[cktraveler.livejournal.com]

I've gotten dowsing to work, but the times it's worked it's been exhausting in a way that's really hard to describe. I've done runecasting once or twice but never really gotten good results.

[kyrene-myste.livejournal.com]

The closest I do to rune work is the stuff I do with the Limyran Oracle, which are essentially Greek runes. They only work for certain types of questions, however.

[cktraveler.livejournal.com]

That's true of all the forms I know. Sometimes it's obvious (dowsing can't tell the future very well) but sometimes it's more subtle. I've learned what questions not to bother asking my cards, and sometimes it varies by deck.

[kyrene-myste.livejournal.com]

I hear ya there.

And sometimes I get directed to put down the fucking cards and just say what They're pounding into my head. That works too.

[cktraveler.livejournal.com]

That's when it gets really fun.

Do you ever experience pain when that happens -- an almost literal pounding, like you have to either say what you're seeing immediately or pass out?

[kyrene-myste.livejournal.com]

I just sorta...separate...for a while and stuff comes out of my mouth and I have no control over it. When I come to it's sorta like I had an OBE.

[cktraveler.livejournal.com]

*kind of envious*

I can do that with Djala, but she prefers to be channeled or to meet me astrally, and she's not the vision-granting type anyway.

Guess it's different depending on the source.

[kyrene-myste.livejournal.com]

Apollo doesn't really give me much of a warning but he does it when I'm prepared for it in some way, at least--although that isn't always the case.

It most often happens during tarot readings and the like.

[cktraveler.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it seems to happen most often when the mind is already open and you're already doing some kind of divination. I can usually feel it coming on, but it doesn't make the actual process any easier. Maybe I just need more practice and more control.

[justben.livejournal.com]

For me, I waffle on how big the marketing machine needs to be.On the one hand, I have this gut feeling that it would be nice to have staff to handle the non-oracle details. On the other, I see people like James in Delphi doing it all themselves. I'm not sure how to reconcile those two. Perhaps it's a question of oracular volume and of life expectancy.

Incidentally, James may be a good person to talk to, myste_epoptes. I don't know what you think of him and his practice generally, but even if you're rocky he may have some interesting insights, hving been doing oracular work in the real world for a little while now.

[kyrene-myste.livejournal.com]

I've also been doing it but on a smaller scale. I've attended psychic faires and had a regular stream of clients for a while.

It's just been a while since I've done anything with it, and I tend to keep to answering requests from people whom I know in the community and my friends.

[justben.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it can be hard for me and radiantbaby to get the word out about sehellenes, too. Seems like a small number of people know and are interested, and a larger group of people know but aren't interested. The ones who aren't interested aren't interested in spreading the word, either. And that's the problem: it's hard to get the word out to people who want to know but don't even know how to go looking for an answer. Does that make sense? Social networking goes pretty far, but sometimes it really seems like it's not so far after all.

[kyrene-myste.livejournal.com]

Not interested in it growing huge. I figure word of mouth would be best.

[justben.livejournal.com]

Oh, I'm not talking about huge. I'm talking about when the social networking well runs dry. Like you were saying, where you keep getting requests from friends and acquaintances from the community, but nobody hearing about you from outside that closed group. That's the boat that we're in with sehellenes. We've been patiently waiting it out and focusing on other things (like improving the still-minimal website), but eventually we're going to want something a little bit more. Not sure what we'll do when that time comes.

[kyrene-myste.livejournal.com]

I've had the best luck through a lot of the connections I have here: Pagan, occult, Witchvox, that sort of thing. There's a HUGE population here of occultists, Pagans, Wiccans, witches, you name it. So I'm not altogether worried.

My only concern is stepping on the toes of established psychic and tarot readers in the area. They fight tooth and claw over here.

[cktraveler.livejournal.com]

(continued)

Basically, I can't see any way of being a "freely accessible" oracle without founding an actual temple, without the backing of any larger organization. The problems to consider are more legal, financial, and logistical than anything else -- and probably exactly the wrong things for an oracle to be clogging her mind with.

Assuming it succeeded, then you have to think about the marketing issues and how you're going to make people 1) know you're there and 2) take you seriously. Well, you need to think about how to make non-idiots take you seriously; the kinds of people who read newspaper horoscopes would gladly go to an oracle but are probably not going to take cryptic prophecies well. They want to know the lotto numbers. :P

[kyrene-myste.livejournal.com]

The best way to do that would be to have a virtual temple online, methinks. And see about getting incorporated as a nonforprofit.

[justben.livejournal.com]

Me, I'm not a big fan of online temples. I will often take someone less seriously if they have an online temple, to be perfectly frank. They don't feel real to me at all. They just feel half-assed, like an excuse. "I couldn't make a real temple, but at least I have this handful of ill-designed and unmaintained bits in my corner of the Internet. That's got to be worth something." Not for me. Quite the opposite.

Now, a webpage with information about a real temple, or with information about past oracles -- That is valuable and quite respectable. But an online temple? Absolutely gives me the creeps.

Incorporation is vital if you're going to be handling money, but AFAICT it's mostly irrelevant otherwise. I'm pretty sure 501(c)(3) is grossly overrated in the pagan community -- even if you're handling money it's only legally meaningful (IANAL) if the taxes are more of a burden than the hassle of obtaining it.

Boy, that all sounds negative. Sorry about that. This is one place where I think Neokoroi really have the right idea: As long as the goal is getting something done, legal recognition doesn't buy you much beyond psychological gratification. It's when you want to start interacting with the law and legally-controlled matters like money that it becomes an issue.

[kyrene-myste.livejournal.com]

Basically it would be done as a fraternal org, which is actually good. As for virtual space, that's because a) Boston's expensive and b) I dont see the real need for a public space.

[justben.livejournal.com]

For people foolish enough to take any oracle -- no matter how incredible -- as dictum straight from the Gods, well, what they need are profitis to help them interpret the pythia's oracle. And that's back to the matter of staff. :-)

[ravendreamer.livejournal.com]

Ah....well....I have been in this situation. The first thing I did was ask for more instruction :). I already did oracular work for Apollo, so what did he mean. My instruction was to find him a place of power, like delphi, where an oracle would freely flow. So I have been searching for 5 years.

[kyrene-myste.livejournal.com]

Ok then, let's assume hypothetically speaking that the exact instruction was to "build an oracle in your backyard." I guess that asking for more instruction at this juncture would be a GOOD idea. One of the replies I had gotten back was to do a divination on the issue.

[ravendreamer.livejournal.com]

It helped me. I do most of my divination through dreaming so thats where I got my answer. We (my wife and I) had messages before to build a temple to Apollo and Selene in our backyard.....so we did. I will have to send you a picture of it sometime. Its a big megalithic stone circle.....our neighbors think we are zainey I am sure....but I love our temple. The frustrating thing for me about the place of power deal is that for the last 2 years I have pretty much known where it is...but circumstances have kept me away from it. Its not easy to get to and involves a hefty hike in the rockies.

[kyrene-myste.livejournal.com]

Yes, I got the impression that this message wasn't literal--I don't think that I am building a tripod in my backyard anytime soon, and as I share my yard with my neighbor it's not going to happen, lol!

But I do think that it meant that I have to start something, the details of which are somewhat elusive.

[ravendreamer.livejournal.com]

Ya, the gods are super great at being specific (sarcasm).

OT but related to your comment

[aingealoreiad.livejournal.com]

I'd love to see some pics of the temple--I have been reading about it's progress forever now and would love to have a visual.