bi3mw said: "A simple observation: On You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. and You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. similar processes seem to take place ( from the blue "canopy" / blue liquid to the green "pool" / green liquid ). Can this be coincidence ?"
In my opinion, it is not a coincidence at all. You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. shows us the hermaphtodite as the philosopher's stone or rebis, as I outline above. OTOH, You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. shows us the mermaid, or melusine, as the philosopher's stone, but not within an Ovidian story; instead, the context here is religious. While the tale of Melusine is most commonly associated with French aristocratic lineage, the alchemical Melusine is a different matter. This is the alchemical marriage of body to soul. Nobody explains this better than Paracelsus; the idea seems to be attributed to him but who knows how old it was. At any rate, The Little Mermaid is a direct consequence of this alchemical idea!
In Roger Bacon's Opus Majus, he explains the evolution of religion, from animal worship and the Egypyians, to the half-animals of the pagans, to the Jews, to the Christians. So when I saw this sequence after having just read the passage, I was struck by the similarity.
At the top of the page, you have the figure with the cross. This is Christianity (or Ecclesia, as Koen has suggested). Christianity is built on the foundation of the Old Testament. The ring in the dead figure's hand I have identified as King Solomen's ring, signifying either Wisdom or Judaism, in other areas of the VMS. There are a lot of pipes leading down to our pagan mermaid, possibly signifying dead ends or defunct religions between.
The mermaid herself is in a green pool of prima materia (just like Hermaphroditus in You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. ) with the bodies of animals. Her human form represents her soul, rising up out of her animal tail, towards the reigning religion of Christianity. As Melissa Ridley Elmer’s says “Through her place in the alchemical lexicon, a tradition with pagan beginnings but, ultimately, developed and dominated by clerics of the Church and, later, physicians in the Middle Ages and Renaissance—like Paracelsus (1493–1541), with whose work she is especially associated—Melusine becomes a form imbued with the promise of enlightenment and salvation, a dual figure representing the union of the natural and supernatural worlds. Like the figure of Christ in the imita- tio Christi, the alchemical Melusine serves as a bridge between the visible and invisible, between the explicable and the inexplicable, between immortality and humanity, and between the sacred and the profane. In representing the mingling of the natural and supernatural worlds and the fairy and the ordinary, Melusine ultimately figures both the union of pagan and Christian beliefs and the transformation of the pagan symbol of the siren into a Christian one of duality and enlightenment.” (Ridley Elmes, Melissa, “The Alchemical Transformation of Melusine”, 2)
In my opinion, it is not a coincidence at all. You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. shows us the hermaphtodite as the philosopher's stone or rebis, as I outline above. OTOH, You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. shows us the mermaid, or melusine, as the philosopher's stone, but not within an Ovidian story; instead, the context here is religious. While the tale of Melusine is most commonly associated with French aristocratic lineage, the alchemical Melusine is a different matter. This is the alchemical marriage of body to soul. Nobody explains this better than Paracelsus; the idea seems to be attributed to him but who knows how old it was. At any rate, The Little Mermaid is a direct consequence of this alchemical idea!
In Roger Bacon's Opus Majus, he explains the evolution of religion, from animal worship and the Egypyians, to the half-animals of the pagans, to the Jews, to the Christians. So when I saw this sequence after having just read the passage, I was struck by the similarity.
At the top of the page, you have the figure with the cross. This is Christianity (or Ecclesia, as Koen has suggested). Christianity is built on the foundation of the Old Testament. The ring in the dead figure's hand I have identified as King Solomen's ring, signifying either Wisdom or Judaism, in other areas of the VMS. There are a lot of pipes leading down to our pagan mermaid, possibly signifying dead ends or defunct religions between.
The mermaid herself is in a green pool of prima materia (just like Hermaphroditus in You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. ) with the bodies of animals. Her human form represents her soul, rising up out of her animal tail, towards the reigning religion of Christianity. As Melissa Ridley Elmer’s says “Through her place in the alchemical lexicon, a tradition with pagan beginnings but, ultimately, developed and dominated by clerics of the Church and, later, physicians in the Middle Ages and Renaissance—like Paracelsus (1493–1541), with whose work she is especially associated—Melusine becomes a form imbued with the promise of enlightenment and salvation, a dual figure representing the union of the natural and supernatural worlds. Like the figure of Christ in the imita- tio Christi, the alchemical Melusine serves as a bridge between the visible and invisible, between the explicable and the inexplicable, between immortality and humanity, and between the sacred and the profane. In representing the mingling of the natural and supernatural worlds and the fairy and the ordinary, Melusine ultimately figures both the union of pagan and Christian beliefs and the transformation of the pagan symbol of the siren into a Christian one of duality and enlightenment.” (Ridley Elmes, Melissa, “The Alchemical Transformation of Melusine”, 2)