The symbol of good and evil. Yin Yang. A cat in the Egyptian cult. Open palm (hamsa)

Throughout the history of human civilization, people have sought to know the good and evil. Even in ancient times, the sages noticed an inseparable connection between these opposite phenomena of the physical and the intangible worlds. One is impossible without the other, like darkness without light, a life without death, a disease without health, wealth without poverty, a mind without stupidity, etc.

Oberegi - an integral part of everyday life of various ethnic groups

Researchers, archaeologists and historians who studied antiquities found that in ancient manuscripts and on everyday objects found in various parts of the earth, alongside the depiction of everyday events, there are repetitive signs that seem to fix the painted stories or show the reasons for the imprinted phenomena. In some cases - it's bizarre badges, in others - living creatures with parts of bodies from different animals, in the third - the animals themselves.

One part of the symbols looks static, the other, on the contrary, as if contains the movement. And although most of them appeared to be detached and neutral, researchers did not always and not immediately unambiguously characterize their essence and meaning: what is in them concluded - good or evil, cause or effect? This concerned yin-yang, uroboros, anchovy, colohorth, ankh, mollinets, some symbolic animals, gods, etc.

It turns out that these signs are designed to counterbalance the antagonistic forces, create equality between them.

It is known that too much good breeds evil and, on the contrary, an excess of evil opens up opportunities for the manifestation of kindness. The preponderance of one and the other force is fraught with great troubles. Since everything in the world is interconnected, and a person is small and defenseless, - the nonverbal magic of charms comes to his aid.

Symbols of peace and good, equalizing the mutual influence of opposing elements, neutralizing evil and attracting good, have long been used to paint on the walls of houses and utilitarian objects. Amulet-charms, embodied the desired intention, were worn on the body, hoping in such a way to protect themselves from unhappiness or achieve the fulfillment of the cherished goal.

Anchovy

This symbol of good and charity is considered a guardian of Jews and Muslims, but it appeared long before the emergence of monotheistic religions. According to one source, the symmetrical palm, the anchovy, is the belonging of pagan cults of ancient Mesopotamia, on the other - of Egypt.

According to ancient Egyptian beliefs, the fingers of the anchovy are the divine spouses Osiris and Isis. The central finger is their son Gore, and the two extreme ones represent the spirits of ancestors.

In all traditions, an open hand - hamsa, symbolizes childbearing, health and protection from the evil eye. It, like a universal amulet, is hung in cars, in apartments, attached to bracelets and chains.

Jewelry - pendants and earrings in the form of a symmetrical palm, made of gold and silver, decorated with precious stones, enamel and engraving.

Hand of Fatima

In Islam, the hand of Fatima, or hamsa, personifies the five pillars of this religion - fasting during Ramadan, generosity for the poor, jihad, pilgrimage to Mecca and ritual ablution.

Fatima's palm is the national emblem of Algeria and is depicted on the State Flag of the Republic.

The history of the Muslim amulet sounds like this:

Fatima was the daughter of the prophet Mohammed. According to legend, she could heal the sick with the touch of her hand. Once, when she was cooking dinner, her husband and her mistress entered the house, Fatima dropped the spoon unexpectedly and continued stirring the hot dish with her bare hand. Grief, jealousy and despair have deprived her of sensitivity. Since then, Muslim women have resorted to the help of Fatima's palm when they need moral support and protection from various manifestations of evil.

The hand of Miriam

According to the Judaic tradition, the hamsa represents the Pentateuch of Moses (Torah, Tanah) - the books of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy, as well as five Hebrew letters and five senses, which means that a person should constantly strive for sight, hearing, touch, smell and taste To the knowledge of God.

The hand of Miriam, or Yad A-Hamesh, is the hand of the sister of the divine Messengers, Aaron and Moses. On one side of the Judaic anchovy is depicted the All-Seeing Eye of the Creator, and on the other - the star of David or the words of Amida.

Chinese symbol of the balance of the forces of good and evil

The Chinese symbol of good and evil, yin-yang, is a black and white circle, divided by a wavy line into two identical parts. Black and white as it flows one into another, and, at the same time, originates in each other. Inside each part there is a small circle of the opposite color.

In the opinion of the inhabitants of China, in this figure the essence of the universe, the nature of Tao, is encrypted - the constant mutual penetration of opposites and rebirth. The world is harmonious and man must understand this.

Contemplation of the symbol of yin-yang gives a sense of justice for the world order, the belief that a sad event always follows a joyful, like a night changes the day - it is inevitable. It is important only to properly treat the changing realities and not count on the possibility of eternal happiness and joy.

Yin-yang is not only a universal symbol of the harmony of the world. Sometimes, young lovers and girls use it to express love and devotion. They buy an amulet of yin-yang, divide it into halves and give each other. Yin - black and symbolizes a woman, and yang - white and symbolizes a man. A girl takes a white half, and a young man takes a black one. In this way they impose the obligation to remain faithful to each other.

Birds in the Chinese tradition

If yin-yang is called to harmonize all surrounding space and counterbalance the opposite elements, then to achieve the desired goal in a particular area, the Chinese use special symbols of narrow-minded action. The age-old observations of the habits of animals and birds gave the inhabitants of the Celestial Empire knowledge about their characteristics and about the benefits that can be derived from the symbols depicting these animals. According to the Chinese people, the bird is a symbol of good, love, material prosperity and a successful career.

Almost in every Chinese house, in its south-western part you can see ceramic sculptures of a pair of enamored mandarin ducks. Chinese philosophy attributes to them such qualities as loyalty, love and tenderness, because they create couples for life.

On the table, located in the middle of the south wall, there are figures of cocks. These bold birds always protect their harems from the abusers and are vigilant to ensure that all the chickens are full, satisfied and none of them lost and did not fend off the pack. It is believed that the rooster is the best assistant in the promotion of the career ladder.

The south-eastern corner of the apartment is a zone that attracts material well-being to the house. Here you can find a figurine or an image of a firefly phoenix.

In the Chinese house there is always a corner for other birds that bring luck - owls (for protection from bad influence of strangers), sparrows and pigeons (for peace and harmony between spouses), herons (for longevity), eagles (for willpower and Decisiveness), wood grouses (for respectability and self-confidence), swans (for purity of thoughts) and falcons (for courage and victory in competitions).

Birds, personifying the forces of good and evil in Ancient Egypt

In ancient Egypt, the mythical birds Great Gogotun and Vienna were considered gods, and the death of a falcon, a kite or an ibis was punishable by death.

The God of the moon, wisdom and justice, He had the head of an ibis. This bird foreshadowed the future for the Egyptians. It was believed that she runs a flood of the Nile, and this is directly related to what will be the harvest of the fruits of the earth.

One of the three main Egyptian gods, Gore, who owned the ankh, the key that opened all the roads of fate, had the head of a falcon. This bird patronized the Pharaohs and protected them.

The goddess Nehbet had wings and a tuft of a kite. She gave power to the pharaohs and patronized the extraction of precious metals. To ordinary people, ordinary people also turned to Nehbet. Her huge wings were covered from any danger and dispersed the forces of evil.

Cat in the cult of the Egyptians

The Egyptians worshiped not only the birds, but also the beasts. The cat in the Egyptian cult symbolized good, fun and fertility. This animal is a gift of gods to people. Her embodiment is the beautiful goddess Bastet with the head of a cat. Temples were built in her honor, and the city of Bubastis, dedicated to Bastet, was the first Egyptian city to which the Virgin Mary came with her Divine Son during their flight from King Herod.

If Bastet did not receive proper veneration, she turned into an evil Sekhmet with the head of a lioness.

Cats in ancient Egypt served as a protection of the wheat crop, which the Egyptians supplied to many countries of the world. These animals did not allow rodents to spoil grain reserves and destroy barns. The man who killed the cat was stoned to death. In the event of fire or flooding, cats were first taken out of the house to a safe place.

Cats in ancient Egypt were buried together with their masters in a common crypt. They were mummified or burned in special crematoria. If the cat died, then its masters observed mourning for a few days - men shaved their brows, and women dressed in appropriate dresses. Bastet figurines, as symbols of good and material prosperity, still adorn the houses of modern Egyptians.

Ankh

In recent decades, ancient sacred symbols (in particular the Egyptian sign of good, ankh) have been actively used by youth to express the exclusivity of their subculture. So goths, emo, punks, hippies and others are happy to wear amulets on their wrists and necks copied from pharaohs found in tombs or peeped in the Slavic Vedas.

The Egyptian key of life, ankh, has no less profound content than the Chinese symbol of good and evil, yin-yang.

The ancient Egyptians believed that the short life of a person in a body shell is not only not final, but not the most important one. The main life takes place in the Duath, beyond the threshold of death. Open the door to the afterlife can only the deity owning the ankh. This key is meaningful. It symbolizes a man and a woman, the sunrise and the movement of vital energy within the human body, as well as access to secret knowledge and protection from the forces of evil.

The first Christians of Egypt, the Copts, declared the Ankh a symbol of their faith. Initially, the key of life belonged to Osiris. Christ became his receptor, and ankh, along with other signs - two fish, alpha and omega, anchor, ship and others, until the beginning of the Crusades was firmly associated with Christianity.

Ankh is a symbol of goodness, wisdom and victory over evil. It is also the tree of life, where the ring is the crown and the world of the mountains, and the stem is the trunk of the tree and the path of man.

In the Middle Ages, the ankh was hanged over the bed of the woman in childbirth, so that the delivery would go off safely and a new man come to the world, endowed with good health and a happy fate.

Ouroboros

The Chinese symbol of good and evil of yin-yang is a late transformation of the oldest Middle Eastern uroboros, analogous in meaning and meaning.

Uroboros is a snake curled into a ring and biting itself by the tail or spewing itself. This is one of the ancient signs, which contains a lot of meanings, including the cyclical nature of everything in nature and the constant circular motion of the forces of the universe. The head of the snake personifies the inner world of man, and the tail is the surrounding reality. The essence of the symbol is that man, as well as all nature, create themselves and are in a constant close relationship. Everything lasts, nothing ends, all processes are unchanged and similar to each other.

According to some sources, uroboros, as a symbol of good and evil and their eternal cycle, as a model of the real world, was invented and painted by a student of the famous scientist Mary the Jew during the time of the Egyptian queen Cleopatra. According to other sources, it was known from 1600 BC. E. And also from Egyptian burials.

Waroboros is the most accurate and most famous symbol of good and evil, death and rebirth, eternity and infinity, the universe and the stars, heaven and hell, earth and water.

Pre-Christian symbols of good and evil in Russia. Kolohort

The idea of good and evil, of the cyclical nature and impermanence of the material world among the ancient Slavs was not too different from what we know about other peoples. Even the main symbol of good in Russia, the colohorth, is a circle, from the center of which there are eight oppositely directed rays, representing the balancing movements - salting and anti-saline. This echoes the Chinese symbol of good and evil, as well as with uroboros.

Kolohort symbolizes the sun and the eternal cycle of natural phenomena. He was associated with him and the god Jaril, who was born, blossomed and died every year at the same time. Yarila gave rusicham a rich harvest of fruits of the earth, victory in military affairs, consent and love in families.

Yarila, embodied in the colorthor, as a Slavic symbol of good and evil, also had power over the spirits of ancestors, over life and death.

Molvinets

Molvinets is a Slavic symbol of good, the gift of the god Rod, analog of anchovy and ankh. He looks like a colohorth, but does not contain movement. This charm in its execution looks static, because it consists of two crossed and intertwined closed broken lines resembling the figure 8. Molvenets are a powerful guard against evil eye, bad thoughts, illnesses and unhappiness.

Molvinets endows words and beliefs with gifts, and also protects from malicious rumors and gossip. He most suits lawyers, writers, journalists, politicians and managers of different ranks, although he helps representatives of other professions.

Birds in the Russian tradition

"Birds are the freest and happiest creatures on earth," so our ancestors, the Slavs, believed. Birds are not tied to one place, they have the opportunity to travel around the world. For them are open and sky-high, divine expanses. It is no accident that the symbol of good in fairy tales is a white swan. Often the main character, in trouble, found protection and shelter under the wings of this beautiful bird.

A couple of swans are faithful to each other throughout their lives, and how they care about their chicks deserves a separate story, because the husband and wife are hatching eggs in turn. Together they get food for the chicks, together and fight off the enemies.

Rooster is another character that occupies a place of honor in the pantheon of Slavic birds bringing good and peace. With a loud cry the rooster dispels the forces of evil. After the third crow, the impure force leaves the limits of the audibility of this sound. An economical and attentive cock also sets up its owners for a responsible attitude to home affairs.

Modern science has proven that the sounds of domestic poultry voice soothingly act on the nervous system and relieve the accumulated stress.

The Symbols of Good and Evil in the Christian Tradition

The original Christian symbolism was directly connected with the Middle East. The ancient attributes of good, equality between people, eternal life after physical death and others were actively used by Christians, but were not invented by them. This statement does not concern only the cross on which Jesus was crucified. The crucifixion was affirmed as the official symbol of the victory of good over evil only after the Queen of Helen, the mother of the Roman emperor Constantine, in 326, conducted excavations in Jerusalem and found the miraculous sacred relics associated with the life of the Lord Jesus Christ, and with them Life-giving Cross.

Before that, the emblems of Christians were more than two dozen different objects, including plants, animals, etc. The ship was associated with Noah's ark and reminded Christians of the need to wait, endure and believe in salvation. The anchor hinted at the strength and stability of the new doctrine.

In the symbolism of early Christians, a large place was occupied by birds. Thus, the dove meant the holy spirit and the purity of intentions (it is still used in this sense), the cock symbolized the birth to a new life after the ritual of baptism in the name of the Holy Spirit, the peacock personified the immortality and incorruption of the holy relics, since the meat of this bird does not decompose into Earth, and phoenix - resurrection from the dead.

Modern use of amulets

Despite the fact that the modern official Church considers the use of amulets as pagan fetishism, it is difficult to understand why only a cross, which is also a kind of amulet, can protect against various manifestations of evil, for the contemplation and comprehension of ancient symbols personifying the universe, adjusts to the spiritual and philosophical attitude To the changes occurring in our troubled world, and gives rise to a positive mood.

It is doubtful that the contemplation of yin-yang, uroboros, anchovy, or colchort would provoke condemnation from Jesus Christ or Mohammed, as the merchants, who traded in the temple with some dubious sacred relics, caused the Christ to anger, just as in the current churches gold rings and chains are sold, Dishes and other luxuries and utilitarian purposes for the so-called "recommended fixed donation."

The appointment of amulets, symbolizing the victory of good over evil, is the establishment of peaceful relations between people. It is very commendable that the ancient symbols of harmony once again became popular and popular with a wide variety of people, regardless of their nationality and religion.