26th February 2009, 04:18 PM
Hi folks.
While burials are protected by many (but not all) loam, the process of exhumation sets decay in process much more quickly than would occur otherwise. Archaeology is indeed destructive but should not, of course, be dismissed. Rescue does much good work, but Charlie and our Kennet Avenue ancestors were not ?rescued? out of necessity.
As a Druid of various orders, it is my belief that the wishes of the ancestors is a respectful reburial.
Taliesin said... ?You may gather from my user name that I have some sympathy with the pagan position. Yet, I have never and can never claim to speak for the dead from many millennia ago. We have about as much knowledge of their belief system as a we do of life on exo-planets. I appreciate this may be seen as trolling or being deliberately argumentative, but the CoBDO speaks only for itself and their beliefs. The appropriation of the long dead and their assumed beliefs by the CoBDO is nothing more than cultural theft??
If alternative world views are not fully considered in the science of archaeology, cultural theft may be said to then occur. Taking without considering ancestor, ancestral landscape and pilgrim is simply not acceptable anymore. Science is one world view that should balance with other world views. No one has the right to dictate. We do not dictate, only present a different world view. I speak for the ancestors. If others wish to, that?s fine. We are the ancestors reborn, and the discussion branches into both science, spirituality and the, so far unconsidered ethics of these matters. To say I?m culturally stealing when the dead are unearthed and displayed is spiritual poverty. Other sites have also accussed me of being fluffy and new age. Not true. The ancestors are nothing to do with care bears or putting cotton sheets over the faces of mummies, but ill-considered and blinkered science is everything to with Indiana Jones. It is disingenuous ? a spiritual poverty.
Wile I believe peoples instinctual reactions to the suggestion of reburial is positive, I agree that many Pagans will disagree. The heart and the mind battle against ethics and the never-ending quest for the truth of knowledge. Everything becomes more complicated when spiritualites divide into a) those with a focus rooted deeply in nature, b) a spirituality rooted in textual myth and history, c) spirituality focussed in the collective uncouncious d) a mixture of all these things. No wonder many Pagans and Druids seem unable to make a clear choice for reburial or retention. Classic example is HADs response where a) the exec seem to favour reburial, but they vote for retention because we don?t have a manadate amid the broader community ? which wasn?t a question on the consultation. Remember folks ? we suggest reburial and ask people to agree or disagree.
Sorry everyone, I?m ranting again. Tmsarch ? you?re not dumb, I?m the one who left school with 5 cse?s. Odd eh?
Oddie
While burials are protected by many (but not all) loam, the process of exhumation sets decay in process much more quickly than would occur otherwise. Archaeology is indeed destructive but should not, of course, be dismissed. Rescue does much good work, but Charlie and our Kennet Avenue ancestors were not ?rescued? out of necessity.
As a Druid of various orders, it is my belief that the wishes of the ancestors is a respectful reburial.
Taliesin said... ?You may gather from my user name that I have some sympathy with the pagan position. Yet, I have never and can never claim to speak for the dead from many millennia ago. We have about as much knowledge of their belief system as a we do of life on exo-planets. I appreciate this may be seen as trolling or being deliberately argumentative, but the CoBDO speaks only for itself and their beliefs. The appropriation of the long dead and their assumed beliefs by the CoBDO is nothing more than cultural theft??
If alternative world views are not fully considered in the science of archaeology, cultural theft may be said to then occur. Taking without considering ancestor, ancestral landscape and pilgrim is simply not acceptable anymore. Science is one world view that should balance with other world views. No one has the right to dictate. We do not dictate, only present a different world view. I speak for the ancestors. If others wish to, that?s fine. We are the ancestors reborn, and the discussion branches into both science, spirituality and the, so far unconsidered ethics of these matters. To say I?m culturally stealing when the dead are unearthed and displayed is spiritual poverty. Other sites have also accussed me of being fluffy and new age. Not true. The ancestors are nothing to do with care bears or putting cotton sheets over the faces of mummies, but ill-considered and blinkered science is everything to with Indiana Jones. It is disingenuous ? a spiritual poverty.
Wile I believe peoples instinctual reactions to the suggestion of reburial is positive, I agree that many Pagans will disagree. The heart and the mind battle against ethics and the never-ending quest for the truth of knowledge. Everything becomes more complicated when spiritualites divide into a) those with a focus rooted deeply in nature, b) a spirituality rooted in textual myth and history, c) spirituality focussed in the collective uncouncious d) a mixture of all these things. No wonder many Pagans and Druids seem unable to make a clear choice for reburial or retention. Classic example is HADs response where a) the exec seem to favour reburial, but they vote for retention because we don?t have a manadate amid the broader community ? which wasn?t a question on the consultation. Remember folks ? we suggest reburial and ask people to agree or disagree.
Sorry everyone, I?m ranting again. Tmsarch ? you?re not dumb, I?m the one who left school with 5 cse?s. Odd eh?
Oddie
