Category Archives: Oracles

Putting the Question

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The Pythia with a Supplicant

The Pythia Themis and King Aigeus of Athens at Delphi by the Codrus Painter, circa 440 BC

By now I had become attached to the idea that I was one of the hundreds of women who had served as an Oracle in Delphi. But I was anxious to find out what Source had to say . . .

C: Dear Spirit, PLEASE let me know if I was here and what role I played.

S: You were the wife of one of the great priests in Delphi. As such you assisted him in his work with the Oracle by offering insight into political and religious events of the day.

C: Does this mean that I was not an Oracle?

S: That is correct – you were not. But one of your daughters was chosen to be one of the first Pythias when she was but 18 years old.

C: Are my husband and my daughter from that lifetime incarnated with me in this lifetime? If they are, will you tell me who they are?

S: The priest and your husband in that lifetime is your current husband in this one, and your daughter is your friend Laurel (not her real name).

C: That would explain my connection with her, being with her when we both recognized her husband-to-be and my husband’s connection to her which I have seen and felt.

S: That is correct. And you are correct in imagining the identity of your other daughter in that lifetime as that of your husband’s friend for whom you have had such a profound dislike.

C: What was the cause of my negative feelings toward her?

S: She was extremely jealous of your close relationship with your husband and her sister. Because her sister had been chosen to be the Oracle, she felt totally out of the loop of this ‘holy trinity’ – the ‘odd man out’ if you will.

C: That would explain my husband’s feelings toward her in this lifetime  – his wanting to help her.

S: That is so.

My pen had stopped moving. I was stunned. And incredulous. And not just a little disappointed to learn that I had not been an Oracle after all. Then I remembered the lecture I’d overhead at the Sanctuary about the priests being responsible for delivering the prophesies with little or no help from the Oracles. Could I have just pieced all of this together? It seemed a little too neat and tidy. But at the same time, as much as I didn’t want to believe the words in front of me, it explained a lot.

For one thing, Laurel and I became instant friends when we met, and we’d been mistaken for mother and daughter even though both of us would agree that we look nothing alike. When I found John Collier’s painting, ‘Priestess of Delphi’ I sent her a copy of the image. At first, she felt it was ominous because of the dark background and the fumes coming up through the crack beneath the Pythia’s feet. But as she looked at it again, she experienced a feeling of comfort. At the time I thought this was an odd reaction.

And I had never understood my nearly pathological dislike of my husband’s friend, Jeanine (not her real name, either). We met her at a business function, and while the two of them connected immediately, my reaction to her was so negative that I wanted to leave.

When Jeanine surfaced in this session with Source, I sensed that one of us in that lifetime had experienced a tragic and untimely death. And I feared that it had been my other daughter because according to Source, she had been 18 when she was chosen to be an Oracle. Initially, young chaste girls were chosen to be Apollo’s mistresses. But these innocent virgins did not fare well. Diodorus, an ancient historian tells the story of Echecrates the Thessalian who became enchanted with the Oracle and violated her. This was probably not an isolated incident because the custom was soon abandoned and the Oracles from that time forward were selected from women over fifty.

So what had happened here? I couldn’t begin to guess what, if anything, Jeanine may have done to contribute to such a tragedy. It was all too much. Still suffering from jet lag, I wanted nothing more than a quick lunch and a nap. Back in my room, the sun was spilling in from my terrace. I lay down and as soon as I closed my eyes, I ‘saw’ the temples, treasuries and statues at the Sanctuary, all in their original pristine condition bathed in an intense golden light. In my dream state, I felt the power of these structures touching the core of my being. Then the vision vanished and I descended into a deep dreamless sleep.

Sanctuary of Apollo at Delphi by A. Tournaire

Sanctuary of Apollo at Delphi by A. Tournaire

 

A Day at the Museum

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Siphnian Treasury Frieze ©2009 Charlene Nevill

Siphnian Treasury Frieze ©2009 Charlene Nevill

I had passed the Delphi Archeological Museum several times on my way to and from the Sanctuary, but I hadn’t stopped. I knew that all the treasures that had been saved from the fires, earthquakes, mudslides, avalanches, rockfalls and plunderings of what had been one of the wealthiest places on Earth were cloistered inside those walls. And having explored as much of the Sanctuary as possible, I was ready to see if the architectural fragments and remnants of statues and gifts sent to the Oracles might reveal something about my past in Delphi.

The Twins of Argos ©2009 Charlene Nevill

The Twins of Argos ©2009 Charlene Nevill

The museum was extremely crowded that morning with wave after wave of tour groups. Slipping around the throngs in the first gallery, I entered the next room and came face to face with Cleobis and Biton, a pair of gargantuan marble statues. According to legend, the brothers pulled their mother in a wagon five miles to a festival because their oxen hadn’t returned from the fields. After feasting, they lay down to sleep in the Temple of Hera and never woke up. Whether mythical or historical figures, they represent the ideal of masculine strength and piety in the early 6th century BC. I didn’t know if it was their massiveness or if there was something more, but I gasped when I saw them and felt a twinge of recognition.

Moving ahead of the crowds, I came to a large gallery with statues lined up along each wall. One of the most impressive monuments from the Sanctuary, the 42-foot-tall Column of the Dancers, stood in the center of the room with an ornate Omphalos next to it. Even though I knew this Omphalos had once sat at the top of the column and was but another reproduction of the one that sat in the Oracle’s chamber, I wanted to ‘test’ it. I surreptitiously held my hands a few inches from its surface at the center, top and bottom as I had done with the Omphalos at the site, but there were no vibrations at all. As beautiful as this artifact was with its relief of roped netting, it felt cold and dead.

Statue of a Philosopher, circa 280 BC ©2009 Charlene Nevill

Statue of a Philosopher, circa 280 BC ©2009 Charlene Nevill

I had been avoiding one wall of statues, and when I finally turned my attention in their direction, I understood why. In the center of a multi-figure group stood a well-preserved statue of an aged man presumed to be a philosopher or a priest. I knew instantly from the depths of my being that I did not like this man. Typical of early Hellenistic art, the facial features were not idealized but instead revealed the actual characteristics of the individual. The more I looked at this statue, the more I saw ‘father’. I didn’t know if what I was sensing was coming from this lifetime or from another, but my feelings for this man were very strong and they were not good.

After walking through the remaining galleries, I decided to leave thinking I’d return when it might not be so crowded. It was another hot, sunny day and there were as many people at the site as in the museum. But I was intent on one thing only, and that was to visit the Omphalos again. Approaching the stone, I saw that I would have to wait for the crowds to pass so I could get close enough to give it my test. As before, I felt vibrations in both hands at its midpoint, not as strong as the first time, but intense enough to tell me it wasn’t just my imagination.

Strange vibrations, feelings of melancholy and fear generated by mountains, statues, and the wind . . . What did it all mean? I hadn’t had a conversation with Source since I’d left home, and I felt the time had come. I set off for a sheltered spot at the far edge of the site and found a stone bench beneath a grove of pine trees. Enveloped in the intoxicating fragrance from the trees, I thought of the Pythia sitting on her tripod inhaling the vapors that induced her prophetic state. So how about it, Source? Is there any information for me in this sacred place?

 

Strange Vibrations

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On my first morning in Delphi, I woke up just as the sun was rising. Stepping out onto my little terrace, I saw a ghostly moon hanging above the valley and rays of sunlight touching the hills and olive groves below. Everywhere birds were calling out and singing their morning songs.

The Sacred Way ©2009 Charlene Nevill

The Sacred Way ©2009 Charlene Nevill

After breakfast at the hotel, I headed straight for the Sanctuary. I met few people along the way, but as I neared the site, I saw at least a half dozen tour buses and I knew it would be challenging to keep my focus in the midst of the crowds. I kept hearing ‘OMPHALOS, OMPHALOS’ in my head as I walked past the tour groups that had stopped along the Sacred Way to listen to lectures. Quickening my pace, I hoped they would be distracted long enough for me to have a few moments alone with the ancient stone.

Omphalos1

Omphalos ©2009 Charlene Nevill

Standing with my back to the crowds, I held my hands about eight inches away from the stone’s surface, one on each side. Starting at the center, I felt an unmistakable throbbing sensation in both hands. Moving my hands up to the top, I felt nothing. Back toward the center, the pulsations began again. Then, squatting down, I held my hands near the bottom. Nothing.

I wanted to find a place nearby to sit and absorb these strange vibrations, but the crowds were advancing so I moved off and sat down on a rock where I could gaze at the pillars that once formed the entrance to the Temple of Apollo.

A group of seniors with an English-speaking tour guide stopped directly in front of me. Talking about the Temple as the place where the Oracle delivered her prophesies, she claimed that the Pythia, sequestered behind a curtain, did nothing more than moan and rant while the priests who had taken questions from the supplicants, would ‘interpret’ her hysterical incantations. According to the guide, the priests continually gathered knowledge of politics and worldly affairs from the pilgrims who passed through Delphi; she gave little, if any credit to the Oracle.

delphi-oracle

The Oracle at Delphi

I wondered where she had found her information. From my research, I understood that the priests at Delphi did, in fact, play a pivotal role in deciphering the Oracle’s prognostications. But from studying illustrations of the Oracle while in trance delivering her prophecies and from reading about these sessions, I hadn’t come across any indication of a screen or curtain separating her and her audience. And with Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle among the Pythia’s fans, it was hard to imagine that such a fraud could have been perpetuated successfully over the course of 1,200 years.

As the group moved on, my attention was drawn back to the Omphalos. I thought how strange it was to feel such a connection with this other-worldly object. But maybe it wasn’t so strange. In her book Messages from Spirit: The Extraordinary Power of Oracles, Omens, and Signs, spiritual intuitive Colette Baron-Reid talks about rocks as sacred sign-bearers. According to Reid, rocks and stones have life-force energy even though they’re inanimate. And as part of the metaphorical language of Spirit, they represent looking into the past for knowledge.

Well, that pretty much summed up my goal for this journey. The problem was that as hard as I looked, I didn’t seem to be any closer to finding my past. Maybe trying harder wasn’t going to elicit a response from Source after all.

 


The Oracle is In

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Mount Parnassus ©2009 Charlene Nevill

Mount Parnassus ©2009 Charlene Nevill

Or is she? As I approached the sanctuary later that first afternoon, dark clouds framed the mountains as the sun cast the last rays of daylight over the ruins. Feeling a familiar clutching in my heart and my gut as I gazed at that mountain, I knew I’d been here before.

There were scores of people at the site from all over the world. I wondered if the news about the site’s closure had been as disappointing to them as it had to me, but I thought it unlikely that more than a handful had made the trip expressly to commune with the Oracle.

The Roman Agora ©2009 Charlene Nevill

The Roman Agora ©2009 Charlene Nevill

As I walked along the Sacred Way, I focused intently on every stone, every pedestal, and every column hoping to find some connections with the past. I continued to feel overwhelmed by the mountains that towered over the site; I knew they had something to tell me, but I had no idea what it might be nor how to find out.

Below the Treasury of the Athenians, I got my first glimpse of the Omphalos. Tears welled up and my heart ached with an unidentifiable sadness. I couldn’t ‘see’ anything, and I didn’t ‘know’ anything that I didn’t already know, but I was certain that this large, egg-shaped stone and I had a history.

Omphalos ©2009 Charlene Nevill

Omphalos ©2009 Charlene Nevill

Created to symbolize the center, or navel of the earth, the original Omphalos was kept in the Adyton, the inner sanctum in the Temple of Apollo where the Oracle made her prophesies. Delphic authorities had placed several replicas around the sanctuary to remind pilgrims of the site’s holiness. Judging from the appearance of this stone, it was very, very old, and assuming it hadn’t been moved, a multitude of supplicants had passed it as they made their way to the Temple with their queries.

Because I wouldn’t have the opportunity to get close to the Adyton, I vowed to spend time with this strange artifact during the next few days and ‘feel’ its energy. Maybe it, too, had something to tell me.

 

Source Throws a Curve

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View toward Bay of Corinth ©2009 Charlene Nevill

View toward Bay of Corinth ©2009 Charlene Nevill

I am off to Delphi at last! Even though I hadn’t studied up for my brief stay in Athens, I had read so much about Delphi and watched so many video clips about the sanctuary, not to mention two History Channel videos on the Oracle, that I felt like I’d been there already. But wait! Maybe I had . . .

During the three-hour bus ride, I stared out the window watching for anything that might be familiar. After an hour, we were in the countryside passing fields of cotton, sorghum and olive trees. So far, nothing. But when we started climbing Mount Parnassus and I saw clumps of flowering herbs and a goat-crossing sign, I felt tears well up – a sure sign that I had bumped into something from another lifetime.

Steps to Apollonos Street ©2009 Charlene Nevill

Steps to Filellinon Street ©2009 Charlene Nevill

When we arrived in the tiny village of Delphi, it was apparent that there were no taxis. Having studied a map, I knew that my hotel was on the lowest of the tangle of streets that criss-crossed the mountain; I just didn’t know how to get there. So I set off on foot pulling my suitcase behind me. After asking three shopkeepers, I finally found one who was able to tell me that my hotel was at the opposite end of town and the only way to get there was down a series of stone steps. Another test. At least I was in better shape than when I’d arrived in Athens.

Checking in at my hotel, I was hoping for a room facing the Bay of Corinth. The woman at the desk assured me that because I was staying for five days, there was no question that I could have a room with a view.

©2009 Charlene Nevill

©2009 Charlene Nevill

When I entered my little room, sun was streaming in through French doors that led to a tiny patio with a marble-top table and a small chair. Looking down I saw a garden with a flock of chickens on one side and another garden with giant melons on the other. I took a deep breath and thanked the gods for this little piece of heaven.

Speaking of gods, I was anxious to get to the sanctuary. I wanted to walk the Sacred Way through the Agora, and past the ruins of the treasuries that once held offerings made by Greek city states to Apollo. But most of all, I wanted to visit the Temple of Apollo where a succession of Oracles in rapturous union with Apollo advised a steady stream of kings, philosophers, and ordinary citizens on everything from wars and affairs of state to personal matters over a period of 1,200 years.

On my way out, I stopped to chat with the proprietor. “You know, the site is closed,” she said. “WHAT?” I squealed. “I’ve traveled half way around the world to visit the Oracle.” “You and everyone else,” she said.

There was a map of the site on a bulletin board showing that only half the site had been closed. But of course, it was the top half where the Temple of Apollo was located. It seems there had been a rock slide ten days earlier and there were no plans to re-open that part of the site any time soon.

I hadn’t forgotten Angelika’s advice about the possible disruption of plans, and here it was – the ‘unexpected development’. Incredulous yet undaunted, I told myself, like Avis, I would just have to try harder.