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For these posts to make sense, read them in order.  Start at the top of this page (entry 1), and continue to the following entries below (2-10).

1 - The Oracle of Delphi

On this blog I propose that, regardless of the definition we may ascribe to it, the Oracle of Delphi is real. I believe the story I'm sharing here, which is an exact description of what took place there, with no embellishments, additions, or changes of any kind, is a valid proof of that.

I've looked for modern testimonies of the Oracle but found nothing. I'm sure there are journals, diaries, or memoirs out there, or unwritten or untold stories, which may corroborate the continuity of the Oracle, but I haven't found any. So, I decided to share my experience, to put it out there, because it is a fascinating testimony of what the Oracle of Delphi can actually be, and, mainly, because what took place there demonstrates how amazing Life truly is. 

This painting, done by Michelangelo on the Sistine Ceiling, depicts the Oracle of Delphi as the woman who speaks it. But the Oracle, as it was known for over a thousand years, was neither the person nor the place, but the message, the riddle itself.

The riddle was a poetic response only understood by who asked the question. It has been mythicized as the whisper of Python in the ears of Pythia, the entranced message induced by tectonic fumes of the Delphian region, a divine gift for the savant gipsy, or merely a human invention. And I think it is all of that, including invention.

When myths were invented in ancient Greece, it was always to explain something real, in response to the existence of what was important to them, water and fire, beauty and love, life and death. So, something must have happened in the Delphian region to provoke imagined explanations in reaction to it. Whatever it was, it inspired the creation of endless stories around it for hundreds of years on.

The problem I have here, trying to explain such things like the Oracle, is that it is a metaphysical occurrence, which means it takes place in a quantum realm, not in our common time-space continuum.  So, its presence and words cannot be understood solely by our everyday minds, by our linear way of thinking within our basic three dimensions only. But, this doesn't mean it cannot be effectively written in the form of a story, a logical narration that still makes sense to our common ways of thinking. I believe we all know that, what takes place in parallel fields of reality, can be and has always been understood intuitively. We all possess that valid and real sixth sense, which we don't exercise much at all but is there, ready to be activated. Let this story itself open your intuition, with the complete use of your rational abilities, let it show you the magic between the lines and inside the words.

I'd say one more thing before you read it. Explaining the Oracle is like explaining music or true poetry, words alone cannot do it. But, like music and poetry, the lack of literal explanation doesn't conflict with the complete understanding we have of them.  We do comprehend the songs, a Bach suite or a jazz impromptu, by just listening to them. We all get the poems too, a Shakespearean sonnet or a T. S. Elliot's love song, by just reading them. And the fact that we cannot truly explain them in our own words doesn't negate our profound discernment of them. We apprehend what they mean intrinsically, intuitively, with a mind that doesn't need much thinking about the words in the poem or the notes in the song, but with a self that rather perceives their expression without any thought needed to assist at all.

Let the same thing happen to you with the story of my Oracle. Read it, and comprehend what it implies, intuitively, even if you can't explain its occurrence with everyday words.

2 - The Sanctuary at Delphi.

When I visited Greece in 2008, the Oracle of Delphi was described to us by our guide as a political invention used to govern the vast Greek territory, which back then encompassed much more than present Greece. The institution, the oracle system and its divinations, have been gone now for almost two thousand years, and all that is left is beautiful ruins and a museum, a fancy background for poets and hikers.

The Oracle in ancient times decided the fate of Greece through its riddles, which were known for hundreds of years before Homer, over a thousand years before Christ. For most of those years, the Oracle was not the institution it came to be though, which by the Roman invasion resembled an organized religion, with its priests, Pythonesses and treasuries. Before all of that, there was only a direct contact with a mysterious presence on that beautiful Mount Parnassus, which throughout centuries has never stopped attracting people's imaginations to that particular place. Today's scientists are explaining it as the hallucinogenic effect of tectonic fumes, which are released periodically through cracks provoked by ancient quakes, but the point is, we are still talking about it.

As an institution with such long history, the oracle surely had its moments of political corruption, but I have to wonder, what actually happened during the first hundreds of years of its life? What was that place to humans who, specially during those early stages in our development, when the mind was still young and simple, were so much closer to the earth itself? Humans then had a different relationship with nature at large and their own, to Gaia, who seems to have been obvious to all the inhabitants of the planet at this stage. We have lost this connection, but I believe it's still there, buried under our modern intellect.

The sanctuary continued to be a political and religious center in the region throughout Rome's occupation, but on the 4th century AC the Romans had to eventually destroy it to govern effectively, specially once the new movement that was taking Rome by surprise began to take force, Christianity.
I ask, why was it that the Oracle of Delphi had such a powerful influence over the intelligent Greeks, throughout their entire existence?  We read how Socrates spoke of it logically, without questioning it, as if it were an obvious thing. The Oracle was consulted before matters of state were decided, or war and marriage. Our modern minds look at this with modern thoughts and take it for granted, we simply dismiss it because we cannot understand it. We, modern peoples, are unable to recede back to our human experience three thousand years ago, to that time when our intellectual capacities had just began to write and think dialectically. For us to create a connection with our ancient and earthly humanity requires an active imagination.

The Egyptian civilization preceded the Greeks in the large Mediterranean area for thousands of years. We are closer in time to Ancient Greece than those Greeks were to early Egyptians. Thirty centuries is a long time. During all that millennia, as has been noted by modern anthropology, humans possessed a kind of mythical thinking, not quite rational and logical yet, but immersed in more of an animistic way of perceiving things. Their writing alone illustrates this. Egyptians, like us today, wrote the way they thought, and vice-versa. They wrote hieroglyphics, images and symbols, which although had a verbal translation, existed mainly in the visual realm. And myths, as we know, are closely linked to our subconsciousness, mainly to our collective ones, and made essentially of archetypes that speak strongly to us through nature, societies and time. At this point in our evolution, these archetypes are much more active and perceivable, and generate the believe in humans that everything in nature is "animated" by its own spirit.

The Egyptians developed indeed a sophisticated grammar, which was not only necessary to facilitate the verbal descriptions of myth for it to be known collectively, but also needed by a growing civilization. But the young languages of so many tribes coexisting with each other along the banks of the Nile river were very simple at that point. Most of the collective understanding and belief of humans in general at this stage came from the observation of symbolic expressions that, because of their universality, were easy for all to comprehend. Not much rationalization was needed.

When the Egyptians mummified their bodies, for instance, they preserved all the organs in beautiful urns, all except the brain, which was disposed of. Why would they do that? Why would they want to spend their afterlife without a thought?  I believe that during those three thousand years they chose eternity without a brain because they didn't think they will need it.

The Oracle appeared very early on during the formation of our mental capacities, when reason starts to govern life for the very first time. And I'm sure it appeared, and it lasted that long, because it was truly perceived, actually sensed, and because there was most definitely a real need for it.

I used to think humans chose a place to represent their abstract believes so they can give them form, like churches and museums, or mountain peaks and sanctuaries. I thought they added to those places their own poetry, their own dreams and fantasies, in response to their profound human yearnings. But now I know it could be the other way around, at least in Delphi. There, people began to believe and fantasize because there was a special poetry spoken in those mountains in the first place. They witnessed it, they talked and wrote about it, and kept returned to it for over a thousand of years, three thousand if you count me. 

The documented stories of the Oracle of Delphi demonstrating a visual comprehension of the present and of the future in its riddles, should make us wonder if we should just dismiss it as a mere archaic human invention.  Because, if the Oracle was indeed real, what that means to us is very profound. It tells us something very important about Life itself.   

My Oracle, as I much later understood it, began in the evening of July 3rd, and ended in the early afternoon of July 4th, 2008.  It truly changed my life and my understanding of it. I believe that if you comprehend what the presence of the Oracle reveals, you'll live a better life and will have a deeper appreciation for it. 

3 - My Question.

Ever since I read Plato's account of Socrates and the Oracle of Delphi I've wanted to go there. I was convinced the Oracle would speak to me as well. I was a young teenager then so it was easy to dream like that, but it was at the age of forty when I was finally able to go.

I had envisioned myself entering a small open temple, more in the shape of Athena's than Apollo's, on top of a hill near the ocean. I imagined the answer to my question coming to me arms open, head up and eyes closed, in the whisper of a soft sea breeze entering directly into my mind and heart. I didn't know then about the institution in Delphi, its priests and Pythia, its laws and treasuries, which resembled more an organized religion than a powerful place on Earth.

When I learned, after arriving to Greece, that the Oracle in the past was given inside the temple of Apollo, I imagined then myself standing on its ruins facing the vast valley bellow. I envisioned the Oracle, the words, clear in my mind, the obvious answer in a riddle to the important question I'd ask.

In early July of 2008, there was only one question I needed to ask: "Should I quit my job?"

After teaching art for six happy years at a high school in New Jersey, I wanted to concentrate more on my own artwork. I had already met with my three school administrators and resigned, but they didn't accept it, and asked me to think about it more, suggesting this and that. My trip to Greece was in a few weeks from then, so I told them during a meeting that I knew then what my question was going to be for the oracle. I didn't really have one yet. I told them that I will know for sure what to do after I get its answer in Delphi. They looked at me as if they suddenly realized I was crazy, that I had been coo-coo all along and they just realized it :-)

4 - The Oracle began upon arrival.

I was traveling through Greece on an archeological bus tour of twenty or so people with my friend Oscar.

Our bus arrived to the town of Delphi before six in the afternoon. It was early July so I knew we had at least three more hours of sunlight.

The hotel was located on the hills of mount Parnassus, which I admired all the way up from the road.

I told Oscar I wanted to climb the mountain as soon as we got there, even if it meant I'd miss my dinner. It was the only time I could do it, the next day we had the tour of the site of Delphi in the morning and after lunch we'd continue our trip through Greece.

One of the ladies on the bus, Susan (pictured here with me), overheard me and asked if she could join me. She's a lovely woman, athletic and easy to talk to, but I knew that if she came, we wouldn't make it to the top, which was my goal. But I could't say no.

We put our sneakers on and climbed about half the way up. The rocky and dry terrain was tiresome and the sun was setting fast.

We stood there for a few minutes, in silence, admiring the beauty of that mountain chain and the valley bellow. A soft breeze made the brilliant light of the sun sail on the waving grass and a peaceful beauty overwhelmed us both.
After a couple of "wow"s, I said "This is the best temple there is," referring to the mountains, to nature, since really no other can connect us more directly with the soul of life.

She agreed with a smile and a shake of her head, without a word.

I looked at Parnassus and said quietly to it, "You are the temple."

Of course, I didn't know then how important those words would be the next day.

We climbed down right before dark, and were still able to eat some dinner. 

Later on, a friend told me that when I didn't say no to Susan, I sacrificed my desire to make it to the top, which was my unconscious offering to the oracle. It may indeed still be a requirement, as it always was, and for a reason.

The "sacrifice" itself turned out to be deeply rewarding. The act of helping Susan climb up and down, and of moving slower to respect her pace, while keeping her company all along, took me out of myself, which is something that in those days I was not accustomed to. The etymological meaning of the word ecstasy is "out of the self and into the wild-erness."  It's that simple. So the act alone made me feel more human and more connected to my surroundings, more ecstatic, than I had been, which put me in a more receptive state during my time there.

What is most important though, is that without Susan there I probably wouldn't have verbalized out loud that the mountain is the temple, which would be crucial on the next day.

In Delphi, it turns out, the spoken word is truly special.

5 - The evening of the Oracle.

After dinner, people from the tour group wanted to go out for drinks and music, but I declined. I knew the next morning would be too important for me to mess up with it.

A Peruvian couple and their son (in the picture with me) didn't want to go out either, so we stayed at the hotel lounge conversing about religion and spirituality. They were Krishna, but lived a normal life without having to shave their head or dress in orange clothes.


We talked long enough for the party people to meet us again after their night out. They came in and sat with us for about ten minutes. One of the women (pictured here with her daughter), with whom I had not spoken, told me that her mother, who was in the tour as well, was Greek, and that she knew the language well.

"Do you want to know your name in Greek?" She asked.

"Sure," I said curiously.

"It's Yorgo, which means 'Worker of the land'."
I thought it was very interesting that my last name, Larrea, means "pasture" in its original Basque. Together I would be "The worker of the pasture." I saw myself on Mount Parnassus a few hours earlier, feeling at home on that terrain where grass and rock create songs of wind and sun. 

I thanked her for sharing that fact with me, and a short time later we all retired to our rooms.
Needles to say, on the next day, the spoken name Yorgo would be part of my oracle, which I wouldn't have known if not for a random encounter just some hours earlier. She just came out of the blue and said it to me from across the lounge, moved by an impulse. 

6 - The night of the Oracle.

Back in my room, where I had been in bed for probably twenty minutes or so, something extremely strange happened.

I was falling asleep, at that moment when consciousness gives way to the subconscious, and suddenly, against the black of my inner vision, white lines moved in like a hundred snakes. They appeared to form the shapes of two tigers, one larger than the other, with its pow raised. The small one seemed to kneel or sit in front of it. (This picture is a close replica of what I saw, though I believe now the tigers were my own interpretation of those forms).

I sat up on the bed, impressed by the force with which the image assaulted my mind and very confused by it. Knowing that I was beginning to fall asleep, I just shook my head and laid back down without much thought.

Probably five minutes later, another strange image appeared in my mind, with such insistence that I had to get out of bed and stand in the dark hotel room to try to make sense of it. It was a red dot, as if made of dust, floating with an orange glow against the beige background of the mountain.

Nothing like that had ever happened to me before. Not once in my life had I gotten out of bed to ponder something that entered my mind in a quasi subconscious state, commanding so much attention.

When I couldn't find any meaning in these visions, I understood they may be related to what was about to happen on the following day, when I visit the oracle's site itself. I concluded I'll have to be attentive to those shapes and colors, I might see them on a rock, on some sign, on somebody's t-shirt?

I went back to sleep very intrigued by the unusual quality and potency of these visuals, and with great expectation.

7 - The morning of the Oracle

After breakfast, the tour bus took us up to the Delphi archeological site.

The plan was to visit the famous museum before the ruins, but too many buses were parked already in front of the entrance, so we were taken to the temple of Athena first, to kill some time.

Not many people came down, so when I took this picture I was alone.

What happened here was, again, something I've never experienced before. I was about to walk by the temple of Athena, towards the bus, when the air stopped me, literally. That's the only way I can describe it. I was walking back and something in the air or the air itself "physically" stopped me. So I stopped, astonished.

The temple, to my right, felt extremely quiet and heavy. I looked at it respectfully, acknowledging its unique roundness, trying to understand why I couldn't walk by it, yet.

The camera in my hands started to feel intrusive, out of place. I put it away and heard my self say: "I've waited for this day most of my life. I can't be a tourist today."
Then I looked at the temple and said: "From now on it is a meditation."
I walked up in silence and spoke very little the rest of time, and only with Oscar.

Later on I understood: I couldn't pass Athena's temple without asking for wisdom first. She's, after all, Wisdom's goddess. I was rude and didn't honor her presence, but she showed me.  Her temple is at the base of the sanctuary for a reason; the pilgrim would reach it before Apollo's temple and the rest of the complex. Athena would help the visitor with the necessary wisdom to ask the right question, and to interpret the answer correctly. And, in my case, to be able to actually hear the answer itself in the first place.  

8 - The Charoteer, at the Delphi Archeological Museum.

We finally made it to the museum, our preliminary stop, which turned out to be much more impressive than I had imagined. It has extraordinary sculptures such as the best portrait of Antinous I've ever seen, and the intelligent and lively Hagias.

The Omphalos, bellybutton, is also there (not the original, but an ancient copy still), which marked the navel of the Earth, or the center of the world, which was believed to be in Delphi.

I walked through the museum in silence, taking it all in, knowing that Oscar had been in the gallery of the Charioteer all along.

Oscar had told me many years ago that only once in his life he had an experienced that could be considered mystical. It was when he saw the Charioteer at Delphi with his friend Ivonne. They had been so touched by it that returned early next morning to sit in his presence again, in complete silence for as long as they could.

My friend Donna, who didn't know Oscar or anything about my conversation with him, told me basically the same thing a few days before my trip to Greece. She, literally, said that the only time she experienced what could be called mystical was when she saw the Charioteer.

I was, of course, very impressed by this, and my desire to see it grew stronger than ever before. Needless to say, I was in awe of it from the instant I saw it. I didn't even talk to Oscar, who was sitting nearby, until he stood up to leave.  His friend Ivonne had told him: "I don't love the sculpture, I love him!"

It's so true! He's indeed fully alive, and what he shows us is something hard not to admire and fall in love with. He was to me everything that I respect in a human being. He's as humble as he's confident, disciplined as he's sensitive, athletic and fully present to the now, before the gods, before all.

What impressed me the most though, were his eyes, so open, attentive and reverential, ready to act effectively if commanded, always looking straight ahead with alertness and intelligence. This bronze cast is of the highest quality of its time, a gift of a Sicilian city to the gods in Delphi to honor its triumph in the chariot race at the Pythian Games. The actual young man may have influenced its creation, which could explain the interesting departure from the Archaic style of the time, and the magnetic realism.

This sculpture is one of those rare examples of what art can do, that unexplainable mystery that elevates us and takes us beyond our comfort zones. These pictures won't show why, I had seen images of it many times before, and never really understood its importance. It was only then, in its presence, as I walked around him with my heart in my throat, that I comprehended why anyone would be so completely mesmerized.

I've never seen a sculpture with such powerful and intriguing presence before or since. In its own way it's as hypnotizing as the Mona Lisa, and for the very same reasons. No wonder it's considered one of the greatest artistic achievements of ancient times. 

9 - My Oracle in Delphi

The tour guide gathered us at the entrance of the archeological site.  "We've lost some time," she said. "We only have thirty minutes here."

My heart dropped to the floor. How was I supposed to see the temple of Apollo, the theater of Dionysus, the race track, and receive the Oracle, in thirty minutes!

"We need at least an hour," I yelled.

"OK," she responded. "It's twelve fifteen. Everybody on the bus at one o'clock."

She looked at me and I consented.

I began to move up alone, without saying another word to anyone.

I passed the Athenian treasury, rushing a little, and began to panic, really afraid of not having enough time. So I had to calm my self down, and did it by accepting that, if something was going to happen there, it was not going to be of my own doing. I chose to trust the moment and the place, to have faith.

I continued more relaxed, in as much contemplation as I could among the tourists, always conscious of the ticking of time.

The temple of Apollo stood in ruins but still majestic on the edge of the impressive Parnassus, out of limits to visitors. I understood then the importance of my verbalizing "the mountain is the temple" the prior evening. I would've been extremely disappointed if I had expected to receive my oracle in the temple itself, as it happened in ancient times.

So I kept walking up the mountain. When I approached the theatre of Dionysus, a young woman sang playfully to the amusement of some tourists seated on the stones, waiting to confirm the famous acoustics they've heard about.

When I stepped on the platform nobody waited for me to perform, but I felt the need to still do or say something, at least make a sound.

I stood at the center of the stage and opened my mouth to maybe sing a note and hear it taken by the subtle air up the mountain, when an unexpected awareness of the impropriety of that act made me stop short. Somehow I knew I shouldn't do it.

I felt the soft breeze on the side of my face, making its way up all the way from down beyond the ocean, the same ancient breeze that impelled sounds to the ears of those gathered, aware of the sacred ritual. The importance of what was said, and how, in such a special place, became apparent to me then, so I couldn't make a sound.
"It's a sacred act to speak here," I thought.

I became aware of how the spoken word, in a place of power, has mythical importance. Delphi was a sanctuary for over a thousand years. There, if we respect the place, our movements and words are elicited by an impulse that comes from the earth.
So I continued my walk up, observant all the while, attentive to red and orange, and to the shapes of the tigers I saw the night before.

When I made it to the race track, few people were in the area, and a welcomed silence reigned.

I had very little time, every move had to be right.
I saw the end of the track on the opposite side, and there was no one there. I walked to it knowing that it was the farthest point from the entrance.

I paced around the stone marker with careful steps, aware of the air on my pores and my face. I sat on it and looked at my watch. It was almost twelve fifty. I had about ten minutes left, and I needed at least five to run down the site and make it back on time to the bus.

I closed my eyes and focused intensely, waiting for a whisper within my ears, or an image, a vision in my mind. Nothing happened for a short while. Then, I saw a flash of the eyes of the Charioteer, wide open and alert. "Open your eyes," I told myself.

I opened them, and saw a father and his son, of about five, walking towards me, conversing in Spanish, my native language.

"They're going to brake the silence, to be a distraction," I thought.

I focused my attention straight ahead, pass them, trying to ignore their presence, so afraid of their interference, that I didn't notice the colors they were wearing. Both of them wore beige safari hats and shorts, and the father had a red polo shirt on, larger than the orange one the son's. That fact hit me later.  (This image is a reconstruction so you may visualize it).

They stood at about ten feet to my right, very quiet for what seemed a long moment. I must have had probably a minute left, when one of the most astonishing things occurred.

"Papá," said the boy, in such a way that the word itself, its sound, its vibration, held me, completely, and instantly. My body was, literally, yes literally, held by his voice. Every molecule in me responded to it, overwhelmed, against my own will to ignore it.

"Éste es un escorpión," ("This is a scorpion"), the boy continued.

"No es un escorpión" ("It's not a scorpion"), the father replied casually.

"Yo sé que lo es" ("I know it is"), stated the boy, with absolute resolution.

"Entonces ten cuidado que no te pique" ("Then, be careful it doesn't bite you"), the father responded, without any concern at all.

"Ya me picó" ("It already did"), the boy declared with certainty.

In that instant I knew. I new it in my bones, that was my oracle. I knew it immediately, and not only because the voice of the boy, which I was trying to avoid, came rushing through me and held my whole body solid like a rock, like nothing that had ever happened to me before. I also knew it because I was born in November, and have always been a very proud Scorpio. I've identified very much with the sign, its symbolism and characteristics, since I am indeed the universal description of a scorpio man. The father of the boy knew there wasn't a real scorpion, otherwise he wouldn't have been so nonchalant about it.  The boy was fantasizing, playing a mind game, moved to say it out loud at that moment, within that one minute I had left. And what he said was my riddle, the answer to my question: Should I quit my job or not?  I had already resigned from it, I had already decided it was best to leave, but I was asked to reconsider. The oracle was telling me: "Your soul, the scorpio, already bit you, and there's nothing you can do. It's done."

And then, a truly unbelievable thing happened:
Those resounding words were followed by absolute silence. I turned to look at them, in awe of what I heard and how I heard it, and what I saw simply blew my mind.

The father was squatting on the ground, very close to the boy, ready to take a picture without saying a word. The boy was kneeling on the ground, facing right into the lens. The second I turned to look at them, the father tilted his head to have a vertical picture, and by doing so, covered the black of the camera and his hair with his safari hat . The boy's face was mostly covered by the hat from my angle. All I saw then was Red and Orange, against the beige of the stones and sand of the track on the side of the hill. And their bodies were doing just what the tigers in my vision did. When I saw them, I knew it immediately, that that was exactly what the white lines were forming, not the tigers. I saw tigers because my mind needed to give an image to those lines.  It would have been really difficult to see the bodies of an older man an a boy squatting like that and make any sense out of them. I had to see the tigers, that's an oriental image my brain was familiar with.

What is most amazing to me is that I would have known the words of the boy were my oracle, even if my vision on the night before had not been matched and corroborated with their body movement and color.
It was the most extraordinary feeling, very difficult to describe, the power of that voice over my whole self, a voice that I was trying to avoid hearing. The two of them had been quiet from the moment they got close to me. The voice of the boy sounded like in a vacuum, strong and all encompassing. And then, abruptly, they were completely quiet, taking a picture without any of them saying another word.

The moment the boy was done talking I knew with absolute certainty that that was my riddle, it was pure direct knowing, which doesn't happen too often. The visual confirmation with the clues from the night before were just an astonishing, perfectly choreographed and timed icing on the cake.

I ran down and was the last person from the group to step on the bus, exactly at one o'clock, on the dot!  That was incredible as well, the exactitude in the timing of the whole thing.

And it didn't end there. Another astonishing confirmation was about to seal the deal, and the timing of this one was even more outstanding.

I didn't say much to Oscar during the five minute bus ride to the restaurant. I was trying to catch my breath from the intense run down the site the whole while.

As we stepped off the bus to have our lunch, the woman right in front of me conversed with the Greek mother of the lady at the hotel's lounge, who told me about my name.
I heard her ask: "What's the name of the island of Onasis?"

'How trivial,' I thought, 'to ask about celebrities in a place like this.'

"Scorpion," the Greek lady replied.
The word shook me as my ears popped. 

"She said 'scorpion'" I said out loud to Oscar, to make it more real, to confirm it to myself.  

At that instant, right then and there, when I said "Scorpion" out loud, we were walking by the restaurant's host, who was standing by the entrance greeting us. He waved at a waiter standing inside and called practically in my ear "Yorgo!"  

The words "Scorpion" and "Yorgo" were said almost exactly at the same time, within a second apart! Only about ten minutes earlier the boy had said the word scorpion, describing how it had already bitten him(me). I knew it was in reference to me, to my soul. And now, the word Scorpion is spoken again, almost exactly at the same time as my Greek name is called out loud, as I'm walking by the loud voice itself.
What are the chances of that happening? Really? What are the probabilities??
Both words were spoken out loud and clearly within a second!!
(This image is a recreation, the one above shows the ladies in the story, in the middle of the group).

If that lady was not right in front of me stepping off the bus I wouldn't have heard her question, we were all walking behind each other. If the woman with her had not been Greek she wouldn't have known the answer. If the boy and the father had taken two more minutes to get there I would have had to leave. If I had not stayed late talking to the Peruvian family I wouldn't have heard that my name is Yorgo, from someone I had not spoken to. If Susan had not been seating in front of me, only for that ride, she wouldn't have heard me say I wanted to go up the mountain and wouldn't have come with me. If I had been alone I'm not sure I would have verbalized that the mountain IS the temple.

And then, everything happened with such exactitude during moments with very little time in each. So many people involved, so many encounters that very easily could have not happened, one minute sooner or later, one person missing or quite or unheard here or there, and it wouldn't have worked. For all of that to happen, wouldn't it require a lot of preparation?

When the host called out Yorgo, it was a loud and clear confirmation of my riddle. What a reiteration! When I think of everything that had to take place for that second to make sense, for the riddle to be complete! There were six people involved just then, in that second. The American tourist, the Greek woman, Oscar and I, the host and the waiter, all of us had to be at our right places and at the right time, and say our lines loud and well, for it to work!
I am Yorgo, and I am a scorpio, and the scorpion that I am already bit me.  My own mind, my own soul, had made the decision already. That's what I understood when I heard it, but now it was official.
I remember at that moment I said back to... the mountain, "You didn't have to do that. I knew." But now, years later, I'm so grateful it did. The confirmation itself was a dramatic and supernatural final act, and it was truly fascinating to witness it.

The Peruvian family, Oscar, and I sat at a smaller table to have our lunch. I raised my wine glass and said, "I'm living proof that the Oracle is real."

They all smiled and toasted, but nobody asked me to elaborate.

PYTHIA'S BATH

In ancient times, the oracle was given only during the nine warmest months of the year. Pythia, the priestess who would answer the questions in a trance, was reported to look as if she had exerted herself, exhausted and drained afterwards, so it was obviously something that couldn't be done often.

As part of her various rituals, Pythia had a ceremonial bath on the seventh day of each of the nine months, and the bath on the seventh month of the year was the most important one. All these facts I learned back home, after my trip to Greece.

I was there for twelve days, and the only one day I "bathed" was on July 7th. I am a swimmer, and every hotel we stayed at had a pool, but never felt like going in any of them. We visited the island of Hydra on that day, a couple of days after my Oracle took place. Right after our arrival, I walked away from the group to be alone. I sat at a restaurant for a drink, and after looking at the blue water for a long while, almost hypnotized by the saturation of its hue, I walked towards it like an automat. I left my shoes, camera, and clothes on a rock, and dove to the bottom of the sea. It surprised me that I remained suspended there, maybe 12 feet deep, completely calm, for a longer time than I thought I could.

There was something very special about that dive, though I couldn't think much about it then. When I read back home that Pythia's main bath was on the seventh day of the seventh month, I looked up my itinerary of the tour and it was indeed July 7th when we went to Hydra. It was on that day when I dove in the sea in an unusual way. I didn't swim, I floated in all sort of ways, bathed more than swam, which is definitely not my style.

Though I know I'm not a Pythia myself, it was me who received the oracle directly, and like her, I had to catch my breath right afterwards, even if it was because I had to run down the mountain to be on the bus on time. It's all symbols, nothing more, but there's enormous beauty in them when they add up like precise words in a very special poem.

10 - The Temple of Apollo

The myths tell us that Apollo killed Python, the largest snake known to man, in Delphi, overthrowing the reign of Gaia for ever in the zone.  This myth, as all myths, represents humanity's state of development at the moment it was invented. For as long as it was told, which is an entire millennium before our common era, there was a war between the female natural order and the male intellectual and physical powers.  Gaia was the most powerful figure in the local myths of that region for thousand of  years, as the various Cycladic statuettes prevalent during these era demonstrate. This explains why Pythia, the priestess who received the oracle from the earth, was always female.  Which I find very unusual, specially during the last centuries of ancient Greece, when women couldn't even attend the theater or vote at all.

Gaia may be understood as Mother Earth, and as demonstrated by the 20,000 years of art production all over Europe preceding the Greeks show. The female in nature governed the world, the Goddess Mother, the Life Giver.  Eventually, she had to be defeated by Apollo, the male god that represented the new intelligent warrior the Greeks saw themselves as. Gaia, the female with her earthy tendencies and dangerous instincts, had to be overpowered. This happened at Delphi, and Apollo became its god and Delphi his official home on Earth.  Its great temple was, of course, dedicated to him. 

Apollo is the Greek, and Roman, god of music, healing, prophecy, and enlightenment.  All of it seems to have been embodied in Delphi, which was a large complex where games, exchanges and special encounters took place. 

On each wall of Apollo's temple a phrase was carved:

"Know Thyself."  "Nothing in Excess."  "Make a Pledge and Mischief is Nigh."

Two of these phrases give advice, which, reduced to four words, was the most important the Oracle could give. I love how succinct they are; two strong words each:

"Know Thyself."    "Nothing in Excess."

"Know thyself" was Socrates's favorite advice, whom undoubtedly learnt it from the Oracle's walls. It has been a motto in our cultures ever since. By now we all seem to know how valuable it is to know ourselves, although very few of us actually know what that truly means.

In the Old Testament,  to know some-one meant to have laid with that person. To know, is to be or have been with the other, to become one with the entirety of the other. To know, in reality, is to comprehend.
Today, we do know so much, but how little we comprehend! To comprehend is to contain, to grasp, to make the other our own, which is not equal to the knowledge of the other. Comprehension is apprehension of that other thing or self one wants to know. It requires depth of thought and feeling, empathy and intuition, and an honest openness and willingness to learn of our own existences. 

Know Thyself doesn't mean think about yourself and have an understanding of who you are. It means comprehend EVERYTHING you are, physically, mentally, and spiritually. It means bring all the words, the rhetoric of the mind, into a present awareness in the body. It means comprehend with all the senses involved, understand as the physical animal we are, and the spiritual beings in these bodies we borrow from the earth.

Few of us know ourselves because most of us are rarely in the moment, in our body, in the here and now, with all that we are, not just the disembodied mind and the erratic emotions we have grown accustomed to being.

Can you imagine?  To really know everything about your self, the entire organism that you are?  How much more will then you'll know others as well? Our choices will surely be very different. 

"Nothing in Excess," on the other hand, is something we rarely hear. But what an advice it really is!

The word Nothing is absolute, and Excess is universal. Everything that we do or don't do, have or not have, can be done or had in excess. Eating. Drinking. Talking. Thinking. Building. Loving. Hating. Using. Having. Doing. Resting. Sleeping. Writing. Driving. Shopping. Learning.  Everything can be done in excess!

The advice doesn't tell us to not do any of those things; we could do them all if we want or need to, as long as in each case it is done or had moderately. Not doing can also be done in excess. Omission. Inertia. Apathy. Egotism. Egocentrism. Absence. Detachment. Stagnation. Boredom. Depression. Isolation.  We can indulge in them as well.

If we pay more attention to this advice, we would be more conscious of the negative effects that overdoing or overindulging have in us. Imagine the world's wealth attained by all humans, at various levels but all, if excess in accumulating by a few fortunate ones was not existent, if our personal desire was not to have the most but to be the best humans we could be. The social effects would be amazing.

In our own personal lives, if we don't allow excess, there will be no alcoholism, obesity, bulimia, depression, sickness, drug addiction, neurosis, hatred, loneliness, anguish, madness.

Imagine, if we all lived without excess and learn to know ourselves, what kind of world would this be? Two solid advices, four words, which, if we followed, could make us great, and could make the world a much more wonderful place.

The third phrase is the one we tend to simply dismiss today:

"Make a Pledge and Mischief is Nigh."

Why a pledge? A pledge could be a promise, an offering, or a vow. I think the oracle meant all of these. You promise to go to the Oracle one day in your life, and promise to take it seriously. You bring an offering to show how much the Oracle means to you. The offering comes in many forms, like the walk up the mountain after a long travel in itself, or the prescribed sexual abstinence and fast before entering the site. It could come in the form of a personal sacrifice, or a valued possession. For over a thousand years, the Oracle required all, the sacrifice and the material donation.

The museum in Delphi has some of the best sculptures in the world for that reason. For the Oracle to take the question seriously, an equally serious offering had to be given.

Why Mischief? Pythia, the priestess who received the Oracle and gave it as a riddle, entered into a state of trance to do so. The message came from within the Earth, the whisper of Python. This, even for ancient Greeks, was out of the ordinary, and in order to do it, one had to suspend thought and go ahead like a child, with a faithful and thoughtless innocence. The whole act of asking and responding seems to enter dangerous ground, but whatever the results there was no malice. All innocent, with suspended thought, but real.  It's just mischief.

Why Nigh? Because if there was an answer, it was going to be given right there, on the side of Parnassus, inside Apollo's temple.  That's the beauty of it. One asks the Earth, the place, Python, and only there and then the answer takes place. Not like a prayer that may be answered later or somewhere else. The response is right there and right then; which is why the a priori sacrifice is needed, to seal the deal.

On the forth wall of the temple, an epsilon (E) was also written, and not many good explanations for it have been given.

I'd just say, look at the symbol for epsilon and that for the sixth and seventh chakras, which represent the highest levels of understanding and consciousness. Could it be a common ancient form seen from the other side of the wall, as if what it represents comes through it onto your space?  Or simply a formal shift or flip of the letter in time and culture?