The Sun, The Seasons, and The Swastika (2023)

In the words of the philosopher Alfred North Whitehead, “There is one great difference between symbolism and direct knowledge. Direct experience is infallible. What you have experienced, you have experienced. But symbolism is very fallible…It is the cause of progress and the cause of error.” The fallibility of symbolism is ironically a side effect of one of its great virtues: namely, the fact that a symbol can be interpreted creatively in many diverse ways. The same symbol that can represent blessings and good luck in one context can represent hate and bigotry in another. A symbol that represents wisdom and enlightenment in one culture can, in another, represent sin and evil. This paper will argue that symbols rooted in natural phenomena can be interpreted in a great variety of ways, though this variety is also limited by the character of the phenomena themselves. Some of these uses yield insight into the nature of reality and are occasions for human beings to gain understanding of themselves and their larger environment. Symbols unite communities around sets of shared meanings and values. Symbols, though, can also divide and be used to demonize others. In exploring the ways in which symbols have been used and misused, this presentation will strive to understand visceral responses and how these create and reinterpret symbols throughout the world in the modern age.

2021

The Dharmic symbol of 'Swastika' is losing its narrative war in Australia like elsewhere in Western nations. The 'Swastika' is synonymous with antisemitism in a multicultural Australia where Indic identity groups like Hindus, Buddhists, Jains and Sikhs are model minorities. Two extreme threads represent the misappropriation of 'Swastika' in Australia. The first thread is the fringe White Supremacists inspired by their American and European counterparts. The second thread is the deliberate ignorance maintained by the ecosystem of media and academia to maintain Western Universalism.

2012

The swastika is one of the oldest symbols of Mankind, going back at least to the VII millenium BC. It appears on many diverse prehistoric archaeological remains like rock art and pottery, among other artefacts and monuments. Some researchers simple ignore it or call it “decoration”, while others, frequently, consider it only as a solar symbol. Indeed there are several meannings of the swastika, which occur throught time and space and that must be analysed with a contextual approach. In 1978, the discovery of a Chinese comet Atlas at Mawangdui, dating from the 4th century BC, is surely a turning point regarding the interpretation of the swastika. In fact, one of the depicted comets has the shape of that symbol. In this paper the author presents an interdisciplinary methodology to demonstrate the cometary origins of the swastika: iconographic data (prehistoric carvings, the Chinese comet atlas and drawings from early astronomers), astronomical and astrophysics data (studies regarding comets and experiences in astrophysics), writen data (texts from Classical Roman writers), and geographical data (the simultaneous presence of the symbol during the V millenium BC, in regions without contact). As a conclusion, it can be argued that during Prehistory the relation between comets and religion (or myth) is very close and, therefore, these astronomical events must have left a deep impression in the mind of the observers, due to the visual impact that they produced, being probably considered as manifestations of the gods. Introduction

ALCEU: Revista de Comunicação, Cultura e Política, 2022

Continuing the work of Aronis and Aoki (2021), this essay focuses on contemporary installations of swastikas on U.S. campuses and uses a media ecology theoretical approach to expand on the technological operation of the swastika in the service of antisemitism. The author examines the matter and medium of the swastika, along with its doing, in order to deconstruct its violent, harassing, and threatening nature for the U.S. university Jewish community, as well as for other potentially affected minoritized and racialized communities. Through five lenses of technological, material, and communicative exploration assembling, dual act of marking, space/time bias, (re)mediation, and prescription the author explains how installed swastikas create a traumatizing effect for Jewish university members. This may assist scholars and practitioners regarding education on the topic and treatment. Aronis, C. (2022). The Technological Operation of the Swastika: A Media Ecology Approach. ALCEU: Revista de Comunicação, Cultura e Política, 22 (46), 96-115.

ORIGIN AND SYMBOLISM MOTIF “MOVING SWASTIKA”, 2018

A lot has been said about the cross as a symbol of the sun before the advent of Christianity. And a lot has been said about the ancient sign of the "swastika", derived from the sun cross. But there is another ancient symbolic motif, which originated from the swastika. This is the motive of the "Moving swastika". Unlike the sun rotating around its axis (a single swastika), this motif is a rhythmically repetitive swastika, sequentially connected to each other in an S -shaped structure. The structure of this motive develops linearly, which predetermined the function of a border in the designs of ancient art. But before becoming a decorative border, this motif served as a sacral guardian (talisman) on household items and jewelry. The ancient motif “Moving Swastika” had a protective function and was depicted on cult objects, ceramics, jewelry, fabrics and carpets. The motif of the “Moving Solar Deity” in the form of a swastika recurring and connected with each other, with the spread of Islam, also acquires a new symbolism: While preserving its pagan, “protective” context in the works of Muslim art, it has become a decorative border. In the decoration of architectural structures, works of artistic metal, ceramics, fabrics and carpets, the motif of the “Moving Sun (swastika)” continues to retain its original function of the amulet. This symbolic motif of the rim protects the border, hidden (batin) from the outer, overt (zahir), forming the border between the sacred and profane world.

Most of us shudder when we see photos of swastikas on Nazi flags or on the uniforms of the Third Reich. It reminds us of that terrible historical period in the mid-20th century when hatred threatened to rule the world. Most of us would be surprised to learn, however, that this emblem was once an ancient symbol known the world over to represent just the opposite: peace, prosperity, and fortuity.

Swastika is widely used in India's various religious traditions. In prehistory, various civilizations and cultures of the world used the sign of Swastika since Neolithic period. Although, India maintained its tradition over thousands of years, other culture discontinued or never made Swastika as a permanent part of their religious tradition.

Archaeologia Baltica, 2020

The paper focuses on the swastika, artefacts of antler, wood, metal and clay marked with the swastika, and swastika-shaped items from the 13th and 14th centuries in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. An answer is sought to the question what the swastika, a universal sign and symbol, represented in ancient Lithuanian culture and religion, and what kinds of shapes and accompanying mythological meanings it possessed. It is concluded that in the 13th and 14th centuries, the swastika did not have a canon of representation, and its perpendiculars on one-sided items faced in one or the other rotary direction (clockwise or anticlockwise), while on two-sided ones they faced in both directions simultaneously. Two Lithuanian gods, Perkūnas (Thunder) and Kalvelis (Blacksmith), emerged in the explored contexts of items marked with a swastika. This confirms the genetic connection between the swastika and an equilateral cross, the sign of fire or Thunder, characteristic of the Baltic and ancient Lithuanian religious tradition. To date, there is no reason to believe that the perpendiculars could change the symbolic meaning. Baltic mythology, cross of fire, swastika, Grand Duchy of Lithuania, Vilnius castles, Kernavė archaeological site, Bajorai cemetery

2014

At the 20th International Conference of the European Society for Astronomy in Culture , held in Slovenia in 2012, Reza Assasi (2013) presented the paper 'Swastika: The Forgotten Constellation Representing the Chariot of Mithras', in which he identified Mithras and his quadriga with the constellation Draco, centre of the zodiac in the map of the stars. Thus he proposed a new interpretation that contradicted that accepted by researchers of the Mithraic religion who associate Mithras with the sun. This article aims to show that, contrary to this new interpretation, Mithras should still be identified with the solar deity. Mithraic iconography and liturgy is analysed in the present work, paying special attention to the relationship between the two solar deities Helios and Mithras. The context in which the swastika is depicted is analysed, demonstrating that it never represented a constellation but instead represented the sun. We follow the theory of David Ulansey (1994), which asserts that Mithras should be identified with the "hypercosmic sun", the sphere of fire which Greek philosophers located beyond the starry heavens.