On chaos

Chaos, in a primordial sort of way. The Greeks regarded Chaos not in the modern connotation of the term, as a mass of confusion, but as the endless void. The infinite nothing from which spawned everything. Chaos is more appropriately written Ka-os, pronounced Kah-aws. The break in the middle, the awkward hesitation, the actual phonetic representation of that momentary lapse in sound, is actually of greater significance than most laymen realize. Although the word signifies the meaning, the break is representative of Chaos in a more accurate way than the word itself.

In the Theogony, written by Hesiod, after Chaos came Eros, Gaia, and Tarteros. It is an important note to mention that it was not Chaos that birthed Eros, Gaia, and Tarteros, but in fact the three came into existence on their own. They willed themselves into being, if you will (no pun intended). Although, if one stops and really examines the situation, creating oneself into the void, an infinite span of ultimate nothingness, can only be likened to being birthed by the void. There's nothing there to give birth to you, so only Nothing could have given birth to you. Or is that arguing semantics?

I imagine, were I a much better philosopher, or perhaps a much more competent abstract thinker, I could find the distinction between the two. Perhaps it's really a matter of power, the kind that occurs when something gives birth to another, or when something forces itself into a space that (if we may assume, in this train of thought) didn't want the intrusion.

Nevertheless, I've always found it a point of fascination that Hesiod chose Love, the Earth, and the Pit of Ultimate Suffering to be the three primordial entities after the void. Love, in particular, as the other three can arguably be described as places. I do think it significant, however, that even as early as Hesiod a place of punishment was considered a primal aspect of creation.

At any rate, I think it is perhaps an indication of what a tumultous force Love was, to the ancient Greeks. The God of Love was nothing less than one of the first four entities responsible for creation, and the Goddess of Love the result of a rather violent struggle for power, a betrayal of a particularly intimate sort, and the emasculation of the very Sky. Love is powerful, creational, promordial, and therefore also dangerous and potentially ruinous.

And then, somewhere in the order of the 12th century or so, the bloody French came along and turned the whole thing romantic in the worst sort of way. The noble knight, forever adoring his lady from afar, doomed to love her but never able to claim her. Perhaps she returns his love, but, alas, even if she weren't wedded to the lord, or baron, or marquis, she was still a noblewoman, and therefore as out of his reach as the stars in the sky. A romantic notion, maybe, but ultimately a foolish one.

Is there a point to this? Ha. Yes, actually, but not for anyone but myself. Read the subtext, if you like - I'm just writing to add a layer of serenity to a rather disheveled me.