A study of nasty and nice lab rats has scientists on the verge of knowing the genes that separate wild animals like lions and wolves from their tame cousins, cats and dogs.
Unlike their wild ancestors, house pets and other domesticated animals share the trait of tameness, meaning they tolerate or even seek out human presence. New research, which is published in the June issue of the journal Genetics and involved the interbreeding of friendly and aggressive rats, reveals gene regions that influence the opposing behaviors.
Read the full article:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20090610/sc_livescience/geneticdifferencefoundinwildvstameanimals
Some people have messaged me inquiring about why I wrote the Therian Bible and about the beginnings of the Therian Temple.
I figured that the best way to answer everyone at once would be to explain the history in a blog here.
To get to the very root of the story, I must take you back several years.
In the mid 1980s when I first witnessed a real wolf firsthand.
I was in Illinois at night in my older cousin’s car, and she pulled over to let her boyfriend get out of the car and relieve himself.
This happened to be at the edge of a large Forest Preserve.
I wandered away from the group a bit and stepped into the dark woods very quietly, and to this day, I am unsure what drew me to do this.
I saw a Grey Wolf walking through a clearing. I stared silently, both excited and surprised at once, but not really scared, although, perhaps some would say I should have been.
I had always liked wolves and kept posters, t-shirts, etc. of them, but now seeing the Wolf in Nature, I felt a much closer bond to them.
The Wolf’s movements reminded me of my own, the wolf’s reaction to our encounter seemed to mimic mine. I wanted to go with the Wolf, but my cousin called for me and the animal disappeared into the darkness.
As I grew older, I always remembered that experience. In retrospect, I thought of the danger of even thinking that I could or should run off into the woods with a Wolf.
It would not be a sensible thing to do, and I knew better, yet I kept having that “feeling” of wanting to run free in Nature, just as the Wolf does. My friends and family would always joke that I was a “Werewolf” because I had so much Wolf & Werewolf memorabilia, had a quick temper, and was somewhat unusually strong for a female of my height.
Personally, I thought of myself as a “Lycanthrope” for lack of a better term at the time, but I never thought I could physically “become” a Wolf– to me, I already was a Wolf.
I did realize that those who had been identified as “Werewolves” in the past were Persecuted, and often, killed, so I didn’t want to reveal that I took this concept of identity seriously without having some very good explanations to back it up. I began to keep a Journal of ideas
about the concept of humans with animal personalities, and the best ways to control inevitable “Shifts” that come with such a personality.
When I was in High School, I was interested in various world cultures including Japan, and I read a book titled “A History of the Japanese People from the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era”. In discussing the manners and customs of Shinto adherents, the author described the belief in “Therianthropic Elements” of their Humanoid Deities.
While I had always understood many of the Ancient Pantheons (including Egyptian and others) as being metaphorical representations of Humans with Animal personalities (faces), I never had a proper term for this Concept, and at this moment, It all came together. Yes, I was like a Wolf, but there were all sorts of people with various Animal-typed personalities. Cat-people, Squirrel-People, Bird-People, etc.
As I read more about the ancient Shinto, I saw some useful elements of their practices.
While I did not believe in or worship Animalistic deities, the idea of combining Animal archetypes with Ritual and “removal of pollution” from the body & mind seemed to be very in tune with Nature and positive for mental clarity.
If the worship of the deities is removed from the equation, almost any system of belief could be syncretically combined with this practice, and generally, to the benefit of the practitioner.
I did more and more research every year on this topic over the years, reading every manner of Occult and Folklore book referencing Werewolves, Witches who turned into Cats, Winged Women, and so on.
Throughout my late teen and early twenties years, I experimented with various Traditional* Occult Ritual formats, integrating the removal of pollution idea and animal archetypes, taking notes on which worked best, i.e. which created the most natural, intense and enjoyable Shift
during, and created the most peaceful, decompressed feeling afterward.
Fast forward to the late 1990s / early 2000s. All the while, I have been collecting notes and clippings on Occult sciences, especially those pertaining to the “Therianthropic element’ concept.
The concept had for years been bleeding heavily into my music and art, with more and more images and songs referencing Lycanthropy and Therianthropic ideas.
The “Werewolf” idea had become such a major part of my public image it was getting to the point where I felt I had better explain what I was talking about, lest people think I am promoting the idea that people can transform into wolves and gain super-human strength, or fly, etc.. I had all this research and knowledge regarding the “Therianthropic element’, yet what use was it to keep it all to myself, and only “hint” at the idea artistically?
I didn’t want others like me to get the wrong idea and go off into a false, and possibly dangerous path.
This became especially important to me as I saw the internet Therian subculture grow with many people spreading dangerous ideas into the community, telling them they are invincible, to hurt people, etc.
I pondered ways to communicate to others the most positive applications of Therianthropy.
So many years worth of quotes and notes added up to a confusing pile of information that needed a lot of coordination to assemble all of this into something usable by others like myself, those with Animal personalities, who can benefit from Ritual decompression.
One summer night in 2005, I invoked a very intense mental shift and sat down with a stack of unlined paper and a #2 Pencil.
I layed out the papers and notepads, and set out to compile all these years of research into something streamlined enough that one wouldn’t need to be a scholar to be able to grasp the concepts within.
The Theriogram symbol made its way onto the paper first. After that ,the words flowed naturally and the text was written without a break in one all-night session.
This text became the Therian Bible. It remained unedited to represent the exact way I wrote it during the Shift, leading some to criticize the punctuation, etc., but this is unimportant to me.
The text is the Word of the Wolf, in the Wolf’s words. It is simplistic and primal, and puposely so. One must build from a simple base their own applications of Therian Magic.
Heavy books full of potions, dogmatic formulas, and Numerological meanderings are not the stuff of the Inner Beast, the Most Primal Self.
The Therian Bible was written for Therians, not for the general public or literary reviewers.
Initially, I just distributed the book completely DIY, and people had to get it directly from me.
Then I met a gentleman who is known as Fenrir Therion. He had ordered the book, utilized it, and was ethralled with the ideas within.
He was interested in connecting Therians who used this system, and I informed that I had considered the idea of building a community/organization around the Therian Bible.
Thus was born the idea of the Therian Temple. I sent out a questionnaire to those who had ordered the book, and from the responses found the first members of the Therian Temple.
Fenrir had begun to use some proto-logos and talk about Therian Temple to some of his online friends, and as more people asked what we were about, we decided that it was time to open the group to the Public and build a website.
In August 2008, we opened the Therian Temple website and started accepting Memberships from around the world.
Fenrir began to explain our beliefs to some communities online and some responded well, some not so well.
Many people were initially afraid of us, but who isn’t afraid of a real live Wolf?
Many people called us “secretive”, as if that’s a bad thing, because we do not release membership information or numbers.
In reality, most of members would not feel safe to join a group based on such a controversial concept if we weren’t “secretive”.
Over the years, Therian Temple has been discriminated against sometimes, but at the same time, we have found many allied minds who are supportive of our ways.
We have met all sorts of interesting and intelligent people who have become TT members, as well as several nutcases whose membership was denied, but hopefully, no feelings were hurt too badly.
We have been praised and condemned, but all in all, I think we are off to a Fine Start…..And we plan to continue our efforts to positively contribute to the Therian Community worldwide, through literature, online activities, events, and more.
HAIL THE INNER BEAST!
TEMPLUS THERION ETERNUS!
HP N. Noctis
The Therian Temple now has a Presence on Facebook!
If you area Facebook user you can “Become a Fan” of Therian Temple at the following link:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Therian-Temple/90634978728?ref=mf
This announcement may be of interest to many of our members, but participation is not limited to TT membership:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
From NCM & Fenrir’s Lair Records:
(NOV. 2008 Chicago/Cincinnati/Providence):
Noctis Cultus Media, in collaboration with Fenrir’s Lair Records, is assembling a new compilation featuring only Therian-identified independent musical artists, for which a title will be decided upon later via online vote by all the artists who will participate.
The goals are to represent the strong creative force of Therians in underground music, and to give international promotion to talented up-and-coming Therian artists, as well as give those artists an opportunity to make some money selling their own copies of the CD.
NOTE: This CD will be aggressively promoted / sold internationally, so do not participate if you do not want your identity as a Therian to be a “public” part of your artistic persona.
This is for openly-Therian artists.
Bands are required to have at least one openly-Therian member.
We require one or two high-quality recorded tracks. Tracks must be already mixed & mastered.
The preference is that the tracks submitted have some relation to a Therianthropic or Animal theme, but songs with other subject matter will also be considered.
We are also looking for skilled Therian visual artists for liner / cover artwork.
The label(s) will be making & distributing promotional flyers and adverts, but artists are also free to do their own promotions.
We also plan to put on a promotional live concert / music fest in the Chicago area featuring as many of the compiled artists as can be arranged. The proposed venue is open to all-ages, has excellent sound and lights, and actually pays the performers fairly!
If you are an independent (Therian) artist or band who wishes to participate in this, or future NCMG or Wolf’s Lair compilations, email: noctiscultus@gmail.com a with “THERIAN COMPILATION SUBMISSION” in the subject line.
Compilation Details:
The way we arrange releases is thus:
CD format
Color packaging (although your art may be b&w of course)
You / the artist send us finished tracks & basic art work, info, titles, etc .
We have the discs manufactured / printed and buy them at cost from the manufacturer as people Order them (print on demand).
If you wish to have your own copies to distribute, You would buy as many copies as you want at the same production cost we pay and sell them at full price through your own distribution circles, as we will do in ours, or we can cover all fulfillments (orders / shipping) if you are more interested in the free promotion aspect than making money off of disc sales.
You can buy as few or as many copies of your own release as you want, or none.
You will be required to fill out a simple contract using your REAL LEGAL NAME giving permission to reproduce and distribute your music.
You retain 100% of all rights to your music, of course.
You are simply giving us permission to release it only on this Compilation.
As you may know, the Full Moon phase is the BEST time to practice Therian Rituals.
Such a phase begins today.
The most-widely used American Full Moon name for this month of October is the Full Hunter’s Moon.
This was the time to hunt in preparation for winter.
This full Moon is also called the Travel Moon and the Dying Grass Moon.
To those who follow the zodiac & astrology, this is a Full Moon in Aries.
Aries is the first sign of the zodiac and is believed to rule new beginnings.
This is believed to be the Full Moon of the child:
a celebration of innocence, adventurousness, and starting anew.
Aries and Libra both have a lot to do with the balance of light and dark.
When Aries begins in March at the Spring Equinox, the Earth reaches the balance point when now there begins to be more light in our day than darkness.
When Libra begins at the Fall Equinox, the Earth reaches the balance point when darkness begins to grow greater than the light.
TODAY 14
Full Moon
4:04 P.M.
There is a new page supporting the Therian Temple on Myspace:
MySpace URL:
http://www.myspace.com/theriantemplesupporters
This profile run by an Active Therian Temple Member / Templar.
This week, the Therian Temple has entered the multimedia world of the “video blogosphere”.
One of your Templars has started a YouTube Video Channel for the Therian Temple, called Therian Temple TV.
The url is:
http://www.youtube.com/user/TherianTempleTV
Please subscribe to the channel and add it to your YouTube “friends” if you have an account there, even if you are a non-Member.
If you are a Therian Temple Member (Vexillarius, Registered or Active) and you wish to participate in Therian Temple TV, please email: info@theriantemple.org for details on how to submit videos of your own creation concerning Therian Magic, General Therianthropy, and related topics.
Members should also note that an RSS feed of Therian Temple TV now appears inside the Therian Temple Network @ Ning:
If you are a TT Member and have not joined there yet, please do.
The url there is:
Email: info@theriantemple.org if you need an email invite to gain access.
