!- in other words : ouroborous * Ouroboros, emblematic serpent of ancient Egypt and Greece represented with its tail in its mouth, continually devouring itself and being reborn from itself. A gnostic and alchemical symbol, Ouroboros expresses the unity of all things, material and spiritual, which never disappear but perpetually change form in an eternal cycle of destruction and re-creation. * Source: https://www.britannica.com/topic/Ouroboros *

Mark Smith asked me if I was familiar with the term ouroboros. I replied, “No.” So he sent me this link.

This symbolizes the cyclic Nature of the Universe: creation out of destruction, Life out of Death.

Mark Smith: Stephen, are you familiar with “ouroboros”?

This is a strong framing of the conundrum of the teacher at so many different levels. I'm going to use this (and cite you and this blog) in a Prof. Dev. I'm doing next week. Teaching tends to return to its ranks those who played the game so well to begin with. (That's what they think they "can" do because that's what they were best at. ) Thus, like the symbol of the ouroboros, the system creates clear boundaries as to who can succeed inside and who will never gain access. However, the system will, as the symbol suggests, eat itself, until it becomes so small and convoluted that it ceases to exist (he waxed, poetically). Thank you.

The concept of eternal return has a chequered history through philosophy and culture, but Alasdair Roberts is invoking the particular use of the term by the religious historian Mircea Eliade. The Wikipedia entry) says that Eliade's eternal return is "a belief, expressed... in religious behaviour, in the ability to return to the mythical age, to become contemporary with the events described in one's myths".

Thus, through the medium of song, we are taken back to become contemporary with, among other things, the Crusades and the falls of Jericho and of Babylon.

From Alasdair's interview by Tyler Wilcox in 2009:

the first song in some ways explores the idea of “eternal return” – I was reading Mircea Eliade on the subject, and Nietzsche obviously wrote about it – I became obsessed with the idea and the various ways in which it could be configured. There’s obviously the classic image of the ouroboros serpent… but I was also think about it in terms of the myth of progress – when what we think of as progress is actually destruction. Like Kekulé’s ring, Benzene. And the fact that I personally constantly return to Song as a form of “expression” or creation rather than, say, improvisation or composition.