Patterns & Metaphors
Mythical fire-dwelling beings
Template:
Symbolic non-human, anthropomorphic beings are represented as dwelling in the heavens, in the air, and in water, but dwellers in fire in human form are few except for the gods and angels of fire and of the sun. Most pantheistic religions, like those of the American Indians, recognized a spirit in the fire, although the spirit appears to have been usually regarded as amorphous.
Metaphor:
The image of a supernatural being burning, standing in fire, or entering or leaving flames in rarely presented as an animate human-formed creature. Salamanders and phoenixes, on the other hand, are well-known theriomorphic images of living fire. An anthropomorphic being associated with flames is symbolic of human energizing at the highest levesl. Some ancient texts such as the mithraic liturgy speak of dwellers in the fire in connection with their initiation rituals. The symbolism of torch-bearers and other flame handlers may be a substitute for fire-dwellers in the old rites. In Christian religious symbolism, dwellers in a spiritual fire are those surrounded by the burning rings of aureoles, mandalas and halos. In the "Golden Bough" the burning of Hercules-Melkarth at Tyre is noted, and his subsequent apotheosis.<
