Many Fornications – (1150)

Introduction

This point was raised by a marvellous missionary giving a talk in the New Zealand retreat. This was not the title of his talk but was a point that he brought up suing his talk.

It initially struck me as interesting, when I began to think about it, I discovered that what he was saying is right. This post then is about what I understood in relation to his point.

Fornication to do with Mind, Word and Sex

If I remember correctly these were the words that he said. So straight away we are told that we don’t only fornicate by losing the sexual energy physically we fornicate mentally and with our words.

I would dare to say that if we fornicate mentally we also fornicate emotionally and with our will. With a bit of reflection this can be found to be true as well.

To me it seems that fornication is related always to energy in its various forms. In the general sense fornication in Gnostic terms in the psychological and esoteric sense is to waste energy, where that wasted energy produces negative results.

The Word Fornication

If we look at the etymology of the word fornication we will find out that it has related to the burn, or furnace and this makes sense because we a person fornicates on any one of these levels they are burning out their energy supplies. Especially to do with sexual energy, because our sexual energy is our igneous humidity and when that humidity that can be transformed by transmutation into fire is all run out of the body through fornication, we are left dry and burnt out, no energy etc.

I have included below an excerpt from the Gnostic Teachings website (https://gnosticteachings.org/faqs/sex/1666-what-is-fornication.html) about the etymology of the word fornication.

Etymology of Fornication

“Originated from: gwher-, meaning "To heat, warm." Derivatives include brand, brandy, forceps, and fornicate.

Zero-grade form *gwhr-. a. burn, from Old English beornan, byrnanbærnan (transitive), to burn; b. brimstone, from late Old English brynstfornicationn, “burning mineral,” sulfur (stfornicationn, stone; see stei-); c. brindled, from Old Norse brenna, to burn. a–c all from Germanic *brennan (intransitive) and brannjan (transitive), formed from *brenw-

a. brand, from Old English brand, piece of burning wood, sword; b. brandy, from Dutch branden, to burn, distill; c. brandish, from Old French brand, sword; d. brandade, from Old Provençal brand, sword. a–d all from Germanic *brandaz, a burning, a flaming torch, hence also a sword.

Suffixed form *gwher-m(n)o-. therm, –therm, thermo-, –thermy; hypothermia, lobster thermidor, from Greek thermos, warm, hot, and thermfornication, heat.

O-grade form *gwhor-. forceps, forcipate, from Latin forceps, pincers, fire tongs (< “that which holds hot things”; -ceps, agential suffix, “-taker”; see kap-).

*gwhor-no-. a. Fornax, furnace, hornito, from Latin furnus, fornus, fornfornicationx, oven; b. probably Latin fornix, arch, vault (< “vaulted brick oven”): fornicate, fornix.

[Etymology quoted from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language (Fourth Edition, 2000).]

It is common to read that fornication is derived from the Latin fornix.

fornic or fornix (Latin): plural: fornices. A vault or archway.

In Roman times, brothels were called "fornices," seemingly because prostitutes could be hired near the "arches" of certain buildings. Thus, it is said that the word fornication appeared (ca. the year 1303) to describe a sexual act with a prostitute. Yet, this word "fornices" is also related to the word "furnace," which is a significant symbol in the Bible.

Nonetheless, the most significant relationship here is between gwher, "to burn," and the word fornication.”

Conclusion

So what is important here is to be very mindful that we waste our energy by misusing the mind, emotion, will and word. We have to be very watchful over our use of them and be very interested in not wasting the energies that make these parts of ourselves to function.

End (1150).