https://youtubetranscript.com/?v=DiL7kcZYg9g
All right, so paper cut asked, hi Jonathan, reading legends of St. Nicholas, I found the story of the evil butcher. For those who don’t know, it goes that three children were gleaning fields, stayed out too late and getting lost, found a butcher shop. The butcher lets them stay the night, but while they’re sleeping, kills them, chops them up and stores them in a pickling barrel. St. Nicholas arrives several years later, realizes what has happened and resurrects the children. The story has a lot of symbolism with the fringe, remnant, nice catch, gleaning, yes, night, being lost and the butcher. But is there a particular symbolism of the pickling brine? Intuitively, it makes me think of bitter waters. Yeah, dude, you got it. What is the symbol of turning a man into a pickle? It also has to do with wine. It has to do with, yeah, it has to do with turning fermentation on itself. It has to do with using the bitter waters, salt or vinegar or fermentation to preserve rather than to destroy. So it’s like one of the hidden aspects of the lower world, which is something that I’ve mentioned a few times. I think I’ve mentioned a few times, which is that this is why it’s difficult sometimes to think about this symbolism because the earth, let’s say the lower part of the pattern, it’s both dissolution, rotting, breaking down into elements and preserving, which is why you find ancient things hidden underground, which is why you find, that’s why you find treasures underground. You find precious things underground. And so that’s one aspect of the lower part of the world. And so that’s exactly what St. Nicholas does, right? St. Nicholas is already related to the solstice, is already related to, let’s say giving back seed, giving back value to things which have been devalued or have been turned into, that’s why he saves the girls that are going to be sold into slavery. By giving them a golden ball, by giving them an identity, by giving them a seed, a precious thing, he’s able to save them from slavery. He’s able to save them from falling into these lower aspects. And in here, you basically have the idea of, you basically have the idea of something like how Christianity is actually able to preserve and resurrect some aspects of the pagan world. It’s like some aspects of the strange. In the same way that, for example, Christianity is the one who preserved and gave new life to the poet, to the Eddas, that Christianity is the one that preserved and gave new life to the Greek Roman myths, to all of these old stories. That is one of the mysteries of Christianity. And so, yeah. It’s finding, finding, yeah, that’s what it is. And so it’s a great story, it’s a wonderful story. [“The Star-Spangled Banner”]