April 6, 2016October 2, 2019 Mago Work Admin

(Spanish/English Poem 1) Excerpts from Tinta negra/Black Ink by Xánath Caraza

[Author’s Note: these poems are from my new manuscript, Tinta negra/Black Ink. The poems do not have titles; they are simply numbered. Both poems were originally written in Spanish and translated into English by Sandra Kingery.]

III.

Cazo la luna azul de julio

Lluvia de dolorosa luz

Penetrante mirada encuentro

Ciervo despreocupado

Compañero de la noche

Fluye de sus pupilas ritmo

Escucha, siente el latir del corazón

No todo está perdido

Oleaje embravecido en la distancia

Nueva corriente arrecia

No todo se ha olvidado

Brilla la nocturna esperanza

Bajo la luna azul

III.

I hunt the blue moon of July

Drizzle of mournful light

Penetrating gaze I find

Impervious stag

Companion of the night

Rhythm flows from its pupils

It listens, feeling the beat of its heart

Not everything is lost

Rough waves in the distance

New current intensifies

Not everything is forgotten

Nocturnal hope shines

Beneath the blue moon

(Translated by Sandra Kingery: Sandra Kingery, Professor of Spanish at Lycoming College, has translated the work of Ana María Moix, René Vázquez Díaz, Liliana Colanzi, Federico Guzmán Rubio, and Kepa Murua.)

See (Meet Mago Contributor) Xanath Caraza.

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(Book Excerpt 3) Mago Almanac Planner by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang, Ph.D.

Details for Mago Almanac Planner are available here. What is the Magoist Calendar? It is a 13 month 28 day luni-menstrual-solar calendar of Old Magoist Korea. Insofar as one year marks about 365.25 days, a time taken for the earth to revolve around the sun, it is a solar calendar. The fact that both the moon and the female menstruation cycle mark 28 days, which makes 13 months or 364 days for one year. This makes approximately 1.25 a surplus. Thus, we have days outside the calendar grid. Each year has one extra day on the day before the New Year’s day. The New Year of Year 1 or 5915 Magoma Era was set on the new moon date before Winter Solstice in 2018 by the Gregorian Calendar. With one extra day, the year makes 365 days. Given that the actual period of the Earth’s revolution is approximately 365.25 days, we have the second extra day every fourth year. Setting aside the extra days, we have 364 days for one year. 364 days divided by 28 days is 13. That is how we have 13 months in a year. The Magoist Calendar championing the matricentric worldview is the very indication that our Mother Earth is stabilized in her own voyages. (To be continued) https://www.magoism.net/2013/07/meet-mago-contributor-helen-hwang/
(Book Excerpt 1) Mago Almanac Planner for Personal Journey by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang, Ph.D.

[Author’s Note: Year 4’s Mago Almanac celebrates the birth of Mago Almanac Planner for Personal Journey. The Magoist 13 month 28 day calendric movement has grown steadily and we welcome the public as well!] PREFACE: What Mago Almanac Planner Offers The Mago Almanac Planner for Personal Journey enchants people and our societies to live with a sense of the natural timespace patterned by the luni-menstrual rhythm in company with the earth’s song and dance. This is not a statement of poetic fancy unsupported by science or mathematics. We are invited to walk through the matrix of Sonic Numerology, the organizing force of Life. The 13 month 28 day Magoist Calendar returns calendric regularity to us. Calendric regularity is the very vision that unfolds the metamorphic reality of WE/HERE/NOW. Unlike the 12 month irregular day calendar that modifies the natural rhythm to serve the purpose of controlling people, the Magoist Calendar guides human activities within the natural rhythm to harmonize the human world with the natural world. The Mago Almanac Planner is built to provide flesh to the bones of the Mago Almanac. Taking the latter as foundation, Mago Almanac Planner partitions a year into the units of weeks and days. The regularity of 28 days makes it possible to lay out 52 weeks and 364 days with one or two extra days seamlessly. The rhythm of nine numbers becomes transparent. Each day of a year is named accumulatively in order i.e. the first to 364th. Likewise, each week of a year is named accumulatively in order i.e. Week 1 to Week 52. Each day is given the daily number, the moon phase, and/or 24 Seasonal Marks. Special days include such double dates as New Year (1st Moon 1st Day), double second (2nd Moon 2nd Day), double third (3rd Moon 3rd Day), and so forth. By writing the Mago Almanac Planner, I have observed that Double Ninth (9th Moon 9th day) overlaps with the 16th mark of 24 Seasonal Marks, Ipchu (立秋 Entering Fall) or Lammas in the Northern Hemisphere. The day of Double Ninth is indeed the center point of a year! Also the interval of 24 Seasonal Marks is about every 15 days, whereas that of 8 Seasonal Marks is about every 45 days. In three Appendixes, I have provided a traditional style of one year calendar, Year 4’s 364 Days (52 Weeks) with 2 Extra Days and their Gregorian Dates or the conversion chart, Large Calendar 1 (Years 1-4) marked in Gregorian C. Dates, and Year 4 Lunar-Menstrual Chart in which one can add their menstrual dates in relation to the moon phases and seasonal marks. As a whole, the Mago Almanac Planner is designed to personalize one’s own celebratory or commemorative days in tune with nature’s rhythm. This Planner marks the 4th year (Volume 4) of the revived Magoist Calendar, Mago Almanac: 13 Month 28 Day Calendar. We are about to complete the first Large Calendar, which refers to the first four years (Years 1-4). We set the new moon date (December 18) before Winter Solstice in 2018 in the Northern Hemisphere as the first lunation of the revived Magoist Calendar. If we count the year from the onset of the nine-state Danguk confederacy (3898 BCE-2333 BCE) founded by Goma, Magoist Shaman Queen Mother, our Year 1 would be 5916 ME (Magoma Era). Technically speaking, the Magoist Calendar formed at the time of our beginning came to be reincarnated on December 18, 2018 in the Northern Hemisphere (hereafter it implies the Northern Hemisphere otherwise indicated.) The year 2018 for the rebirth of the revived Magoist Calendar was arbitrary in that it could have been in 2017 or 2019. In retrospect, I must say that we are lucky to set the time of our first lunation on December 18 2018 because it makes the calendric migration process the smoothest. This means that our Magoist Calendar runs as less as 13 days behind the Gregorian Calendar. If we had begun in 2017, our New Year would have been December 17. Only one day difference. However, if we had begun in 2016, our New Year would have been on November 29. Likewise, if we had begun in 2019, our New Year would have been on November 26. These dates are the new moon date before Winter Solstice, the New Year day. The Magoist Calendar charts the human world into the Reality of WE/HERE/NOW. The Magoist Calendar needs to be in use today, which means that it has to be translated into the language of the Gregorian Calendar. For we have lost the actual counting of the Magoist Calendar into our days in the course of patriarchal history. Mago Almanac serves the purpose of making our calendric migration possible from the 12 month Gregorian Calendar to the 13 month Magoist Calendar. It guides our collective journey in the Mother TimeSpace interwoven by the cosmogonic force of Sonic Numerology, the musical interplay of nine numbers, which gives birth, nurtures, and transforms all beings in the cosmos. Intriguingly, I have realized only last year that the Magoist Calendar is identical with “the 13 Moon Turtle Calendar,” the calendar of North American indigenous peoples, which adopts the turtle shell that has 13 inner sections and 28 outer sections for the calendar of 13 moons and 28 days (see figure). This speaks volumes that the 13 month 28 day calendar was once widely known among peoples of the ancient world. The Magoist Calendar restores the link between lunation and menstruation as a 28 day monthly cycle, a topic that I have discussed in my essay, “Introducing the Magoist Calendar: Original Blessing of the Womb Time,” included in this planner. Why do we need to reinstate the calendar that is based on the luni-menstruation rhythm? That is because the Magoist Calendar is in accordance with Sonic Numerology. Put differently, the moon-women duet inscribed in the 13 month 28 day calendar is given by the Natural World. In fact, the Magoist Calendar is the first and …
Winter-Spring EarthGaian Wisdom: Invoking the Power of Brigid, the Mother Creator by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

In the Southern Hemisphere we have just passed the Earth holy-day of Winter Solstice, which was in late June; and are moving into Early Spring which may be marked and celebrated in early August, as the cross-quarter Moment traditionally named Imbolc. Winter Solstice is the Seasonal Moment of the year when Earth’s tilt leans that hemisphere furthest away from the Sun – when the dark part of the day is at its longest in that place. The stories of Old tell of the Great Mother giving birth to the Divine Child on this night, as henceforth Sun’s light and warmth begin to return to that place, and the ongoing creativity of Earth seems assured. This Earth holy-day was adapted by Christianity as the time to celebrate the birth of its Divine Child: but “the Divine Child” of more ancient Earth-based religious practice seems to have been understood as renewed Being in Earth herself, and thus as the promise of never-ending renewal – apparent eternal Creativity itself. And just so, may it be re-storied in our times, with our renewed understandings of the unfolding creative Cosmos, largely gained by scientific endeavour set free from church controlled dogmas. At the sacred site of Newgrange in Ireland – known by its indigenous name as “Bru na Boinne” – where the megalithic mound is dated at 3200 B.C.E., the Winter Solstice dawn lights up a Triple Spiral motif that is engraved on the inner chamber wall. One of the layers of meaning of this Triple Spiral is the representation of the Triple Goddess as She was known by the ancients in that place[i], and also it is thought that it represents the heart of the sacred heritage of that region: a heritage of ritual celebration of eternal creation that the seasonal wheel of the year expresses, and that this site records the timing of[ii]. Winter Solstice is the time for the lighting of candles, for embracing the miracle of being, for choosing a joyful response to the awesome fact of existence, for celebrating the gift of birth. Birthing is not often an easy process – neither for the birthgiver nor for the birthed one: it is a shamanic act requiring strength of bodymind, attention and focus of the mother, and courage to be of the new young one. Birthgiving is the original place of “heroics” – therefore better termed as “heraics”[iii] … many cultures of the world have never forgotten that the birthing mother is immersed in a cosmic act of creativity. But patriarchal adaptations of the story of this Seasonal Moment usually miss the Creative Act of birthgiving completely – pre-occupied as they often are with the “virgin” nature of the Mother being interpreted as an “intact hymen”, and the focus being the Child as “saviour”: even the Mother frequently gazes at the Child in Christian icons, while in more ancient images Her eyes are direct and expressive of Her integrity as Creator. Winter Solstice and Early Spring rituals may be a contemplation of the Creativity of the Cosmos – Cosmogenesis … how it All unfolds. When told from within a Mother-mind– a mind that connects the biological creativity of the female body to Cosmic Creativity, to our Navel lineage, to the Nativity of every being, then we are all the Holy Ones. And we all – female and male – may know the skill and care required for birthing the New, whether that is physical, psychological, or however it may be categorized. In Earth-based religious practice, the ubiquitous icon of Mother and Child – Creator and Created – expresses something essential about the Universe itself … the motherhood we are all born within: it is not actually a “brotherhood”, as essential connection is commonly expressed. The icon of Mother and Child may express the essential Communion experience that this Cosmos is, the innate and holy Care that it takes, and the reciprocal nature of it: that is, how one is always Creator and Created at the same time … we cannot touch without being touched. We may realize that Cosmogenesis – the entire Unfolding of the Cosmos – is essentially relational: our experience tells us this is so. The Early Spring/Imbolc celebration is traditionally a time of dedication to the nurturance of the New Young Being. Once again, this is no wimpy task: it is for the brave and courageous, whether one is committing to the new being in another or in one’s self. The Great Goddess Brigid of the Celtic peoples is traditionally invoked for such a task. She has been understood for millennia as the One Who tends the Flame of Being: a Brigid-ine commitment is one that is unwavering in its devotion to the central well being and truth of each unique particular self. The stories of Old speak of Brigid in three primary capacities – that may need spelling out in our times: She is imagined as Blacksmith, Physician and Poet. Blacksmith is one who takes an unshapely lump of raw metal, melts it, then takes the fiery hot form and shapes it. This is no stereotypical “feminine” act as that has been understood in popular culture of recent centuries, but it was apparently understood as a female and womanly action in times when Brigid was Deity: the Goddess of Old was/is not bound by patriarchal dualisms. She is spiritual warrior, shaman – this is Her eternal Virgin quality, and which is never separate from the Mother quality or the Old One quality, and there was no need to characterize such power as “masculine” or dissociate it from “nursery” activity. It was apparently recognized that blacksmithing may be metaphor for what is actually taking place in the nursery, and also for any initiative, including the forging of a new era. As Physician, Brigid could be conceived of as one who understands the “physic” of healing, the natural science of matter … how a body relates within itself and within its context, functions harmoniously and thus …
(Meet Mago Contributor) Karen Tintori

Karen Tintori is an internationally bestselling fiction and non-fiction author whose novels have been translated into more than 25 languages and made into films. Her critically acclaimed Trapped: The 1909 Cherry Mine Disaster (Atria Books, 2002) was among the Chicago Tribune’s 2002 Favorite Books. Unto the Daughters: The Legacy of an Honor Killing in a Sicilian-American Family (St. Martin’s Press, 2007) was nominated for a 2008 Michigan Notable Book Award. She contributed to Italian Women in Chicago: Madonna Mia! Qui Debbo Vivere? (Casa Italia, 2014) and has written for Primo Magazine. More at: www.karentintori.com and http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karen_Tintori
(Meet Mago Contributor) Maria Arias

My name is Maria Arias, also known as Maria, which is my artist name. I was born in El Paso, Texas. I live with my husband, daughter and mother in Champaign, IL. I write poems and stories for children and draw illustrations, painting and other visual arts. The media I use includes ink, color pencil, acrylic paint, water color, color pencils and digital media (paint and gimp). I love to express myself in art and share with everyone.
(Book Excerpt) Lessons from the Legends of the Salzkammergut: The Divine Feminine in Place and Time by Krista Rodin, Ph.D.

[This book was publish by Mago Books (April 1, 2022). Details and purchase info is available here (Mago Bookstore).]INTRODUCTION The Salzkammergut is one of the most beautiful places on earth. Mountains stretch to the sky, some even remain snow-covered throughout the year, while others are colored with deep woods, bright meadows, and green pastures. Water is abundant in rivers, streams, and lakes. This lush fertile area has been inhabited for millennia, yet it remains filled with mystery and wonder. The uniqueness of the region has been recognized for centuries by the people living here as well as the workers who came from Germany to work the salt mines, the pilgrims who made their way to St. Wolfgang’s church, those seeking good health in the spas in Goisern and Ischl, and the Viennese court when they summered with Emperor Franz Josef and his wife Elisabeth, Sissi, in Ischl. The most recent international recognition came with the announcement that Bad Ischl and the Salzkammergut have been selected as one of the three European Capitals of Culture for 2024 along with Bodø in Norway and Tartu in Estonia. Different from the other capitals, the Salzkammergut is a region, not a city. Bad Ischl is the historical home of the Medieval Salzkammergut, but it is only one of the ten mini-regions that comprise today’s Salzkammergut, which crosses the borders of three Austrian provinces: Salzburg, Upper Austria and Styria. There are a number of books on the legends and customs of the Salzkammergut available to those who read German. There is, however, nothing that is in English for those who do not speak the local language, but still would like to know more about the magic and history of the area. Additionally, there is nothing in either English or German that places the legends in a culturally relevant context focusing on the impact of Divine Feminine figures on the region. This book hopes to fill that void as it offers insights into how the local legends and customs contain universal lessons while being embedded in the region’s distinct history and geography. The text starts with a brief historical overview of the peoples and events that shaped the legends; this is followed by an introduction to the various Alpine spirits that are touched on in the legends and annual celebrations. The divine feminine figures mentioned include the Neolithic Kienbach Gorge goddess, the Celtic Bethen, their Christian counterparts: Katherine, Margarethe and Barbara, and the Alpine Frau Holle, Frau Percht and Witch Kranabetha. The Virgin Mother Mary appears in various contexts throughout the book. The legends are organized into five general moral codes that shape the region’s communities and are based in specific places and landscapes around Land Salzburg and the Salzkammergut. The next section deals with the relation of the Alpine spirits to the organization of time through the changing of the seasons as seen through local customs and celebrations. The last section ties the themes from the legends and annual celebrations back to the role of the divine feminine in the daily life of the people of the Salzkammergut. A word on the translations and terms: all translations are that of the author as are all the photographs. Translations of the legends are often not literal, but have been adapted for readability and comprehension in English and for a non-local audience. Three legends from neighboring areas in the provinces of Salzburg and Styria have been included as they could easily have been from places within the Salzkammergut, but those from around the city of Salzburg and the Untersberg Mountain are available in other media. Terms like “Raunächte” and “Hollerbush” have been left in German as English translations do not connote the mystery and magic of the German words. The province of Salzburg is called by its German name, Land Salzburg, to differentiate it from its capital city. Regional lakes are also called simply by their German names, e.g., the Wolfgangsee rather than Lake Wolfgang. Frau Percht and Frau Holle are known by a number of different spellings in German legends, e.g., Frau Perchta, or Frau Hold; for simplicity, only the former spelling is used here. The same is true for Witch Kranabetha, who is often spelled Kranawitha or Kranawett; they are the same legendary figure. Additionally, explanatory English or German names and terms are occasionally placed in parenthesis for greater comprehension. The section on traditional annual events relies heavily on Sandra Galatz’ Bräuche im Salzkammergut: Gelebte Tradition im Jahreskreis and some of her entries have simply been translated. The footnotes reference the works the translations stem from, as well as those that provide support for the various topics and ideas presented in the text. Winter mist near Schwarzensee https://www.magoism.net/2018/09/meet-mago-contributor-krista-rodin-ph-d/
(Essay 1) Finding Our Agency and Awareness in the Seeds of Self by Deepak Shimkhada and Lachele Schilling

[Editor’s Note: This and the next sequel is first published in She Rises: What… Goddess Feminism, Activism and Spirituality? Volume 3 as an article entitled, “Finding Our Agency and Awareness in the Seeds of Self” co-authord by Deepak Shimkhada, Ph.D. and Lachele Schilling, Ph.D.] The Source Dr. Deepak Shimkhada It is possible humans might wonder how we got here: a work economy where most people spend eight-hour shifts making minimum wage, too tired and poor to tend to much beyond dinner, shower, and sleep; a concrete urban life where, yes, it is convenient to buy a carton of milk instead of walk out into nature and milk a cow, but, we feel a sense of loss for the spicy smell of grass and warm, tingling sun; a broken global structure of inequality where crumbling buildings in Bangladesh actually do crumble and catch on fire. Meanwhile, those in the Global North can buy a striped crop top for $3 at H&M. We continue on with our ramshackle awareness, blinking towards increased knowledge about how one community’s consumption and waste can create poverty and pollution in another, while waiting for someone to do something, accepting that this way of life is perhaps too embedded to un-root itself in time, and that even if the Industrial Revolution was a moderately recent chapter, human greed for wealth, power, and control is, if we are to take any indication from ancient literature about the tendencies and practices of human beings then, irreversibly encoded within our DNA. But we certainly do know how we got here. It’s how we always get anywhere. It is how a woman can look at her life and assess, at 40, it does not look like what she wanted it to be: she reviews the seeds that have been planted, which have been watered and which neglected. The seed is the embryonic state of all plants and vegetables, for animal, including human, reproduction. Gaia teems with life of all kinds because of the multitude of seeds intentionally and unintentionally finding placement. Seeds of Life Seeds are the reason we can be healthy, in taking in the eventual, after their long and hard journey to fruition, grains, fruits and vegetables in the form of food. It is also because of seeds that we might encounter beautiful landscapes in both the cities and the countryside. Gaia can breathe and dance because of the seeds of the past. If seeds were not so valuable, Monsanto would not be a billion dollar giant industry that aims to monopolize and patent seed banks. We owe all we have to seeds that we or someone else have planted. Every journey has a beginning that includes choices, even if it is the choice to be silent and not act. In addition to its biological function of reproduction and development, some mystical orders consider seeds to hold or be consciousness or energy itself. The dialogue between a student and a teacher concerning Brahman (Ultimate Reality) in the Chhandogya Upanishad is a case in point. The dialogue begins with the words of the sage Uddalaka: “My child, you are so full of your learning and so censorious, have you asked for that knowledge by which we hear the unhearable, by which we perceive what cannot be perceived and know what cannot be known?” “What is that knowledge, sir?” asked Svetaketu. His father replied, “As by knowing one lump of clay all things made of clay are known – so, my child, is that knowledge, knowing which we know all.” “But surely these venerable teachers of mine are ignorant of this knowledge; for if they possessed it they would have imparted it to me. Do you, sir, therefore, give me that knowledge?” “So be it,” said the father. And he said, “Bring me a fruit of the Nyagrodha tree [fig tree].” “Here it is, sir.” “Break it.” “It is broken, sir.” “What do you see there?” “Some seeds, sir, exceedingly small.” “Break one of them.” “It is broken, sir.” “What do you see there?” “Nothing at all.” It is only because humans collectively or individually can wait to pause until what was destined from the seed to manifest itself in the beautiful monstrosities of creation, where the thorny brambles intertwine and serpentine around our limbs and one feels rather trapped, stuck, a lotus rooted in the mud so intimately that to break away would cost our lives. Sensory beings, humans seem to be distracted by what we can touch, hear, and see. Thus the tools of publicity and advertisement ensure we cope with the human predicament in ways that produce profit for our companies and institutions instead of our well-being. But we need to gather our focus and attend to the emptiness, the void, where possibility exists. We need to re-orient ourselves to perceive what is essential in contrast to the spectacle that lusts for our eyes. Vedantic, Hindu and Buddhist traditions perhaps more explicitly or obviously than other traditions assert the non-duality of existence and access to the True Self (as opposed to the more monolithic, absolute, ideal false self) as being within generative energy itself. The father said, “My son, that subtle essence which you do not perceive there – in that very essence stands the being of the huge Nyagrodha tree. In that which is the subtle essence of all that exists has its Self. That is the True, that is the Self, and thou Svetaketu art That.” Not all significant change in the world takes highly advanced problem-solving skills. Some just take the simple wisdom that everything is connected and everything is eternal. If we can constantly remind ourselves of this, we might make the kinds of choices, plant and water the kinds of seeds that would produce a more compassionate, less-polluted and damaged world and life that we have collectively crafted of our own volition, whether we are aware or not. The dialogue goes on to say the following: “Pray, sir,” said the son, “tell …
(Book Review) Genevieve Vaughan’s The Gift in the Heart of Language: the Maternal Source of Meaning by Kaarina Kailo

(Book Review) The Gift in the Heart of Language: the Maternal Source of Meaning by Genevieve Vaughan (Mimesis International 2015) Genevieve Vaughan has published her third book regarding the reality and transformative potential of the gift economy, a logic and matrix of practices that imply the liberation of all genders. The new theory provides solutions to the most urgent need in neoliberal capitalist societies: to overturn the civilizational crises that capitalism and patriarchy have caused with the distortion and appropriation of the Gift. The Gift in the Heart of Language provides sobering and mind-altering perspectives on the gift economy in all of its manifestations.
(Poem) wolf pack by Susan Hawthorne

Photo by Susan Hawthorne © 2013, Capitoline Museum, Rome wolves have come in a packleading them is Guadalupeher shimmering rays a full body haloas if Hildegard had drawn flaming petals around herstrains of mediaeval music mingle with Nahuatlit’s uncanny but like the halo it works with full pageantry comes Virginia Woolfdressed in an Ethiopian jalabainstead of standing to attentionshe reclines in a wicker chair smokingdeclaiming the end of war Christa Wolf bursts in bringing with her a trainload of workerswho carry banners with the wordproletariat written in redAnna Wulf too has a bannerWorkers of the World Unitebut it’s torn and dragging along the groundincreasingly shredded with each step Anna Wulf is carrying a bookshining as brightly as Guadalupe’s halo Guadalupe has her arm around quotidian Marythey have begun to howl not worryingthat the moon is not in the right phaseit’ll come says the second Marywhen we reach BEelemental quintessentialthat is what matters in the distance a songeveryone turns the hags the fairiesthe eldest ones all talk stopsthey stand listen to this song at the edge of hearing a very old woman joins the partyher bearing perfectly straightfeet as light as a birddust gusts rise turn spiral whisper awaybuild become willy-willies flirting with the landair carries the songthe winds become women dancing and then anotherLa Donna Lupa Paleoliticawolf womanat 300 000 years she deserves respectshe says I’m tired of museum lifeI want to return to the slow streamrock time planet time Vassar’s young women crowd the wolvesa Marxist lesbian party gathersaround Christa and Annabut Anna is leaving with her shining bookshe’s asking Virginia about formthe form itselfhow to break through these limitationsChrista is leaving her party toowanders over to where Medea is fixinga wing on her serpented flying chariotshe always was competent Anna slopes back to Guadalupe they are shoutingnot in anger so much as excitementyou have to descend first says GuadalupeI’ll wait for youa visionary can’t avoid her visions no matter the horror Virginia is nodding wishes she’d hadGuadalupe to hold her handat the time of her descents Lupa and Medea are talking in the cornerthe word ‘sons’ is overheard by Curatrixwhy I don’t I teach them to speak Angelic? there’s a noise at the gate voices of a different timbrea group of men is shouting their weapons visibleDiana Hippolyta Minerva and a crush of Amazonsbar their way they bear no armsbut there’s that no-nonsense stance then the martyrs step forwardyou don’t scare us any moreput down your weapons the burly ones are like puppies and do as they are tolda group of suits are betting on the outcomemoney is changing hands too quicklyto see what currency they are using Agnese is speechifyingyou have work to doand it won’t be doneby standing there calling us namestelling us you’ve been hurtsee my scars she raises her shirtshows the burn markspoints to the scar across her throatif you want to know hurtlook at every woman herethe bravest and the oldestboth rich and poor bear scars go on one of Anna Wulf’s descentsif you mustbut right now you have to leaveand work on those money changers the temples have become banksthe banks templesit’s your turn to fix it she turns and walks away the men stand dumbfoundedsome are angry say they should rape usteach us a thing or two all over againbut a few de-escalate Barbara reminds the weaponed onesshe’s their saint the one in charge of explosivesshe suggests to the mathematicians at the backthat they owe her too and perhaps they could get startedon convincing the chargers of interestthe forgers of currenciesthat money is as abstract as calculusas indefinable as an imaginary numberand more irrationalyou can’t take it with you they break off into groupsbegin to talkthey’ve a bit of ground to coverso let’s leave them at their own partythey can send us an emissary when they are ready Photos by Susan Hawthorne © 2013, Rome Notes wolf pack This poem was written while on a Literature Residency in Rome in 2013-14. The poem came towards the end of the residency and draws together many things I learned during my six months there. The resulting book Lupa and Lamb refers to the founding wolf stories of Rome (lupa, wolf, prostitute) and the Christian elements represented by the lamb represented by Agnese (from Latin agnus, lamb). Santa Agnese was a Christian martyr and the patron saint of rape victims and virgins. Anna Wulf: is a character in Doris Lessing’s The Golden Notebook, and the descent refers to Briefing for a Descent into Hell (1971). La Donna Lupa Paleolitica: is currently housed in the Museo archeologico nazionale delle Marche in Ancona. https://www.magoism.net/2013/12/meet-mago-contributor-susan-hawthone/

(Special post) The Goddess Inanna: Her Allies and Opponents by Hearth Moon Rising

Inanna’s Descent to the Underworld is one of the most fascinating myths ever told. Not just because it is profound and enlightening, although it is certainly that. It’s an exciting journey that ignites the imagination, and female characters are at the hub of the action. This is a tale of power: power that is demanded, power that is won, power that is appropriated, and power that cannot be escaped. The story follows the fertility goddess Inanna, who brought civilization to Mesopotamia, as she seeks to expand her realm by venturing into the world below. Inanna’s experiences in the great below, her escape, and the wild events that unfold as a result of her caper are the focus of the tale.
(Special Post 2) Why Goddess Feminism, Activism, or Spirituality? A Collective Writing

[Editor’s Note: This was first proposed in The Mago Circle, Facebook Group, on March 6, 2014. We have our voices together below and publish them in sequels. It is an ongoing project and we encourage our reader to join us! Submit yours today to Helen Hwang (magoism@gmail.com). Or visit and contact someone in Return to Mago’s Partner Organizations.] Harriet Ann Ellenberger I got involved with women’s liberation in the early 1970s, so involved that it became my life for many years. During those beginnings of what is now called “the second wave of feminism,” everything was new to us and everything was mushed together — the political, the economic, the intellectual, the emotional, the spiritual. I liked that a lot; it felt as if all the parts of myself were coming together. During that time, I learned something crucial the imagery and concepts of patriarchal religion justify and are embedded in the material structures of oppression. I don’t know which came first, institutionalized oppression (of everyone; I’m not speaking here only of women) or the religious expression of that oppression. All I’m certain of is that patriarchal religion permeates, for example, the Oxford English Dictionary, which I use all the time, in conjunction with Websters’ First New Intergalactic Wickedary of the English Language, conjured by Mary Daly in cahoots with Jane Caputi.
(Special Post Mother Teresa 2) A Role Model for Women? by Mago Circle Members

[Editorial Note: The following is an edited version of the discussion that took place spontaneously on Mago Circle from March 1, 2013 for about two weeks. It was an extensive, heated, yet reflective discussion, now broken into four parts to fit the format of the blog. We thank each and all of the participants for your openness, generosity, and courage to stand up for what you believe and think! Some are marked as anonymous. As someone stated, something may have been “written in the heat of the moment” and some might like to change it at a later time. So we inform our readers that nothing is written in stone. As a matter of fact, the discussion is ongoing, now with Magoism Blog readers. Please comment and respond as you wish.] Part II: We Disagree! Stand up for what you believe but be open-minded! Naa Ayele Kumari: I am going to step away from the common responses and say this… Binary is only no in betweens if you choose sides and can’t see the whole. I have been a part of black consciousness movements and women’s movements and both have the capacity for progress as well as extreme viewpoints. Both have the capacity to become so hypercritical that the movement itself transcends common human compassion and understanding. Mother Teresa was a human being with flaws and goodness. She had a public image and private fears and insecurities.. l like all of us. She lived her life the best way she knew how.. Like all of us. She made mistakes.. misjudgments.. Like all of us. But she also DID help and inspire others to help too. It is this dualistic thinking that forces people to feel like they have to assign the label of good or bad and no in between. None of us are all good or all bad.. so it seems to me that to label her has an evil traitor who let people die is no better than labeling her an Angel of god who did no wrong. She was a woman who lived her life and managed to come to worldwide fame and inspire others to love at a time and in an institution that was highly patriarchal and women were not raised up at all. Mother Goddesses in Africa were known for great nurturing and care symbolized by carrying a baby and also carried a machete on the other side for justice. This was the fine balance of wholeness…she was the gentle rain and the storm.. This was binary, but not one or the other but both.. Opposite ends of the same pole. [H]: I’m having a powerful visceral effect from this conversation. I feel as if I’m going to vomit violently. Mother Teresa comes to me in dreams and meditations. Makes me wonder what kind of person I’m seen as if I attract her energy. I have always felt so much love for her. Naa Ayele Kumari: If she comes in your dreams and it has been healing for you… Allow it/ her to continue to be healing for you. Its all about love and anything that is not love… Leave it be.. Vomiting is rejecting something that doesn’t belong with you. Embrace love my sister. Antonia McGuire: I think we may all agree that all belief systems initially began to promote a sense of goodness or fairness to some degree, but over time they are corrupted and produce both advantages and disadvantages. Donna Snyder: Yes, Gandhi, too. Back in the 90’s when I was in a band/performance art troupe called Central Nervous System, I shocked all the guys in the band coming out with an improv in response to a melody played on a banjo tuned like a sitar, called exactly that-Yes, Gandhi. Now make no mistake, he is one of my heroes, devoid of the falsified sentimentality that clings to MT. Gandhi’s work was for the world, for the masses, not for the appropriately humbled. Yet I spoke out about his sexual practices, his use of female bodies. Telling the truth about a hero requires courage. Retreating into a blind defense of a myth is a form of ethical cowardice. Anne Wilkerson Allen: Strangely I had a discussion with someone about the “hero’s journey” moving from metaphorical to physical being part of the problem…..when the “demons” are human instead of our own flaws, there seems to be a tendency to point the finger (and gun barrel) elsewhere. [B]: Fascinating & thought-provoking conversation, all. I think the biggest stumbling block I have with MT is how her acceptance of the dogma of the Catholic church blinded her to seeing and then being moved by the suffering of others enough to do something to alleviate & not vicariously celebrate it. No wonder she “suffered a lack of connection with the Divine”. This crisis with her spirituality seems to have been divorced from her and others’ body wisdom. Self-abnegation (perhaps not the same as “sacrifice”) ultimately backfires because some small part of us insists, “I am worthy!” To which I say, “We are all worthy!” [H]: I do not see or feel that she vicariously celebrated the suffering of others. I feel that she devoted her life to deeply loving and serving the poorest of the poor. I have not been to Calcutta and I have also seen some unimaginable poverty in India that is not like anything that I’ve been exposed to before. I truly believe that she had a very deep way of working with suffering that is not necessarily visible to those more accustomed to modern medical intervention and the resources available for such. I have participated in a very small amount of poverty medicine and the resources that we take for granted are just not readily available to MANY. I learned very powerfully from my experience how blessed and fortunate and often very careless we really are with our precious resources. This discussion has been a learning experience for me. I am trying to not take the critical comments […]

Imbolc/Early Spring – a Season of Uncertainty by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

Traditionally the Seasonal transition of Imbolc/Early Spring, celebrated in early February in the Northern Hemisphere, and in early August in the Southern Hemisphere, has been a time of nurturing the new life that is beginning to show itself, around us and within. It is a time of committing one’s self to the new life and inspiration – in the garden, in the soul, and in the Cosmos. We may include in our celebrations and contemplations of this Season the beginnings of the new young Cosmos as She was, that time in our cosmic story when She was only a billion years old and galaxies were forming; and also the new which has continually emerged throughout the eons, and is ever coming forth. The flame of being, as it has been imagined by many cultures, within and around, is to be protected and nurtured: the new being requires dedication and attention. In the early stages of its advent, there is nothing certain about its staying power and growth: it may flicker and be vulnerable. There may be uncertainties of various kinds. There is risk and resistance to coming into being. The Universe itself knew resistance to its expansion when it encountered gravitation in our very beginnings, in the primordial Flaring Forth[i]. The unfolding of the Universe was never without creative tension. The Universe knows it daily, in every moment: and we participate in this creative tension of our place of being. Urge to Be budding forth Imbolc/Early Spring can be a time of remembering personal vulnerabilities, feeling them and accepting them, but remaining resolute in birthing and tending of the new, listening for and responding to the Urge to Be[ii]of the Creative Universe within. Brian Swimme has said (quoting cultural anthropologist A.L. Kroeber) that the destiny of the human is not “bovine placidity” but the highest degree of tension that can be creatively born[iii]. many flames of being, strengthening each other These times are filled with creative tension, collectively and for most, personally as well; there is much resistance, yet there is promise of so much good energy arising. We may be witness to both. This Season of Imbolc/Early Spring may encourage attention, intention and dedication to strengthening well-being: in self, and in the relational communal context, and opening to our direct immersion in the Well of Creativity. We may be strengthened with the joining of hands, as well as the listening within to the sacred depths, in ceremonial circle at this time. NOTES: [i]As our origins (popularly named as “the Big Bang”) are named by Thomas Berry and Brian Swimme in The Universe Story. [ii]As I name this determined Virgin quality in PaGaian Cosmology. [iii]The Canticle to the Cosmos, DVD #8, “The Nature of the Human”. References: Livingstone, Glenys. PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion. NE: iUniverse, 2005. Swimme, Brian and Berry, Thomas. The Universe Story: From the Primordial Flaring Forth to the Ecozoic Era. New York: HarperCollins, 1992. Swimme, Brian. Canticle to the Cosmos. DVD series, 1990.
(Photography & Poetry) Thoughts of Spring by Deanne Quarrie

Spring At the highest point on the tree, you stretch, reaching for the sun. Your pink petals elegant in their grace, you stand alone. Bravest of all, for leaves have yet to come to offer shade Branches bare except for furry buds that will soon follow in imitation of your daring first move. Intrepid flower of Spring, I feel like you in my yearning for the Sun!
Lammas – the Sacred Consuming by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

Lammas, the first seasonal transition after Summer Solstice, may be summarised as the Season that marks and celebrates the Sacred Consuming, the Harvest of Life. Many indigenous cultures recognised the grain itself as Mother … Corn Mother being one of those images – She who feeds the community, the world, with Her own body: the Corn, the grain, the food, the bread, is Her body. She the Corn Mother, or any other grain Mother, was/is the original sacrifice … no need for extraordinary heroics: it is the nature of Her being. She is sacrificed, consumed, to make the people whole with Her body (as the word “sacrifice” means “to make whole”). She gives Herself in Her fullness to feed the people …. the original Communion. In cultures that preceded agriculture or were perhaps pastoral – hunted or bred animals for food – this cross-quarter day may not have been celebrated, or perhaps it may have been marked in some other way. Yet even in our times when many are not in relationship with the harvest of food directly, we may still be in relationship with our place: Sun and Earth and Moon still do their dance wherever you are, and are indeed the Ground of one’s being here … a good reason to pay attention and homage, and maybe as a result, and in the process, get the essence of one’s life in order. One does not need to go anywhere to make this pilgrimage … simply Place one’s self. The seasonal transition of Lammas may offer that in particular, being a “moment of grace” – as Thomas Berry has named the seasonal transitions, when the dark part of the day begins to grow longer, as the cloak of darkness slowly envelopes the days again: it is timely to reflect on the Dark Cosmos in Whom we are, from Whom we arise and to Whom we return – and upon that moment when like Corn Mother we give ourselves over. This reflection is good, will serve a person and all – to live fully, as well as simply to be who we are: this dark realm of manifesting is the core of who we are. And what difference might such reflection make to our world – personal and collective – to live in this relationship with where we are, and thus who we are. We all are the grain that is harvested and all are Her harvest … perhaps one may use a different metaphor: the truth that may be reflected upon at this seasonal moment after the peaking of Sun’s light at Summer Solstice and the wind down into Autumn, is that everything passes, all fades away … even our Sun shall pass. All is consumed. So What are we part of? (I write it with a capital because surely it is a sacred entity) And how might we participate creatively? We are Food – whether we like it or not … Lammas is a good time to get with the Creative plot, though many find it the most difficult, or focus on more exoteric celebration. May we be interesting food[i]. We are holy Communion, like Corn Mother. Meet Mago Contributor Glenys Livingstone NOTES: [i] This is an expression of cosmologist Brian Swimme in Canticle to the Cosmos DVD series.
(Video) Winter Solstice Breath Meditation by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

Winter Solstice/Yule Southern Hemisphere – June 20 – 23. Northern Hemisphere – December 20 – 23 Winter Solstice is a celebration of the Mother/Creator aspect of the Triple Goddess in particular – as both Solstices may be, as dark or light come to fullness. Winter Solstice Moment celebrates the ripe fullness of the Dark Womb, and the gateway from that fullness back into new growing light. It is a Birthing Place – into differentiated being, and Her birthing happens in every moment in the breath, and is seamlessly connected with all layers of being – of self, Earth and Cosmos. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nDsVZzXtoyM The Text in the Meditation[i] Take a deep breath and let it go. Notice the Void at the bottom of emptying your breath … feeling it, and feeling the Urge to breathe as it arises. And again … feeling it over and over – this breath that arises out of the full emptiness in every moment, birthing you in every moment. – Recall some of the birthings in your life, your actual birth – see it there in your mind’s eye … you coming into being – your Nativity, your Nativity. Recall projects you have brought into being, new beings within yourself, perhaps children, new beings in others, how you have been Creator and Created – even at the same time … who was birthing who? Staying for a while with the many, many birthings in your life. – recalling now Earth-Gaia’s many birthings out of the Dark everyday … the dawn is constant as She turns. See Her in your mind’s eye – the constant dawning around the globe, the constant birthing. Recall Earth’s many births right now of all beings – as day breaks around the globe – the physical, emotional, spiritual births. Her many, many birthings everyday, and throughout the eons. recalling now Universe-Gaia’s many birthings – happening in every moment – right now in real time and space … supernovas right now, stars and planets being born right now. Her many, many birthings in every moment and throughout the eons. – recalling now Universe-Gaia’s many birthings – happening in every moment – right now in real time and space … supernovas right now, stars and planets being born right now. Her many, many birthings in every moment and throughout the eons. Come back to your breath – this wonder – none of it separate … the Origin Ever-Present, birthing you in every moment – out of Her Fertile Dark, in real time and space. Feeling this breath, Her breath. NOTES: [i] Glenys Livingstone, PaGaian Cosmology, Winter Solstice ceremonial script, p. 195-196. Reference: Glenys Livingstone, PaGaian Cosmology. Music: Fish Nite Moon by Tim Wheater, permission generously given Images: – Birth of the Goddess, Erich Neumann, The Great Mother, pl. 155. See https://pagaian.org/book/cover-goddess-image/ – Winter Solstice window, MoonCourt Australia 2016 – some sources unknown
(Slideshow) Beltaine Goddess by Glenys Livingstone, Ph.D.

Tara, Hallie Iglehart Austen, p.122 On November 7th at 22:56 UTC EarthGaia crosses the midpoint in Her orbit between Equinox and Solstice. In the Southern Hemisphere it is the Season of Beltaine – a maturing of the Light, post-Spring Equinox. Beltaine and all of the light part of the cycle, is particularly associated with the Young One/Virgin aspect of Goddess, even as She comes into relationship with Other: She remains Her own agent. Beltaine may be understood as the quintessential annual celebration of Light as it continues to wax towards fullness. It is understood to be the beginning of Summer. Here is some Poetry of the Season: Earth tilts us further towards Mother Sun, the Source of Her pleasure, life and ecstasy You are invited to celebrate BELTAINE the time when sweet Desire For Life is met – when the fruiting begins: the Promise of early Spring exalts in Passion. This is the celebration of Holy Lust, Allurement, Aphrodite … Who holds all things in form, Who unites the cosmos, Who brings forth all things, Who is the Essence of the Dance of Life. Glenys Livingstone, 2005 The choice of images for the Season is arbitrary; there are so many more that may express this quality of Hers. And also for consideration, is the fact that most ancient images of Goddess are multivalent – She was/is One: that is, all Her aspects are not separate from each other. These selected images tell a story of certain qualities that may be contemplated at the Seasonal Moment of Beltaine. As you receive the images, remember that image communicates the unspeakable – that which can only be known in body – below rational mind. So you may open yourself to a transmission of Her, that will be particular to you. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKGRoVjQQHY Aphrodite 300 B.C.E. (Hallie Iglehart Austen, The Heart of the Goddess). This Greek Goddess is commonly associated with sexuality in a trivial kind of way, but She was said to be older than Time (Barbara Walker p.44). Aphrodite as humans once knew Her, was no mere sex goddess: Aphrodite was once a Virgin-Mother-Crone trinity – the Creative Force itself. The Love that She embodied was a Love deep down in things, an allurement intrinsic to the nature of the Universe. Praised by the Orphics thus: For all things are from You Who unites the cosmos. You will the three-fold fates You bring forth all things Whatever is in the heavens And in the much fruitful earth And in the deep sea. Vajravarahi 1600C.E. Tibetan Tantric Buddhism (Hallie Iglehart Austen, The Heart of the Goddess). A Dakini dancing with life energy – a unity of power, beauty, compassion and eroticism. Praised as Mistress of love and of knowledge at the same time. Tara Contemporary – Green Gulch California ,Tibetan Buddhist. (Hallie Iglehart Austen, The Heart of the Goddess). “Her eroticism is an important part of her bodhisattvahood: the sweetpea represents the yoni, and she is surrounded by the sensual abundance of Nature. One of Tara’s human incarnations was as the Tibetan mystic Yeshe Tsogyal, “who helped many people to enlightenment through sacred sexual union with her”. – Ishtar 1000 B.C.E. Babylon (Hallie Iglehart Austen, The Heart of the Goddess). Associated with passionate sexuality (and with Roman Goddess Venus) – which was not perceived as separate from integrity and intelligence … praised for Her beauty and brains! Her lips are sweet, Life is in Her mouth. When She appears, we are filled with rejoicing. She is glorious beneath Her robes. Her body is complete beauty. Her eyes are total brilliance. Who could be equal to Her greatness, for Her decrees are strong, exalted, perfect. MESOPOTAMIAN TEXT 1600 B.C.E. Artemis 4th Cent.B.C.E. Greece. (Hallie Iglehart Austen, The Heart of the Goddess) – classic “Virgin” image – wild and free, “Lady of the Beasts”, Goddess of untamed nature. As such, in the patriarchal stories She is often associated with harshness, orgiastic rituals but we may re-story “wildness” in our times as something “innocent” – in direct relationship with the Mother. She is a hunter/archer, protector, midwife, nurturing the new and pure essence (the “wild”) – in earlier times these things were not contradictory. The hunter had an intimate relationship with the hunted. Visvatara and Vajrasattva 1800C.E. Tibetan Goddess and God in Union: it could be any Lover and Beloved, of same sex. Image from Mann and Lyle, “Sacred Sexuality” p.74. Sacred Couple –Mesopotamia 2000-1600 BCE “Lovers Embracing on Bed”, Inanna Queen of Heaven and Earth, Diane Wolkstein and Samuael Noah Kramer. Represents the sacred marriage mythic cycle – late 3rd and into 4th millennium B.C.E. (See Starhawk, Truth or Dare). This period is the time of Enheduanna – great poet and priestess of Inanna. Xochiquetzal 8th century C.E. Mayan (Hallie Iglehart Austen, The Heart of the Goddess). Her name means “precious flower” – She is Goddess of pleasure, sexuality beauty and flowers. Sometimes represented by a butterfly who sips the nectar of the flower. “In ancient rituals honouring her, young people made a bower of roses, and, dressed as hummingbirds and butterflies they danced an image of the Goddess of flowers and love.” Her priestesses are depicted with ecstatic faces. (called “laughing Goddesses” !!) She and Her priestesses unashamedly celebrated joyful female sexuality – there is story of decorating pubic hairs to outshine the Goddess’ yoni. https://www.magoism.net/2013/06/meet-mago-contributor-glenys-livingstone/ REFERENCES: Iglehart Austen, Hallie. The Heart of the Goddess. Berkeley: Wingbow, 1990. Mann A.T. and Lyle, Jane. Sacred Sexuality. ELEMENT BOOKS LTD, 1995. Starhawk. Truth or Dare. San Fransisco:Harper and Row, 1990. Walker, Barbara. The Woman’s Encyclopaedia of Myths and Secrets. San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1983. Wolkstein,Diane and Kramer, Samuel Noah. Inanna Queen of Heaven and Earth. NY: Harper and Rowe, 1983. The music for the slideshow is “”Coral Sea Dreaming” by Tania Rose.
Artful Ceremonial Expression by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

This article is an edited excerpt from Chapter 7 of the author’s book PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion. I always wore a special headpiece for the Seasonal ceremonies when I facilitated them over the years, and I feel that any participant may do so, not just the main celebrant. My ceremonial headpiece with its changing and continuous Seasonal decoration took on increasing significance over the years; it became a personal central representation of the year-long ceremonial art process of creating, destroying and re-creating. For the research period of my doctoral studies particularly, when I was documenting the process, I realised that this headpiece came to represent for me the essence of “She” – as Changing One, yet ever as Presence – as I was coming to know Her. In my journal for the Mabon/Autumn Equinox process notes one year I wrote: As I pace the circle with the Mabon headpiece in the centre, I see “Her” as She has been through the Seasons … the black and gold of Samhain, the deep red, white and evergreen of Winter, the white and blue of Imbolc, the flowers of Eostar, the rainbow ribbons of Beltane, the roses of Summer, the seed pods and wheat of Lammas, and now the Autumn leaves. I see in my mind’s eye, and feel, Her changes. I am learning … The Mother knowledge grows within me. The headpiece, the wreath, the altar, the house decorations, all participate in the ceremony: they are part of the learning, the method, the relationship – similar to how one might bring flowers and gifts of significance to a loved one at special moments. Then further, the removal and re-creation of the decorations are part of the learning – an active witness to transformation through time.

(Bell Essay 6) The Magoist Whale Bell: Unraveling the Cetacean Code of Korean Temple Bells by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang, Ph.D.

[Author’s Note: The part 6 and ensuing sequels are a new development from the original essay sequels on Korean Temple Bells and Magoism that first published January 11, 2013 in this current magazine. See (Bell Essay 1) Ancient Korean Bells and Magoism by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang.] Southern right whale from Wikimedia Commons Introduction The Korean temple bell is no mere Buddhist device. Calling it a Sillan Esoteric Buddhist invention in origin only adds to its mystification. Commissioned by Sillan rulers who represented traditional Magoist shaman rulers, Sillan temple bells administer sonic balance within and without all beings once and for all. In short, the Sillan temple bell reenacts the Magost Cosmogony HERE and NOW.[1] Engendering resonance to the self-creative power of cosmic music, Yulryeo (Rhythms and Tones), the Korean temple bell summons the paradisiacal reality of the Creatrix, Mago. Cast in the form of a female body, the bell structurally embodies the gynocentric principle of the Creatrix, the Mago Way. I have discussed earlier such features as nine nipples and apsaras. Here the dragon figure (Yongnyu) and the sound tube (Yongtong or Eumtong) in its head are focused. Multi-functional and polysemic, the dragon is there not only to be the loop for hanging but also to envelop the sound tube, seen below. Among others, the sound tube stands out as a distinctive feature of Korean temple bells that distinguishes them from their Chinese and Japanese counterparts. What is the sound tube of the Korean temple bell? Why do Korean temple bells have a sound tube? Answers to these questions concern a yet-to-be-unraveled undergirding theme of the Korean temple bell, the whale. Although its origin is debated, the sound tube signals Sillan cetacean veneration. In the mytho-history of Magoism, Silla (57 BCE-935 CE) stands as a prominent ancient Korean state, which succeeded and flowered ancient Magoist cetaceanism. Sillan cetacenism defines Silla as a new government that succeeded Old Magoist confederacies. In this context, we can assess a whale-shaped wooden mallet, which is no mere decorative addition to the bell. Nonetheless, the whale-shaped mallet is only a tip of the cetacean meaning of the bell. A whale (고래 Gorae in Korean) is the very model that the Korean temple bell (the bell hereafter) takes after, especially for its vocalizations. The bell mimics the music of whales. While the latter is heard in water, the former is heard in land. Its cetacean names corroborate such an assessment. The bell is called Janggyeong (長鯨 Eternal Whale), Gyeongjong (鯨鐘 Whale Bell), Hwagyeong (華鯨 Splendid Whale), or Geogyeong (巨鯨 Gigantic Whale). As such, the sound of the bell is alternatively called “the sound of whale (鯨音gyeongeum).” Ancient Koreans perceived whales, pre-human in origin and once a land animal, as the messenger of the Creatrix, Mago. In folk traditions, the phrase, “riding the back of a whale,” was widely popularized among East Asians throughout history, which means that one returns to Mago, by riding the back of a whale upon death. That ancient Koreans were cetacean venerators remains esoteric. The cetacean code of Korean temple bells holds the key to unraveling what has gone suppressed in patriarchy, the Magoist Cosmogony. By the Magoist Cosmogony, I mean a systematic origin story of our universe, as is recounted in the Budoji (Epic of the Emblem City). I have summarized the Budoji’s cosmogonic chapters in my aforementioned book, The Mago Way, as follows: The Magoist Cosmogony highlights the sonic movement of cosmic elements as the Creatrix. In the beginning, there was light. The movement/vibration of light (cosmic music) in the universe caused creation to take place over eons. Stars were born in the previous cosmic era. In due time, Mago was born together with the Earth (the Stronghold of Mago) with her moons. Her (self-)emergence marks the beginning of earthly history. Mago listened to and acted in tune with the cyclic movement of the cosmic music. In further due time, S/HE bore two daughters, Gunghui (Goddess Gung) and Sohui (Goddess So) parthenogenetically. This Primordial Triad laid the foundation for the earthly environment for all species. Mago, assisted by HER two daughters, orchestrated the terrestrial plan to bring acoustic balance in harmony with the cosmic music/sound/vibration. S/HE delegated HER descendants to cultivate and manage the sonic equilibrium of the Earth [Italics added].[2] Precisely, the Sillan temple bell encodes the message that whales are the paragon of Magoists whose mandate is “to cultivate and manage the sonic equilibrium of the Earth.” Restoring Magoist cetaceanism is metamorphic. Antithetical to the very establishment of patriarchy, ancient Magoist Korean cetacean practice unfolds the Other World that has been ever HERE. This essay, assessing the sound tube as a Magoist code of Sillan cetaceanism, aims to delineate how the Magoist cetacean meaning came to be encoded in the sound tube of the bell by the Sillan rulers of the 7th and 8th centuries. In decoding the cetacean message, we are led to the myth of Manpasikjeok (萬波息笛 the pacifying flute that defeats all, hereafter the pacifying flute), a Sillan royal treasure that is hermeneutically construed as made of the tusk of a narwhal. A group of Korean scholars maintain that the sound tube was designed to represent the pacifying flute. The task of this essay is to go further and to re-read the myth of Manpasikjeok—a story of King Sinmun the Great (r. 681-692) of Silla (57 BCE-935 CE) who was told by a sea dragon to create a flute out of a mysterious bamboo tree growing in a mysterious mountain in the East Sea, alternatively known as the Sea of Whales—from the Magoist perspective. This story has been written and misinterpreted as an enigmatic Buddhist story. I hold that “Ruler (King or Queen) the Great (大王 Daewang),” unlike other kings of the ancient world, does not refer to a patriarchal monarch. It is a Magoist cetacean term that is related with “Ruler Whale the Great (Daewang Gorae),” referring to the blue whale for its gigantic size or whales collectively. By adopting the cetacean title …
(Photo Essay 4) ‘Gaeyang Halmi, the Sea Goddess of Korea’ by Helen Hwang

Part IV: Revival of the Gurang (Nine Maidens) Gaeyang Halmi There is more to reveal. As I write this part of the photo essay, I have encountered new information, previously made available online by individuals and organizations. It is reported that the “Suseong-dang” (水聖堂, Sea Saint Shrine) was once called the “Gurang-sa” (九娘祠, Nine Maidens Shine), of which I never heard before.[i] That Suseong-dang is a fake name blew my mind! Note the difference of gender between “the Nine Maidens Shrine” and “the Sea Saint Shrine”! The female-connoted term was stolen just like that! “Gurang-sa,” a female-referenced term as the character “rang” means a maiden, had to go due to its overt female representation. It is not without grounds that I was taken aback to see its present logography, “the Sea Saint Shrine,” on the information board.[ii] I almost heard a voice warning me, “This is not the place that you think it is!” That voice attempted to force me to leave the place without further investigation. However, I intuitively took a mental note, “Something is not correct here.” And I was right! Its name change sheds a consistent light on the meddling of patriarchal distortion/deception done to the tradition of Gaeyang Halmi. Readers are reminded of the lost painting of Gaeyang Halmi, which was replaced by that of the Sea God explicated in Part 2 of this photo essay (also Part 3). Like “the Sea God,” “the Suseong-dang” constitutes no reality. It is not only a conceptual deception but also a theft of the intangible cultural heritage, righteously committed by faceless patriarchal men disappeared into the lapse of time. It is clear that systematic erasure of the Female/Goddess has been in operation. Female power embodied whether in the name of the shrine or in the iconography was stripped away. However, it is proven once again that the Female is immortal because it constitutes the root of patriarchy. People smuggled the forbidden knowledge of the Female to later generations through oral stories. Thus, we find the folklore of the Female subversive.
Mago, the First Mother from East Asia by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

[Excerpts from “Mago, the First Mother from East Asia,” Creatrix Media Live (CML) Roundtable Radio Talk with Dr. Helen Hye-Sook Hwang. May 23, 2011] Jayne DeMente: Welcome Helen, I was fortunate to read some of your research and I applaud you because, we in the Western WSE movement have long needed to hear more from Asian women spiritual leaders and feminists and your reference to the Neolithic timeline… For our listeners and participants online, let’s lead with the question of who is Mago, was she a mother figure, what is Magoism, does any other deity pre-date her? Helen Hye-Sook Hwang: *Mago is the great goddess known to East Asians throughout history. She is the first mother of all, cosmogonist, and ultimate sovereign/ruler. She has many names. Among them are Triad Deity (Samsin), Grandmother (halmi), Auspicious Goddess (Seogo), Evil (Magui), and Old Goddess (Nogo). She is also known as the Giantess who shaped the natural and cultural landscape. Her manifestations are so multivalent that one may think they do not refer to the same goddess. She was well loved, given high esteem, celebrated by East Asians in the past. She was almost completely forgotten, however in modern times, up until the 1980s in Korea, when the principle text of Magoism, the Budoji, re-emerged. *Mago is a mother figure in the sense that she bore two daughters, Kunghee and Sohee, and managed her household called the Castle of Mago, the primordial paradise of humanity. She is the ancestor of all races. She takes care of everything on earth via the equilibrium of cosmic music/sound/vibration. *Magoism is the term that refers to the totality of culture/civilization venerating Mago as the great goddess. It is a tradition largely unnoted but co-opted and distorted in major East Asian religions. The concept of Magoism helps one identify and understand Mago’s multivalent manifestations that are found trans-nationally. It also makes possible to name the female-centered original/primal civilization that gave birth to the forthcoming East Asian civilizations and religions. *Whether Mago is the earliest deity known to East Asia is unknown. In fact, there are goddesses unearthed from “pre-historic” archaeological sites without their names. The life-sized goddess statue was unearthed in the site of Hongshan Culture, northeastern region of present China dating from 4,700 to 2,900 BCE. The heavy use of jade along with the partly bear-figured female icon is congruent with the account of Magoism in the Budoji. Also, of course, there are numerous female figurines called dogu excavated in Japan’s “pre-historic” times. The ancient origin of Mago or Magoism has a merit to explain some facts that remain a mystery, so to speak. Korea is also known as the land of dolmens. Half of the world megaliths are populated in the Korean peninsula. There are numerous pyramids found in mainland China. There is a documentary film about the sunken temple beneath the sea of Okinawa Japan, etc. dating to 10,000 years ago. *Then, how early does Mago date to? It is difficult to date the earliest evidence of Mago or Magoism simply because written history does not exist in pre-patriarchal times. As you see here, when we talk about the earliest of something, everyone assumes it is of Chinese. So let me follow this line of thought: Ge Hong’s record on Magu from China dates to the early fourth century CE (Ge Hong 283—343 CE). However, Daoist scholar Robert Ford Campany states that the cult of Mago dates back to the Stone Age. It is more difficult to date Mago in Korean records simply because ancient written records did not survive. Two books, the Budoji and the Handan Gogi, alleged to have been written in the late 4th or early 5th century and subsequent later times, which refer to Mago otherwise known as Samsin (Triad Deity) remain controversial. Considering that the name Mago is embedded in Korean language as in “gom,” “geum,” and “gam,” whose meaning indicates ruler, sovereign, and head, the origin of Mago is as old as these words. Likewise, most materials that recount Mago as cosmogonist are of folklore, place names, literature, arts, and debris of historical and religious records, most of which are difficult to date for its origin. Anniitra Ravenmoon: Thank you Helen, you have done much academic research and hold several degrees, can you explain to us how your education or experience informed you regarding Mago? Helen: *I would say that encountering Mago as a doctoral research topic is ultimately prompted by my intellectual quest as a Korean feminist. Following radical feminism of Mary Daly, I wanted to seek spirituality that is not only non-patriarchal but also East Asian and Korean. This made me study feminism and East Asian religions, histories, and cultures, etc. I end up with so much to study over the past decade and a half. I did not take up graduate studies as a means to develop an academic career. I loved reading and studies from youth. This kind of attitude is not that practical in the job market. However, I believe this is the right path for me. To look back, I did not follow the ready-made conventional path of life. I was a dreamer and idealist. I still value those qualities in myself and others. I used to think to myself, if I had remained a Christian, I would not have sought Mago. How could I? Likewise if I had resorted to Buddhism, I would not have encountered Mago. Because I wanted to carve out my own spiritual path as a Korean feminist, I was able to encounter Mago. Another factor at work in my study of Mago is the cultural or spiritual tradition of cultivating the Dao, the Way, in East Asia. I wanted to find out what the truth was, how I could make the most out of my life and etc. So I tried the shoes of a Catholic overseas missionary for a while. Leaving Christianity behind, however, helped me realize the cultural heritage that I have within. It was …