January 10, 2017October 2, 2019 RTM Editors

(Prose) Earth’s Renewal Moon by Sara Wright

[I took this photograph during the last full moon (12/24/2015), the “Earth’s Renewal Moon” according to the Blackfoot Nation. This moon belongs to Waboose, the Spirit Keeper of the North and it is considered to be the first moon of the New Year; it can occur anytime during the period that extends from December 22^nd until January 19^th.]

The Earth’s Renewal Moon is special to me because, for the next three months, I will be able to watch the moon rising over the southeastern horizon from the window in either my bathroom or living room. The moment before she makes her ascent, the mountain glows with an otherworldly, silvery white light. My dove Lily B celebrates these months by singing to the moon each month from his window perch. He and I are both in love with the luminous white blossom that fills the night sky with such beauty that even all but the bravest stars dim under her loving gaze. I always look for the rabbit who hides with his grandmother in this moon.

I am also reminded that some Native peoples, like the Haida, the Cree, and the Potawatoni, call this first moon of the year “the little bear moon.” Not surprisingly the little bear moon corresponds to the birth of black bear cubs, which occurs some time in January. Alert and caring mothers tend their infants while snug in their underground dens, many of which are tangled in the roots of the trees, these baby bears will soon depend upon for climbing.

On this first day of the new year, I think about the Earth’s ability to renew herself, her animals, plants, and people…

It is in renewal that hope becomes reality.

Read Meet Mago Contributor Sara Wright.

0 thoughts on “(Prose) Earth’s Renewal Moon by Sara Wright”

Sara Wright says:

January 11, 2017 at 7:12 PM

Actually, she is full at around 6:30 AM tomorrow in this hemisphere… but tonight she is gorgeous and once again I am reminded that she begins the new year with Renewal and the possibility of moving Forward… yet one more turn on the spiral…

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Bart Everson says:

January 11, 2017 at 9:01 AM

Thank you for this lovely paean to the Moon. She’s in the news now as scientists debate anew the history of her origin. One big trauma or many small ones? Given the timeframe you report, I guess the next occurrence of “Earth’s Renewal Moon” is tomorrow, 12 January.

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(Poem) The Holiness of Broken Things by Melissa Austin

Meet Mago Contributor, Melissa Austin. This girl cried over dead baby birds found among the branches of a lightning-struck tree. She couldn’t see how something broken could still be holy.
(Essay) The Gift Alternative by Genevieve Vaughan

[Editor’s Note: This essay is based on Vaughan’s speech delivered at EWHA University July 2014.] Although the South Korean economy is flourishing, the economic (and environmental) situation worldwide is worsening and many people are now convinced that a radical alternative to capitalism is necessary. Most people believe that the Communist experiment failed, so they are looking elsewhere for models. I believe that an alternative model already exists although we have been taught not to see it. It is based on mothering and being mothered, the central social interaction of childhood, which, because it is necessary for children’s survival, may be considered a cultural universal. Some suggest (Liebermann 2013) that evolution, through the adaptation of our species to sociality, hardwired our brains in ways that make us disadapted to the ego oriented cultures of loneliness in which our competitive market economies have thrust us. Darcia Narvaez (2012:197) talks about ” the parenting practices that emerged with social mammals some 30 million years ago”, and that “mostly match up with the common practices for infants and young children recorded among foraging hunter-gatherers who live in small, cohesive communities representing the lifestyle of over 90% of human genus history… Ancestral childrearing practices include extensive, on-demand breastfeeding, constant touch, responsiveness to needs of the child, natural childbirth, and multiple adult caregivers” The multiple caregivers ensured support for the birth mother, a characteristic that is sorely missing in our society. Although some hunter-gatherer groups have trade, most are societies of generalized reciprocity, where everyone gives to everyone. That is, they are societies of generalized nurturing that Narvaez calls “companionship societies”. In our market based society, nurturing has mainly been assigned to the birth mother, who receives support only if she is lucky enough to have an available grandmother or if she has the money to pay for childcare or if she has a feminist husband. Nurturing young children requires unilateral giving because although they actively and creatively receive, children cannot exchange, that is they cannot give back an equivalent of what they have been given. Unilateral giving is the only way to make human infants survive. Unlike most other mammals they are born vulnerable and dependent and require intense unilateral care for many years. The unilateral identification and satisfaction of their needs by adults and children’s reception of these need-satisfying gifts and services, create relationships of mutuality and trust and form the basis of later relations of community. In fact giving and receiving is a kind of glue that holds communities together. Giving to satisfy the needs of another also gives value to her or him. It implies the other is important to the giver and is registered in the self esteem of the receiver. I call this implication ‘gift value’. As the child grows h/er needs diversify and change. Sometimes s/he needs independence and the mother has to be sensitive to this and other psychological needs, calibrating her giving. Exchange changes this original logic. In fact, the doubling of the gift in exchange changes the relationship entirely, from other oriented to ego oriented. The attention of the ‘giver’ is no longer focussed on the need of the other but on the need or desire of the self. Gift value is cancelled by the equal return and is transformed into exchange value while, after the exchange is concluded, the use value of the product is seen as a ‘property’ of the object without human relational implications. Cancelling the gift transaction in this way creates a whole area of life, the market, that functions according to exchange and exchange value and is based on a quantitative equation between what is given and what is received. In this way mothering, assymmetrical unilateral giving, is left out of the interaction. The main motivation of the market, profit, is actually made up of gifts. Marx’s idea of surplus value shows how the labor time of workers in excess of the amount covered by their salaries is captured by the market. This extra time is given free to the capitalists but is forced from the workers. To this we should also add free housework and care work that pass through the surplus value in that they diminish the monetary cost of reproduction of the workers and of all the members of society. In fact unremunerated labor in the home would add some 30% to 40% to the GDP in most countries if calculated in monetary terms We should add the gifts that are ‘given’ by nature, that are also unmonetized. In 1997 ‘eco system services’ were calculated at $33 trillion as compared to global GDP in of $18 trillion (Costanza et al.1997). These free gifts are not recognized as such but they nevertheless unconsciously confer value on the receiver by implication. That is in this case they give gift value – importance – to the market and its protagonists as well as to its values and thought processes. They collaborate in maintaining the dominance of the market over the gift economy. To the gifts just mentioned can be added the gifts that are extracted through the differences in level of life between countries, in that the livelihood of the worker costs less in developing countries than it does in dominant capitalist countries. There is therefore a greater gift margin that comes from the gifts of women and of the developing society as a whole, which is monetized through the portion of the salary of the workers in the developed country, which is used to buy the imported product. Thus the gifts of workers from both hemispheres flow towards the capitalists but particularly towards those in the Global North. One more recent development is the commodification of the free gifts of nature and culture, water, seeds, fertilizer and indigenous knowledges and the seizure of those gifts by Northern corporations. In this perspective it is clear that the market is floating on and permeated by a sea of gifts. In fact the market is a mechanism for channelling gifts away from …
(Poem) A Story of the Goddess by Luke Buckham with art by Victor Hernández

With one’s whole body, as these dancers Nowadays her husband, a sea scorpion an equally fervid stabber the world has its legends of life a great feast and festival the rhythmical movement of the nymph The girl became world voracious, and impotent with a wild temper, she keeps watch her one eye over the mammals her severed fingers sprang from her body transformed gauze and a black backcloth towards humanity the chief deity of the lower autumn people an armless woman with whom she shares the arctic and there she still dwells, keeping this ballet without music from shaded bleachers far north hold her honor
Sara Wright

Read all posts by Sara Wright. Sara is a Jungian therapist, a naturalist, ethologist, ritual artist, animist, and a writer who lives in the western mountains of Maine and writes about animals and plants in Nature, and the relationship between Nature and herself. She has Native American Roots. I am a naturalist and a writer; I live in a little log cabin in the woods by a brook with two small dogs and two doves. I write stories about the animals and plants that live here on my property in the western mountains of Maine and publish them regularly in my nature column in the local paper. I am also an independent black bear researcher who uses “trust based” research to study the bears that have visited me here. Trust based research/fieldwork allows me to apprentice myself to Nature through any of its individuals if they are willing. I am the student; each species is the teacher. I have Native American roots, which may or may not be why I have dedicated my life to speaking out on behalf of the slaughtered trees, dying plants and disappearing animals. This is the only work that matters to me. “Over the Edge and Beyond: Journal of a Naturalist” sarawrightnature.wordpress.com
(Essay 3) Magoist Cetaceanism and the Myth of the Pacifying Flute (Manpasikjeok) by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang, Ph.D.

Reversing the Reversed of the Buddhist Textual Erasure (Part 2) Single-horned Jicheongsu (Acoustic animal of the Earth)http://www.whim.tw/gate?mod=article&id=20100826134013 Sillan Magoists saw that whales governed the whole world by their sonic capacities, which conditioned the aquatic environment of the Earth. Note that the expression of “the whole world” refers to no romantic abstract. Led by whales, Sillan rulers saw themselves as a governing delegate of the Whole World, which is the Reign of Mago, the Creatrix. They were consciously going against an ethnocentric or imperialist perspective. A supra-nationalist perspective constituted the very vision of Sillan Magoist Cetanceanism. Precisely, Sillan rulers acted upon no other goal than restoring the original meaning of the State of Old Magoist Koreans, known as the Confederacy of Nine Hans (Danguk) or the Confederacy of Three Hans (Budo Joseon), who represented the One People of the Mago Decent. Silla was no patriarchal or ethnocentric state. She was the light of ancient Magoist Cetaceanism for the whole world in the post-Budo period. Note the brief mytho-history of Magoism in six periods:[1] The Mythic Period: The Beiginning of Mago Stronghold, the Primoridal Paradise, and Mu (Shaman) Elders The Golden Period: Pre-Chinese (read pre-patriarchal) Old Magoist confederacies (Hanguk and Danguk) The Budo Period: Budo Joseon, the proto-Chinese confederacy of Three Hans The Post-Budo Period: Ancient Korean States (Buyeo, Silla, Goguryeo, Baekje, Gaya, Balhae) and Goryeo and Early Joseon The Dark Period: After 1592 Japanese Invasion in Joseon and modern Koreas The Revival Period: After 1980s when the Budoji was reappeared in public The story delineates the event that the protagonist, King Sinmun, is initiated to Magoism Cetaceanism, as he succeeds the throne of his deceased father, King Munmu, an ardent devotee of Magoist Cetaceanism, in leading the state, Silla (57 BCE-935 BCE). The fact that the story of the pacifying flute involves the three generations of Sillan rulers, King Munmu, King Sinmun, and King Hyoso (son of King Sinmun), indicates a state-sponsored revival of Magoist Cetaceanism. And that they mark the first three rulers of United Silla (668-935 CE) is no coincidence. Shouldered with the task of opening and laying the foundation for the new era, United Silla, these Sillan rulers aimed at the flowering of Magoist Cetaceanism. Sillans brought to fruition the collective aspiration of ancient Koreans shared with their sisterly states of Gaya, Baekje, Goguryeo, and beyond in the Post-Budo Period. They established a magocratic confederacy of nine states once again under the banner of Magoist Cetaceanism. Here the nine states refer to the nine neighboring peoples of Silla. Broadly, “the nine states” means the peoples of the whole world. In the context of Magoism, the number nine refers to the perfected, all entities of the kind. And the governance of these Sillan rulers was in the continuum of their predecessors and successors. The very purpose of Sillan foundation and early Sillan politics aimed to actualize the legacy of the Magoist Mandate, the self-defining ethos of Koreans. Early Sillans called themselves the People of Little Budo after Budo Joseon (2333 BCE-232 BCE), the third and last three-state confederacy of Old Magoist Korea, better known as Old Joseon. The political achievement of United Silla in seventh century as a whole meant a flowering of Old Korean Magoist Cetaceanism. Magoist Cetaceanism demarcates ancient Koreans from the Chinese in the Post-Budo Period, that is, in the wake of Budo Joseon’s decline in 233 BCE. Amidst the complex political situation of East Asia wherein the newly established dynasties of Imperial China rose to threaten the neighboring peoples, Sillan rulers resorted to Magoist Cetaceanism not only for the self-protection of the Sillan State but also for the self-realization of a magocratic confederacy. Evidence shows that Sillan rulers espoused the domain of patriarchal religions, Buddhism in particular, from the privileged perspective of Magoist Cetaceanism. Sillan Esoteric Buddhism was a brainchild of Sillan Magoist Cetacean rulers. Born with the teaching of Magoist Cetaceanism at the core, Sillan Esoteric Buddhism, much misconstrued and misrepresented today, was no local practice. Nor did it reflect a low-level consciousness that is discriminative in nature. Seen in the cetacean code of the Sillan temple bell, early Sillan Buddhism was autochthonous and prompted the arrival of innovative Buddhist schools of East Asia and beyond. The Chinese admiration of Sillan Buddhism in the seventh century is well addressed in the account of Mangulsan (Mountain of Ten Thousands Buddhas), a situational religious art engineered by King Gyeongdeok the Great of Silla, to be discussed in a later section. In the course of time, Sillan rulers migrated from the office of Mu (Shamans or Officiated Magoists) but held onto the role of Seon (Lay Magoists). This Sillan legacy, although unadmitted publicly, ran deep in the royal houses of Korean states throughout the forthcoming history. (Ruler Bodhisattva Jijang Rides the Auspicious Jicheong) 地藏王菩薩騎瑞獸地聽http://www.foshanshuan.com.tw/design_130.html#.Xh0-y1NKjSY In traditional East Asia, the narwhal is not utterly unknown. In fact, the following anecdote of Gim Gyogak, a mid-seventh century Sillan royalty and a Buddhist monk, insinuates that Sillan Magoist Cetaceanism was spread to China under the patronage of Buddhism. Put differently, Sillan Buddhism took the form of a syncretic religion amalgamated with Magoist Cetacenism. While Silan rulers actively pursued the policies that support Magoist Cetaceanism, some Buddhist monks were known for their esoteric practices. To be mentioned later, Monk Myeongrang was widely noted for his esoteric practices related with the Ruler of Dragons. Gim Gyogak was another one. Venerated as a reincarnated Bodhisattva Jijang (地藏 Ksitigarbha), Gim Gyogak is told to have crossed the West Sea of the Korean Peninsula to Tang China (618-907) by riding the back of a mythical animal, Jicheongsu or (地聽獸 the terrestrial animal who hears or an acoustic animal of the Earth). White in color, Jicheongsu is told to have had one horn. In iconography, Jicheongsu is depicted as a single-horned dragon-like beast (see the image). The one-horned leviathan who carried Gim Gyogak over to mainland China is evocative of a narwhal with a tusk. Its name, Jicheongsu, which literally means “The terrestrial animal who …
(Art) The Great Mother by Julie Stewart Rose

The significance of the mother figure to Julie represents the nurturer in the Great Mother – one who you can hand the cares of the world to instead of carrying them yourself.
(Art) Sacred Lotus, Symbol of the Sacred Feminine by Glen Rogers

My spiritual journey has coincided with my infatuation with the lotus. In both Buddhism and Hinduism, the lotus is a sacred flower and refers to spiritual awakening and purity of heart. It’s the cycle of the lotus that provides the metaphor for rebirth—with the bud emerging from muddy waters each morning and gradually opening with perfectly clean petals. Each lotus bud represents potential, and with the fully formed blossom comes Nirvana. The Sanskrit mantra “Om mani padme hum” which means “jewel in the lotus” is supposed to have great mystical power. In my meditations, the image of the lotus unfolding is my heart opening to Spirit. In the Kamasutra, an ancient Hindu text about human sexuality, the lotus is the yoni or vulva from which all life arises. The Sacred Feminine is personified in the pink petals of the lotus blossom as they quietly reveal the center. From my book, Symbols of the Spirit: A Meditative Journey Through Art, available thru Amazon or my website, glenrogersart.com. https://www.magoism.net/2021/01/meet-mago-contributor-glen-rogers/
(Poem) Make Me a Pond Lily by Carolyn Lee Boyd

Photo by Carolyn Lee Boyd Ever the eye in the center of the universe The lily in the pond opens, one of millions of Ordinary blooms in thousands of wild places. I hold it in my muddy hands and let seep into me Its moon hues, its human-soft petals, its sun-light expanded Boundaries, floating in the calm, life-giving waters. To begin, choose anything – a speck of dirt, a galaxy, a lily. Witness it with love and no expectations. Within a second, it will grow beyond everything you think you know, And speak, and heal, and make peace. Real life is like that, like a universe full of all We need if we will just let it find asylum in our hands. While all Creation expands, we retreat beneath our surface, Close our petals, hide from what we truly seek. May the lily’s center be our stillpoint. May we stop there, turn around, and join all that is in an infinite Openness, like our hands when we meet a beloved. May all the universe be our beloved. https://www.magoism.net/2016/08/meet-mago-contributor-carolyn-lee-boyd/
(Quilt Art) Anat by Kaarina Kailo

The “Fertile Crescent” refers to a crescent-shaped region in Western Asia. Formed by the Tigris and Euphrates rivers and the Mediterranean Sea, this region gave rise to some of the world’s earliest matriarchal civilizations. It was the cradle of Neolithic economy (8th millennium BC) with famous sites such as Jerico and Catal Höyuk. Would the warmongers still terrorize people in the Middle East if, instead of competing over whose male god one has to obey and honor, battling over land and resources instead of sharing the fertile lands, people worshipped the Great Mothers of both Palestine and Israel! Here in my quilt work is the daughter ANAT of the motherline to which Anat (Asherat, Ashtaroth, Astarte), the Palestinian Goddess of Love, Goddess of Grain and Agriculture belonged. If Asherat was the omnipotent creatress and destructress; sister-bride to Baal, the Hebrew counterparts were not enemies or rivals, but mythic kin. Asherah is the great goddess in ancient Semitic religion but appears also in Hittite writings as Ašerdu(s). The goddesses were One, not rivals. Imagine if they now reigned over the war-torn Gaza! https://www.magoism.net/2016/03/meet-mago-contributor-kaarina-kailo/

(Special Post 4) 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.] Yvonne Lucia: “Feminism is the radical notion that women are people.” -British suffragist and journalist Rebecca West “When the God is male, the male is God.” -Mary Daly Yvonne Lucia sacredartportal.com Lila Moore: My first piece of performance art was a ritual inspired by Isis. However, as a young artist, my interest in combining art and ritual was devalued by my teachers and critics alike. I felt isolated and persecuted. Only after relocating to London was I able to gradually understand that my personal and creative aspiration was integral part of a collective and global feminine and feminist awakening. I realised that personal experiences of women have political perspectives, and that being a contemporary woman artist positions me in the midst of historical and cultural enterprise. As an artist-film-maker and scholar, I have regarded my work as a spiritual quest, exploring through dance-ritual and art films the interaction of the body and psyche with the natural environment and technology. In the 21st century, my interest in the healing and transforming aspects of images on screen has been combined with a growing sense of activism. It seems inconceivable to take images of nature out of context by ignoring the ecological holocaust which is evident everywhere. I have felt compelled to ask whether the needs of the body and mind can be separated from the needs of the Earth?
(Special Post 2) Multi-linguistic Resemblances of “Mago” by Mago Circle Members

Artwork, “The-great-mother” by Julie Stewart Helen Hye-Sook Hwang: On the word, Magi/Magus, from Magi – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Magi (/ˈmeɪdʒaɪ/; singular magus /ˈmeɪɡəs/; from Latin magus) were priests in Zoroastrianism and the earlier religions of the western Iranians. The earliest known use of the word magi is in the trilingual inscription written by Darius the Great, known as the Behistun Inscription. Old Persian texts, predating the Hellenistic period, refer to a magus as a Zurvanic, and presumably Zoroastrian, priest. Pervasive throughout the Eastern Mediterranean and Western Asia until late antiquity and beyond, mágos was influenced by (and eventually displaced) Greek goēs (γόης), the older word for a practitioner of magic, to include astronomy/astrology, alchemy and other forms of esoteric knowledge. This association was in turn the product of the Hellenistic fascination for (Pseudo‑)Zoroaster, who was perceived by the Greeks to be the Chaldean founder of the Magi and inventor of both astrology and magic, a meaning that still survives in the modern-day words “magic” and “magician”. In the Gospel of Matthew, “μάγοι” (magoi) from the east do homage to the newborn Jesus, and the transliterated plural “magi” entered English from Latin in this context around 1200 (this particular use is also commonly rendered in English as “kings” and more often in recent times as “wise men”).[1] The singular “magus” appears considerably later, when it was borrowed from Old French in the late 14th century with the meaning magician. … An unrelated term, but previously assumed to be related, appears in the older Gathic Avestan language texts. This word, adjectival magavan meaning “possessing maga-“, was once the premise that Avestan maga- and Median (i.e. Old Persian) magu- were co-eval (and also that both these were cognates of Vedic Sanskrit magha-). While “in the Gathas the word seems to mean both the teaching of Zoroaster and the community that accepted that teaching”, and it seems that Avestan maga- is related to Sanskrit magha-, “there is no reason to suppose that the western Iranian form magu (Magus) has exactly the same meaning”[4] as well. But it “may be, however”, that Avestan moghu (which is not the same as Avestan maga-) “and Medean magu were the same word in origin, a common Iranian term for ‘member of the tribe’ having developed among the Medes the special sense of ‘member of the (priestly) tribe’, hence a priest.”[2]cf[3] Helen Hye-Sook Hwang: On the word, Gaia, from Gaia (mythology) – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia In Greek mythology, Gaia (/ˈɡaɪə, ˈɡeɪə/ GHY-ə, GAY-ə;[1] from Ancient Greek Γαῖα, a poetical form of Γῆ Gē, “land” or “earth”),[2] also spelled Gaea (/ˈdʒiːə/ JEE-ə),[1] is the personification of the Earth[3] and one of the Greek primordial deities. Gaia is the ancestral mother of all life: the primal Mother Earth goddess. She is the mother of Uranus (the sky), from whose sexual union she bore the Titans (themselves parents of many of the Olympian gods) and the Giants, and of Pontus (the sea), from whose union she bore the primordial sea gods. Her equivalent in the Roman pantheon was Terra.[4] … The Greek name Γαῖα (Gaĩa)[5] is a mostly epic, collateral form of Attic Γῆ[6] (Gê), Doric Γᾶ (Gã, perhaps identical to Δᾶ Dã)[7] meaning “Earth”, a word of uncertain origin.[8] Robert S. P. Beekes has suggested a Pre-Greek origin.[9] In Mycenean Greek Ma-ka (transliterated as Ma-ga, “Mother Gaia”) also contains the root ga-.[9][10] Helen Hye-Sook Hwang: Greek mythology of Gaia’s family tree is remotely evocative of the Magoist genealogy written in the Budoji (Epic of the Emblem City), the principale text of Magoism. In Korean, “Mama” is also an honorary title referring to the royal family including ruler, ruler’s mother, father, grandmother and so on. This suggests that “ma” means “mother,” “ruler,” and “Goddess” all at once in gynocentric/gynocratic (Magoist/Magocratic) societies, pre-patriarchal in origin. Helen Hye-Sook Hwang: I came to search the etymology of “montgomery” in relation to Mt. Mago or Mt. Goya and am led to such related terms as Gomer, Gog, Magog. Montgomery (name) – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Montgomery or Montgomerie is a surname from a place name in Normandy.[1] Although there are many stories of its origin,[2][3][4][5] An old theory explains that the name is a corruption of “Gomer’s Mount” or “Gomer’s Hill” (Latin: Mons Gomeris), any of a number of hills in Europe named in attribution to the biblical patriarch Gomer,[2] but it does not explain the final -y or -ie (the phonetical evolution would have been *Montgomers) and it does not correspond to the old mentions of the place name Montgommery in Normandie : Monte Gomeri in 1032 – 1035, de Monte Gomerico in 1040 and de Monte Gumbri in 1046 – 1048.[6] More relevant is the explanation by the Germanic first name Gumarik,[7] a compound of guma “man” (see bridegroom) and rik “powerful”, that regularly gives the final -ry (-ri) in the French first names and surnames (Thierry, Amaury, Henry, etc.). Moreover, the name is still used as a surname in France as Gommery,[8] from the older first name Gomeri.[9] Helen Hye-Sook Hwang: On the word, Gomer below from Wikipedia. Gomer (גֹּמֶר, Standard Hebrew Gómer, Tiberian Hebrew Gōmer, pronounced [ɡoˈmeʁ]) was the eldest son of Japheth (and of the Japhetic line), and father of Ashkenaz, Riphath, and Togarmah, according to the “Table of Nations” in the Hebrew Bible, (Genesis 10). The eponymous Gomer, “standing for the whole family,” as the compilers of the Jewish Encyclopedia expressed it,[1] is also mentioned in Book of Ezekiel 38:6 as the ally of Gog, the chief of the land of Magog. Helen Hye-Sook Hwang: On the word, Gog and Magog from Wikipedia. Gog and Magog: They are depicted as monsters and barbarians from the East/Eurasia. Gog and Magog (/ɡɒɡ/; /ˈmeɪɡɒɡ/; Hebrew: גּוֹג וּמָגוֹג Gog u-Magog; Arabic: يَأْجُوج وَمَأْجُوج Yaʾjūj wa-Maʾjūj) are names that appear in the Hebrew bible (Old Testament), the Book of Revelation and the Qur’an, sometimes indicating individuals and sometimes lands and peoples. Sometimes, but not always, they are connected with the “end times”, and the passages from the book of Ezekiel and Revelation in particular have attracted attention for this reason. From ancient times to the late Middle Ages Gog and Magog were identified with Eurasian nomads such as the Khazars, Huns and Mongols (this was true also for Islam, where they were identified first with Turkic tribes of Central Asia and later with the Mongols). Throughout this period they were conflated with various other legends, notably those concerning Alexander the Great, the Amazons, Red Jews, and the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel, and became the subject of much fanciful literature. In modern times they remain associated with apocalyptic thinking, especially in the United States and the Muslim world. Helen […]
(Special post) Laurie Baymarrwangga, Senior Australian of the Year 2012

Posted with permission in Return to Mago on ‘Australia Day’, 26 January 2014 (Australian time), in recognition of the ill-treatment and misunderstanding of Aboriginal people that was set in train when, in 1788, white people first settled in the land now known as Australia.

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.
Samhain/Deep Autumn within the Creative Cosmos by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

This essay is an edited excerpt from Chapter 4 of the author’s new book A Poiesis of the Creative Cosmos: Celebrating Her within PaGaian Sacred Ceremony. Traditionally the dates for Samhain/Deep Autumn are: Northern Hemisphere – October 31st/November 1st Southern Hemisphere – April 30th/May 1st though the actual astronomical date varies. It is the meridian point or cross-quarter day between Autumn Equinox and Winter Solstice, thus actually a little later in early May for S.H., and early November for N.H., respectively. A Samhain/Deep Autumn Ceremonial Altar In this cosmology, Deep Autumn/Samhain is a celebration of She Who creates the Space to Be par excellence. This aspect of the Creative Triplicity is associated with the autopoietic quality of Cosmogenesis[i] and with the Crone/Old One of the Triple Goddess, who is essentially creative in Her process. This Seasonal Moment celebrates the process of the Crone, the Ancient One … how we are formed by Her process, and in that sense conceived by Her: it is an ‘imaginal fertility,’ a fertility of the dark space, the sentient Cosmos. It mirrors the fertility and conception of Beltaine (which is happening in the opposite Hemisphere at the same time). Some Samhain/Deep Autumn Story This celebration of Deep Autumn has been known in Christian times as “Halloween,” since the church in the Northern Hemisphere adopted it as “All Hallow’s eve” (31st October) or “All Saint’s Day” (1st November). This “Deep Autumn” festival as it may be named in our times, was known in old Celtic times as Samhain (pronounced “sow-een), which is an Irish Gaelic word, with a likely meaning of “Summer’s end,” since it is the time of the ending of the Spring-Summer growth. Many leaves of last Summer are turning and falling at this time: it was thus felt as the end of the year, and hence the New Year. It was and is noted as the beginning of Winter. It was the traditional Season for bringing in the animals from the outdoor pastures in pastoral economies, and when many of them were slaughtered. Earth’s tilt is continuing to move the region away from the Sun at this time of year. This Seasonal Moment is the meridian point of the darkest quarter of the year, between Autumn Equinox and Winter Solstice; the dark part of the day is longer than the light part of the day and is still on the increase. It is thus the dark space of the annual cycle wherein conception and dreaming up the new may occur. As with any New Year, between the old and the new, in that moment, all is possible. We may choose in that moment what to pass to the future, and what to relegate to compost. Samhain may be understood as the Space between the breaths. It is a generative Space – the Source of all. There is particular magic in being with this Dark Space. This Dark Space which is ever present, may be named as the “All-Nourishing Abyss,”[ii] the “Ever-Present Origin.”[iii] It is a generative Place, and we may feel it particularly at this time of year, and call it to consciousness in ceremony. Some Samhain/Deep Autumn Motifs The fermentation of all that has passed begins. This moment may mark the Transformation of Death – the breakdown of old forms, the ferment and rot of the compost, and thus the possibility of renewal.[iv] It is actually a movement towards form and ‘re-solution’ (as Beltaine – its opposite – begins a movement towards entropy and dissolution). With practice we begin to develop this vision: of the rot, the ferment, being a movement towards the renewal, to see the gold. And just so, does one begin to know the movement at Beltaine, towards expansion and thus falling apart, dissolution. In Triple Goddess poetics it may be expressed that the Crone’s face here at Samhain begins to change to the Mother – as at Beltaine the Virgin’s face begins to change to the Mother: the aspects are never alone and kaleidoscope into the other … it is an alive dynamic process, never static. The whole Wheel is a Creation story, and Samhain is the place of the conceiving of this Creativity, and it may be in the Spelling of it – saying what we will; and thus, beginning the Journey through the Wheel. Conception could be described as a “female-referring transformatory power” – a term used by Melissa Raphael in Thealogy and Embodiment:[v] conception happens in a female body, yet it is a multivalent cosmic dynamic, that is, it happens in all being in a variety of forms. It is not bound to the female body, yet it occurs there in a particular and obvious way. Androcentric ideologies, philosophies and theologies have devalued the event and occurrence of conception in the female body: whereas PaGaian Cosmology is a conscious affirmation, invocation and celebration of “female sacrality”[vi] as part of all sacrality. It does thus affirm the female as a place; as well as a place.[vii] ‘Conception’ is identified as a Cosmic Dynamic essential to all being – not exclusive to the female, yet it is a female-based metaphor, one that patriarchal-based religions have either co-opted and attributed to a father-god (Zeus, Yahweh, Chenrezig – have all taken on being the ‘mother’), or it has been left out of the equation altogether. Womb is the place of Creation – not some God’s index finger as is imagined in Michelangelo’s famous painting. Melissa Raphael speaks of a “menstrual cosmology”. It is an “ancient cosmology in which chaos and harmony belong together in a creation where perfection is both impossible and meaningless;”[viii] yet it is recently affirmed in Western scientific understanding of chaos, as essential to order and spontaneous emergence. Samhain is an opportunity for immersion in a deeper reality which the usual cultural trance denies. It may celebrate immersion in what is usually ‘background’ – the real world beyond and within time and space: which is actually the major portion of the Cosmos we live in.[ix] Samhain is about understanding that the Dark is a fertile place: in its decay and rot it seethes with infinite unseen complex golden threads connected to the wealth of Creativity of all that has gone before – like any …
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.
(Music) Songs for Samhain by Alison Newvine

The season of Samhain is upon us. This playlist is an offering for this descent into the sacred darkness, and a companion for the journey into the underworld. Invocation of Witches features music by Loreena McKennitt, Marya Stark, Inkubus Sukubus, Wendy Rule, my band Spiral Muse, and many others. It is a soundtrack for ceremony and each song expresses a different face of the spirit of the witch. May this Samhain season guide you gently into the dissolution of what no longer serves, the honoring of what is complete and the cultivation of the inner space that will gestate what is yet to come. https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2CFNoH9exhloz3w95P3Rlb?si=270cf01fabb8421c https://www.magoism.net/2023/10/meet-mago-contributor-alison-newvine/
(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
(Video) A Samhain Ceremony by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVRoK2XNeqw The purpose of the video is for ceremony and I suggest pausing the video where it suits you, to add your own processing, embellishments and/or your own drum, percussion and voice wherever you please. I have made short spaces in the video where it could be paused. For more full participation in the ceremony, you could have some past photos of yourself, an altar with ancestor photos, a gingerbread snake, some apples sliced up, and some apple juice. The script for this Samhain ceremony is offered in Chapter 4 of my book A Poiesis of the Creative Cosmos: Celebrating Her within PaGaian Sacred Ceremony, with all acknowledgements and references there. However I want to acknowledge here the inspiration and some text of Robin Morgan’s poem “The Network of the Imaginary Mother” in her book Lady of the Beasts, for which I was given permission in my book. I also acknowledge here the paraphrase of some words by Starhawk in her book The Spiral Dance, used in the rite of Sailing to a New World. I also use a line from the poem Song of Hecate by Bridget McKern. The elements of Water, Fire, Earth and Air on the altar in this video are placed in directions that are appropriate to my region in the Southern Hemisphere, and East Coast Australia: you may place yours differently, and transliterate when I mention the direction (which I do minimally). For the rite of the Transformation Journey (remembering old selves) I use an adaptation of a children’s game “In and Out the Windows”, where each participant travels in and out of upraised and linked arms of the circle, and when ‘in’ may speak and /or show photos of themselves from the past. Some may choose to remember any self from the entire evolutionary story, with whom they would like to identify. The game seems appropriate to what each being does existentially in so many ways, over the eons as well as in our personal lives. The chant can be found on YouTube. The photos used are a collage of footage and photos from the 2024 Samhain ceremony at my place in Wakka Wakka country, South East Queensland Australia, and from previous Samhain ceremonies I facilitated over the decades in MoonCourt, Goddess ceremonial space in NSW Australia, Darug and Gundungurra country. Music credit: All music used in this video is by Tim Wheater, which has previously generously allowed me to use in my work. The pieces used are from Tim’s CD Fish Nite Moon: they are Ancient Footsteps, Fish Nite Moon, Spiritbirth, and Conception. I thank my partner Robert (Taffy) Seaborne for his participation in the creation of the video.

(Video) Gurang (Nine Goddesses), Gaeyang Halmi (Grandma Gaeyang), and Goddess Gom: Exploring Old Magoism in Korea by Helen Hwang

Meet Mago Contributor, Helen Hye-Sook Hwang, Ph.D. Read (Photo Essay 5) Gaeyang Halmi, Sea Goddess of Korea.
(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.
(Budoji Essay 2) The Magoist Cosmogony by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

“Mago, the eponymous Goddess, is the head, ruler, and guardian of Mago-seong. She represents the eco-community of the Earth in the intergalactic universe.” [Author’s Note: This and subsequent essays are part of the forthcoming book tentatively entitled, The Magoist Cosmogony from the Budoji (Epic of the Emblem City), Translation and Interpretation, Volume 1, that I am currently writing. I am indebted to Harriet Ann Ellenberger, who has given me her prompt feedback and editorial advice in a most supportive manner. I am thankful to Dr. Glenys Livingstone, who has inspired me to write this book sooner than later. I am also grateful for Rosemary Mattingley, who has provided copy-editing of my essays in Return to Mago Webzine.] Chapter One (Translation) Mago-seong was the grand castle located in the highest place on earth. Revering the Heavenly Emblem (Cheon-bu), it succeeded the Former Heaven (Seon-cheon). There were four Heavenly Persons[i] at the four corners of the castle. They built pillars and sounded music.[ii] The eldest was named Hwang-gung (Yellow Gung),[iii] the second Cheong-gung (Blue Gung), the third Baek-so (White So), and the last Heuk-so (Black So). Mother of two Gungs was Gung-hui (Goddess Gung)[iv] and mother of two Sos was So-hui (Goddess So). Gung-hui and So-hui were the daughters of Mago. Mago was born in Jim-se (My/Our/This World).[v] Mago had no [human] emotion of pleasure and resentment. Taking the Former Heaven male and the Latter Heaven female, Mago bore two Hui Goddesses without mate. Like Mago, two Goddesses, without mate but by the emotion [of the cosmic periods], each bore two Heavenly Persons and two Heavenly Women. They were four Heavenly Persons and four Heavenly Goddesses in all. [i] Here “in” in Cheon-in 天人 is transliterated as a gender-neutral term, “beings.” It means “a person” but often transliterated as “a man.” [ii] The whole sentence can also be translated as “They made tubes and composed music.” [iii] “Ssi” in Hwang-gung-ssi 黃穹氏 intimates both a leader by name of Hwang-gung and the clan led by Hwang-gung. Other terms of “Cheong-gung-ssi,” “Baek-so-ssi,” and “Heuk-so-ssi” are used in the same way. [iv] Literally “hui” in Gung-hui 穹姬 and So-hui 巢姬 means a woman. Since it refers to Mago’s two daughters, I translated it “Goddess.” [v] “Jim” in Jim-se 朕世 can be transliterated as “my,” “our,” or “this.” ◊ Mago-seong (Mago Castle) was the grand castle located on the highest place on the Earth. Mago-seong, located on the highest mountain, is the primordial home of Mago, the Primordial Goddess, and Her descendants, human ancestors. Mago-seong also refers to the Earth itself (see Chapter 2). Mago, the eponymous Goddess, is the head, ruler, and guardian of Mago-seong. She represents the eco-community of the Earth in the intergalactic universe. Mago-seong’s location on the highest mountain symbolizes Mago-seong’s supremacy as the prototype of a Magoist state that will follow the cosmogonic event. Mago-seong’s location also indicates its proximity to the extraterrestrial cosmos, in particular to the Sun, the direct cause of the auto-genesis of all things on Earth. Mago-seong: Paradisiacal home of Mago and Her descendants, human ancestors. The axis mundi (world axis, center of the world) of the Magoist cosmogony.