(Quilt Art) The Syrian Eye Mother Goddess and her Daughter by Kaarina Kailo

Kaarina Kailo, The Syrian Eye Mother Goddess and her Daughter, 2020, 45 x 50cm

With the Ancient Votive Eye Statues one reaches to the beginning of civilization ca. 3700–3500 B.C. when the first cities sprang up in Mesopotamia and the near East. I recreated a figurine which is one of thousands of mother-daughter statues found in Tell Brak, a vast mound and one of humanity’s first cities. It was built around the same time as Ur and Sumer. Patriarchy privileges images of fathers and sons, and my quilt art seeks to redress the balance by honoring also the mother-daughter bond of matrilineal cultures.

(Meet Mago Contributor) Kaarina Kailo

2 thoughts on “(Quilt Art) The Syrian Eye Mother Goddess and her Daughter by Kaarina Kailo”

faithdivergent says:

April 24, 2024 at 3:02 PM

Such a beautiful piece of craft! I haven’t heard of the Syrian eye goddess before, but it just occurred to me that the eye motif is very similar to those found on the Pict stone carvings in Scotland. Which gives weight to Gimbutas perhaps.

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Lena Bartula says:

March 19, 2024 at 9:57 AM

How wonderful to read about the Syrian Eye Goddess. I haven’t known about her before, but now she becomes part of my research and my devotions. I will send you an article about an eye quilt collaborative project soon, that I began in November. Oh, this eye goddess is exactly what I needed today.

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(Book Excerpt 2) The Crone Initiation: Women Speak on the Menopause Journey ed. by Kay Louise Aldred, Pat Daly & Trista Hendren

[Editor’s Note: This anthology was published by Girl God Books (2022).] “Restorying Menopause: My Journeys with Inanna, Persephone and Skeleton Woman” by Sara Miller Menopause needs a reframe. We need to give this Rite of Passage, this journey of unbecoming and of becoming anew, much more respect and honour. Myth can and does provide a powerful context for restor(y)ing menopause. Goddess myths have a particular potency as they offer powerful motifs of descent and rebirth and hold many keys to our personal and collective navigations through this rite of passage. The night sweats signalled the beginning of my perimenopausal journey. I would wake drenched with sweat, tangled in cold, wet sheets, after the flush of heat had left my body. Sleep was becoming increasingly difficult, and I had enlisted the help of a Chinese Doctor to assist me. I continued with my life as a passionate and determined activist while navigating perimenopause and then along came ACIS. Andeno Carcinoma in Situ is an aggressive form of cervical dysplasia. Suddenly I was thrust into the medical system. An immediate hysterectomy was suggested and there was a sense of urgency and fear from the medical practitioners and my family. My response was to slow right down. I hit the pause button on my life and dived deeper into the Mystery of my menopausal journey. I sought guidance in many different and powerful ways, but the guidance that resonated most deeply was that of myth, those Stories Alive that assisted me on my very personal journey through ACIS, cervical cancer and eventually surgical menopause. Myths provide a powerful map for journeying through our initiations. Embedded in these tales of transformation we can see repeating patterns, of severance, transition, and return.[1] The stories of Inanna, Persephone, and Skeleton Woman were three powerful Story Guides, offering insights and terrain for navigating my journey through menopause. Severance These Goddesses were severed from the life they had known before. Skeleton Woman was thrown over a cliff, “for she had done something of which her father disapproved.” Persephone is either abducted into the underworld, or importantly in earlier myths, She willingly descends. Inanna also goes willingly into the Underworld. Severance through descent is the central to their myths, to their journeys and the transformation that follows. I too would need to descend. Severance is a separation, a tearing away from. It is psychic, and it is bodied. It is the first part of any initiation, including menopause. In my own journey with ACIS I was stepping deeply into the unknown. I had envisaged a much more graceful journey. But then I had to reckon with this disease in my cervix, and in myself. At the same time my body was tangoing with the hormonal changes of perimenopause, my 14-year-old daughter was doing her own dance with puberty. She had begun bleeding and was navigating mood swings, and some serious eye rolling, a barrage of whatever’s, and an obvious desire to generate distance from me. It was a painful time and so I turned to the mother-daughter myth of Demeter and Persephone. I found recognition in their story of separation, of loss, and of renewal. Their story gave voice to the depth of the grief I was feeling. I missed my young daughter, and the closeness we had. When Persephone willingly journeys to the underworld, “a chill passes through” Demeter. She tries to entice her daughter to stay in the world of sunshine but to no avail. Demeter must face her daughter’s departure, this rupture of their relationship, and the beginnings of Persephone’s own transformation. She must also face the change that brings for herself. Their story resonated deeply with me; the grief of letting go and the acceptance and necessity of my daughter’s own adventure through her teenage years. I, like Demeter, was required to step into trust, trusting her to journey well through this difficult period, as she navigated her own hormonal dance of becoming a woman, all the while navigating my own dance. After being diagnosed with ACIS I journeyed for a year trying to heal myself, and the Stories Alive in my cervical cells. I explored the stories in my body through somatic and shamanic work. I tended to my inner maiden, and the rupture that had occurred in my own teenage years. But 11 months and two cone biopsies later – having declined several offers to remove my womb, I was notified that ACIS had spread from my crypts, and I had cervical cancer. Left unchecked and/or undiagnosed, cervical cancer is a deadly disease. It spreads rapidly through the body. And so I made the painful decision to have a hysterectomy. With this knowing of my impending surgery I prepared for my departure. In each of these Goddess Myths there are brave souls willing to tend to the Goddesses departure. Inanna has Ninshubar, Persephone has Demeter, and Skeleton Woman has the fisherman. I too called in support. Ninshubar drums for Inanna as she descends into the underworld, and my sisters did just that for me. I also had several womb ceremonies to say goodbye to my womb, to make sacred, this sacrifice of womb to earth, of menstrual cycling to menopause. It was also necessary to cultivate my own internal Ninshubar, my witness perspective as I tended to my own ghosts and exiled parts. She sang songs of encouragement as I faced death and bade me honour the life/death/life cycles of which menopause is an important component. Death is a formidable presence in each of these stories. But it’s not only the death of the separate self as proposed in modernity. In these stories death is an integral part of a continuum of death/ life/death. Momento mori Skeleton Woman whispered to me. Momento mori, remember you will die. These whisperings were powerful reminders of the eternal cycle within menopause, and in my particular journey. Like Inanna before me, on that cold surgical table, I was naked and bowed low. My womb, cervix, fallopian …
(Art) Gaia#72: Benediction – We Who Are All Bless-ed by Deborah Jane Milton, Ph.D.

Life’s mandate: Everything created here over billions of years interconnected inextricable beholden one to the other. all sacred all hallowed all revered all sanctified No separation Holiness everywhere. (Meet Mago Contributor) Deborah Jane Milton, Ph.D. This art is included in Celebrating Seasons of the Goddess (Mago Books, 2017).
(Essay Part 3) Restoring Dea – Female Metaphor for Deity by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

This essay is the third part in a series of edited excerpts from chapter 3 of the author’s book, PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion. Before She appeared in human form, there were stones, trees, pools, fruits and animals that She either lived in or were identified with Her or parts of Her. For many peoples the stones and rocks were Her bones, the vegetation Her hair. Poppies and pomegranates and other such many-seeded flora identified Her fertility and abundance. Grain/food could represent Her. The earth itself was understood as Her belly, the mountains as places of refuge, caves providing shelter for the unborn and the dead. Primal peoples everywhere at some time understood Earth Herself as Divine One, Deity – Mother. They languaged this in different ways. The pre-Celtic indigenous Europeans named Her – the Land – as Lady Sovereignty.[1] In South-East Asia, where She has been known as Mago, Earth is Her Stronghold, the primordial home.[2] In Greece and in the West, She has been known as Gaia. Central to understanding the Female Metaphor, is understanding the sacredness of vessels, pots, containers. These objects were understood as representations of Her. Pots, urns, pitchers “made possible the long term storage of oils and grains; the transforming of raw food into cooked; … also sometimes used to store the bones and ashes of the dead.”[3] The vessel was felt as an extension of the female body that shaped life, carried the unborn, and provided nourishment. Kettle, oven, cauldron have to do with warmth and transformation; bowl, chalice and goblet are vessels of nourishment and their openness is suggestive of gift. The making and decorating of pottery was among the primordial functions of woman, often with taboos imposed on men to prevent them from going near. In later periods of human culture, in Eleusis, Rome and Peru and elsewhere the sacred vessels were supervised by the priestesses. The chalice was the holy Cup, felt as Her power to give life. Riane Eisler, in The Chalice and the Blade, compares the chalice’s power to give life with that of the blade, which is the power to take life, and develops how this was borne out culturally. In Christianity, woman was denied the right to handle the vessel as chalice – a ritual metaphor for the huge transition that had taken place in the human understanding; it was as if the female body no longer belonged to the female. Water was a central Goddess abode, as it nourished and transformed, and also contained. She was identified with the water birds and ducks. As Bird Goddess She was the life giving force, nurturing the world with moisture, giving rain, the divine food – the very milk of Her breasts. So our ancestors frequently featured breasts set in rain torrents on the jars that they made.[4] The tree as container and shelter, and also sometimes bearer of nourishment as in the fruit-bearing tree, was a central vegetative presence of Goddess. The figuring of such a tree in a negative context in later religious stories of humanity was not an arbitrary matter – this tree, particularly a fruit tree, was understood by the people of that time to be bearer of the Female Metaphor – Dea. The story was clearly a political statement, as many researchers now suggest. Some animals were identified as particularly potent with Her; the deer with its fast growing antlers speaking of Her regenerative power, the toad with its pubic shape, the bull with its crescent shaped horns, the butterfly that emerged from its dark transformative space, the bear that so powerfully protected the young, the pig with its fast growing body and soft fats. The pig’s identification with Goddess, with the Old Religion of the Land, had a lot to do with its later denigration, and to taboos on its flesh.[5] Similarly, animals with which women have been “insulted” – cow, duck, hen – are animals once sacred to the Female. The snake was especially significant as symbolic of immortality, vitality and rejuvenation because of its shedding skin. The snake’s intimacy with the earth, its knowledge of the darkness of the earth’s womb as well as the light of the upper world, made it a symbol of power and wisdom. It was a Mother-power and wisdom that the later patriarchs rejected, as evidenced in their artwork and literature. The treatment of the snake’s knowledge in the Genesis myth may be understood as a direct reference to the Old Religion. In Christian art, Mary as Goddess is often depicted standing on the snake crushing it. As the humans developed symbols, one of the earliest representations of Goddess was the downward pointing triangle, the pubic triangle. This was a recognition of the Source of life, the Gateway. Sometimes Goddess was depicted displaying her breasts, belly, genitalia, or entire naked body as a form of divine epiphany. Today, Western science has come to understand that the Universe is still rushing away from its birthplace, still expanding. The Mystery is still birthing. The Gateway still pours Itself forth. All of manifestation is divine epiphany – Her ecstatic irrepressible expression. This ancient Goddess symbol has been renewed empirically. Central to the spirituality and understanding of Great Goddess is the recurrent cycle of birth and death, the immortal/never-ending-renewal process of creation and destruction. It is a cycle seen most clearly in the moon, with its waxing, fullness and waning; which also corresponds to the body cycle of menstruation. The constant flux of things is manifest everywhere, in the seasons, in breathing, in eating. This is the nature of Goddess, Her manifestation, Her play. Anthropomorphized, this cycle is Virgin/Young One, Mother/Creator, and Crone/Old One. In Her most ancient and powerful depictions, Great Goddess embodies all three aspects – not just one; for example, Artemis is not only depicted as Virgin, in some images She clearly represents Mother and Crone too. These three aspects of the cycle, of Goddess, belong together, and together they constitute a wholeness. In …
(Meet Mago Contributor) Mary Beth Moser

Mary Beth Moser, PhD is passionate about the cultural history of her ancestral homeland of northern Italy. Her publications include “The Everyday Spirituality of Women in the Italian Alps: A Trentino American Woman’s Search for Spiritual Agency, Folk Wisdom, and Ancestral Values.” (ProQuest, 2013), and “Honoring Darkness: Exploring the Power of Black Madonnas in Italy,” along with several published essays. In addition to writing, traveling and giving presentations, she dreams under the night skies of her island home in the Northwest US.
(Video) Spring Equinox Goddess Slideshow by Glenys Livingstone

When EarthGaia our Planet reaches the midpoint of Her orbit between the Solstices – the last ones being Winter in the South, and Summer in the North, it is an Equinox Moment @ EarthGaia, a moment of balance of dark and light for the whole Planet. In the Southern Hemisphere it is the Season of Spring Equinox/Eostar with the balance about to tip into increasing light after the dominance of dark for six months. This balance moment in the light part of the annual cycle may be associated poetically with the joyful return of the Beloved One who has gained new Wisdom from the depths … after long and lost wanderings. The returning Beloved One may be understood as a redeemer figure – the Seed of Life that never fades away. It is a “resurrection” – the original, and organic to being. It is a Moment of certain emergence, and knowing the joy and power of being.
(Prose Part 1) The Bear Goddess in Europe by Sara Wright

“It is very peaceful with the bears; the people say that’s the reason human beings seldom return.” Leslie Marmon Silko The mythology of the Bear Goddess has its roots in all continents and appears in all circumpolar cultures. The giant carnivorous nine-foot cave bear was antecedent to all. The themes of the bear first as an image of the Bear Goddess as Great Mother, guardian, celestial guide, shapeshifter, marriage partner, soul bridge, healer, and agent of renewal are present in all these cultures. In this essay we will seek out the Bear Goddess as she manifests in these guises in Europe.
(Poem) Fragrant Sacrifice by Melissa LaFlamme

Some wounds will not let go. They have not come for that. What pains you, shapes your soul, has come to claim you, call you to your knees, instruct you, induct you, reveal to you the elixir in your heart, the Mystery in wilder, natural ways, in the ways they taught you to turn from, to fear. To snuff.
(Essay 2) The Terms ‘Feminine’ and ‘Masculine’ by Glenys Livingstone

This essay is the second part of an evolved version of an excerpt from Chapter 2 of her book PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion. In the first part of this topic, I described dimensions of what I consider to be confusions about the terms “feminine” and “masculine”, and the general lack of clarity about the popular use of them to qualify aspects of being. I asserted that “wholeness” does not have to be understood in terms of a “feminine” plus “masculine” equation, and that the Universe was apparently not actually formed by “female” plus “male” energy, as is often loosely proclaimed: Cosmic creativity proceeded long before the advent of the male/gender (at about one and a half billion years ago),[i] and even before the advent of the biosphere – the first cell (at about three point eight billion years ago).[ii] The qualities of femaleness and maleness may be something quite different from any cultural designations of “feminine”and “masculine”, and do not appear to be essential to the Creativity of the Universe. I spoke for the unfolding of a cosmology wherein the Mother-of-All/Creatrix may be known to be a complete and whole unity of Creativity: characterised by a triplicity – not a duality, a “power of three”, as Marija Gimbutas described the apparently noted Creativity represented in ancient images of female Deity – Goddess.[iii] It is a triplicity that many cultures understood to characterize the essence of Cosmogenesis, and which has been identified frequently – in symbol and in anthropomorphic image – with female metaphor in a myriad of ways. Another dimension to the confusion about the use of the terms “feminine” and “masculine” is the lack of clarity about the primordial nature of the cosmic power of Allurement – a “Power” that cosmologist Brian Swimme lists among others as “coursing through the Universe and each of us”[iv]: present primordially, before the advent of maleness or gender. Allurement itself, or Holy Lust as it may be termed,[v] unites the Cosmos: Desire itself unites the Cosmos, not the subject/object of the desire, and it is a reduction to imagine/assert that it is simply female plus male that unites the Cosmos, or our psyches. This may be lovely poetry – a metaphor and an experience, where the Power does occur, but it is not bound to this relationship. All being knows it – within the self and in relationship. Masculinity or maleness is a particular physical expression that can give rise to its own symbolism – but the interpretation of that symbolism is something else. For example, the phallus can be passive, vulnerable and flower-like if the mind-frame is shifted. The Green Man metaphor may be developed as a deeply relational story – of “male-referring transformatory powers” as it may be termed[vi]: and there are some who are doing that well in recent times.[vii] The story of maleness as innately “active, dominant, inflexible”, by association with the phallus, is a patriarchal one that can be changed: and perhaps it was different in an earlier mythic era,[viii] and still so in some survivng Indigenous cultures. “Masculinity” and “femininity” are largely cultural developments – developed over time by story, belief systems, even the foods each sex have been allowed to eat in some cultures, the activities they each have been allowed, so that certain styles, physical and psychic, have been bred into and out of maleness and femaleness to suit the mindframe. “Maleness” and “femaleness” may be something quite different and more like a physical kaleidoscope: and it was a very creative move at a relatively recent point in the evolutionary story, that did enhance the Cosmogenetic enterprise of differentiation, communion and autopoiesis/subjectivity – a threefold Creativity unfolding the Cosmos.[ix] Both, and all genders on the kaleidoscope, are embraced and immersed in the same Creative Dynamic of Being that preceded their evolution, and both and all may be described as exhibiting the three manifesting powers of Cosmogenesis.
(Photo Essay 2) Goddess Pilgrimage 2018 by Kaalii Cargill

[Author’s Note: In May 2018, I set out on a 3 month pilgrimage to Greece, Turkey and the prehistory sites of “Old Europe”. Once again my main focus was “visiting with the Grandmothers”.] GREECE continued Visiting with the Grandmothers – – at the National Archeological Museum in Athens: – at the Benaki Museum in Athens: – at museums in ancient Corinth and Mycenae (c1300 BCE): – at the Archeological Museum in Thessalonika (Neolithic): Meet Mago Contributor Kaalii Cargill

(Special Post) Why I choose to be an RTM contributor by Glenys Livingstone

The contribution of my writing to Return to Mago E-Magazine has evolved since it began four years ago, into a deeply mutually enhancing relationship. The time and effort taken to write carefully and in alignment with my heartfelt passions and insights, and then to be able to publish to a receptive audience, has always been rewarding – for me personally and apparently for many who received it.
(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.
(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.

Beltaine/High Spring within the Creative Cosmos by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

This essay is an edited excerpt from Chapter 8 of the author’s new book A Poiesis of the Creative Cosmos: Celebrating Her within PaGaian Sacred Ceremony. Traditionally the dates for Beltaine/High Spring are: Southern Hemisphere – October 31st or 1st November Northern Hemisphere – April 30th (May Eve) or 1st May though the actual astronomical date varies. It is the meridian point or cross-quarter day between Spring Equinox and Summer Solstice, thus actually a little later in early November for S.H., and early May for N.H., respectively. The twin fires lit in older times on hilltops in Ireland for Beltaine likely represented the two eyes of night and day.[i] With this vision, Goddess as Sun and Moon sees Her Land, and with the power of Her eyes (Sun and Moon) brings forth life and beauty. With the fire eyes, Goddess“reoccupied and saw her whole land…”[ii] The twin fires later came to be used to run cattle between as they headed out to Summer pasture, for the purpose of burning off the bugs and ticks of Winter; the fires may thus be understood to serve a cleansing effect and likely the origins of the tradition of the ceremonial leaping of flames by participants in Beltaine festivities. In PaGaian Cosmology this is poetically expressed as the Flame of Love that burns away the psyche’s “bugs and ticks,” and sees the Beauty present, and calls it forth. The Beltaine flames may be a celebration of Sun entering into the eye, into the whole bodymind: a powerful creative evocation upon which the Dance of Life depends, and as the cleansing power of love and pleasure. PaGaian focus for Beltaine is on the Holy Desire/Passion for life, and it may be accounted for on as many levels as possible … the complete holarchy/dimensions of the erotic power. On an elemental level, there is our desire for Air, Water, the warmth of Fire, and to be of use/service to Earth. There is an essential longing, sometimes nameless, sometimes constellated, experienced physically, that may be recognized as the Desire of the Universe Herself – desiring in us.[iii] We may remember that we are united in this desire with each other, with all who have gone before us, and with all who come after us – all who dance the Dance of Life. Beltaine is a time for dancing and weaving into our lives, our heart’s desires; traditionally the dance is done with participants holding ribbons attached to a pole or tree (a Maypole in the Northern Hemisphere, which may be renamed as a “Novapole” in the Southern Hemisphere), wrapping the pole with the ribbons. This is not simply the heterosexual metaphor as is thought in modern times (thanks largely to Freudian thinking) – it is deeper than that. As Caitlin and John Matthews point out: it is symbolic of a far greater exchange than that between men and women – in fact between the elements themselves. … the maypole, a comparatively recent manifestation in the history of mystery celebrations, can be seen as the linking of heaven and earth, binding those who dance around it … into a pattern of birth, life and death which lay at the heart of the maze of earth mysteries.[iv] Beltaine is a celebration of Desire on all levels – microcosm and on the macrocosm, the exoteric and the esoteric.[v] It brought you forth physically, and it brings forth all that you produce in your life, and it keeps the Cosmos spinning. It is felt in you as Desire, it urges you on. It is the deep awesome dynamic that pervades the Cosmos and brings forth all things – babies, meals, gardens, careers, books and solar systems. We have often been taught, certainly by religious traditions, to pay it as little attention as possible; whereas it should be the cause of much more meditation/attention, tracing it to its deepest place in us. What are our deepest desires beneath our surface desires. What if we enter more deeply into this feeling, this power? It may be a place where the Universe is a deep reciprocity – a receiving and giving that is One. Brian Swimme says, in a whole chapter on “Allurement”: You can examine your own self and your own life with this question: Do I desire to have this pleasure? Or rather, do I desire to become pleasure? The demand to ‘have,’ to possess, always reveals an element of immaturity. To keep, to hold, to control, to own; all of this is fundamentally a delusion, for our own truest desire is to be and to live. We have ripened and matured when we realize that our own deepest desire in erotic attractions is to become pleasure … to enter ecstatically into pleasure so that giving and receiving pleasure become one simple activity. Our most mature hope is to become pleasure’s source and pleasure’s home simultaneously. So it is with the allurements of life: we become beauty to ignite the beauty of others.[vi] Beltaine is a good time to contemplate this animal bodymind that you are: how it seeks real pleasure. What is your real pleasure? Be gracious with this bodymind and in awe of this form, this wonder. Beltaine is also a good time to contemplate light, and its affects on our bodyminds as it enters into us; how our animal bodyminds respond directly to the Sun’s light, which apparently may awaken physical desires. Light vibrates into us – different wavelengths as different colours – and shifts to pulse. It is felt most fully in Springtime (“spring fever”), as light courses down a direct neural line from retina to pineal gland. When the pineal gland receives the light pulse it releases “a cascade of hormones, drenching the body in hunger, thirst, or great desire.”[vii] We respond directly to Sun as an organism: it is primal. NOTES: [i] Michael Dames, Ireland, 195-199. [ii] Ibid., 196. [iii] I have been inspired and informed by Swimme’s articulations about desire, particularly in Canticle to the Cosmos, video 2 “The Primeval Fireball,” video 5 “Destruction and Loss,” and video 10 “The Timing of Creativity.” [iv] Matthews, The Western Way, 54. And for more, see “Creativity …
(Prose) Desire: the Wheel of Her Creativity by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

This essay is an edited excerpt from the concluding chapter (Chapter 8) of the author’s book PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion. Place of Being is a passionate place, where desire draws forth what is sought, co-creates what is needed[1]; within a con-text – a story – where love of self, other and all-that-is are indistinguishable … they are nested within each other and so is the passion for being. I begin to understand desire afresh: this renewed understanding has been an emergent property of the religious practice of seasonal celebration: that is, the religious practice of the ceremonial celebration of Her Creativity. It has been said She is “that which is attained at the end of desire[2].” Within the context of ceremonial engagement and inner search for Her, I begin to realize how desire turns the Wheel. As the light part of the cycle waxes from Early Spring, form/life builds in desire. At Beltaine/High Spring, desire runs wild, at Summer Solstice, it peaks into creative fullness, union … and breaks open at that interchange into the dark part of the cycle – the dissolution of Lammas/ Late Summer. She becomes the Dark One, who receives us back – the end of desire. It has been a popular notion in the Christian West, that the beautiful virgin lures men (sic) to their destruction, and as I perceive the Wheel, it is indeed Virgin who moves in Her wild delight towards entropy/dissolution; however in a cosmology that is in relationship with the dark, this is not perceived as a negative thing. Also, in this cosmology, there is the balancing factor of the Crone’s movement towards new life, in the conceiving dark space of Samhain/Deep Autumn – a dynamic and story that has not been a popular notion in recent millennia. Desire seems not so much a grasping, as a receiving, an ability or capacity to open and dissolve. I think of an image of an open bowl as a signifier of the Virgin’s gift. The increasing light is received, and causes the opening, which will become a dispersal of form – entropy, if you like: this is Beltaine/High Spring – the Desire[3]that is celebrated is a movement towards dis-solution … that is its direction. In contrast, and in balance, Samhain/Deep Autumn celebrates re-solution, which is a movement towards form – it is a materializing gathering into form, as the increasing darkness is received. It seems it is darkness that creates form, as it gathers into itself – as many ancient stories say, and it is light that creates dispersal. And yet I see that the opposite is true also. I think of how there is desire for this work that I have done, for whatever one does – it is then already being received. Desire is receiving. What if I wrote this, and it was not received or welcomed in some way. But the desire for it is already there, and perhaps the desire made it manifest. Perhaps the desire draws forth manifestation, even at Winter Solstice, even at Imbolc/Early Spring, as we head towards Beltaine – it is desire that is drawing that forth, drawing that process around. Desire is already receiving; it is open. Its receptivity draws forth the manifestation. And then the manifestation climaxes at Summer and dissolves into the manifesting, which is perhaps where the desire is coming from – the desire is in the darkness, in the dark’s receptivity[4]. It becomes very active at the time of Beltaine, it lures the differentiated beings back into Her. So the lure at Beltaine is the luring of differentiated beings into a Holy Lust, into a froth and dance of life, whereupon they dissolve ecstatically back into Her – She is “that which is attained at the end of Desire.” And in the dissolution, we sink deeper into that, and begin again. All the time, it is Desire that is luring the manifest into the manifesting, and the manifesting into the manifest. Passion is the glue, the underlying dynamic that streams through it all – through the light and the dark, through the creative triplicities of Virgin-Mother-Crone, of Differentiation-Communion-Autopoeisis[5]. Passion/Desire then is worthy of much more contemplation. If desire/allurement is the same cosmic dynamic as gravity, as cosmologist Brian Swimme suggests[6], then desire like gravity is the dynamic that links/holds us to our Place, to “that which is”, as philosopher Linda Holler describes the effect of gravity[7]. Held in relationship by desire/allurement we lose abstraction and artificial boundaries, and “become embodied and grow heavy with the weight of the earth[8].” We then know that “being is being-in relation-to”[9]. Holler says that when we think with the weight of Earth, space becomes “thick” as this “relational presence … turns notes into melodies, words into phrases with meaning, and space into vital forms with color and content, (and) also holds the knower in the world[10].”Thus, I at last become a particular, a subject, a felt being in the world – a Place laden with content, sentient: continuous with other and all-that-is. Notes: [1]“…as surely as the chlorophyll molecule was co-created by Earth and Sun, as Earth reached for nourishment; as surely as the ear was co-created by subject and sound, as the subject reached for an unknown signal.” As I have written in PaGaian Cosmology, p. 248. [2]Doreen Valiente, The Charge of the Goddessas referred to in Starhawk, The Spiral Dance, p.102-103. [3]I capitalize here, for it is a holy quality. [4]Perhaps the popular cultural association of the darkness/black lingerie etc. with erotica is an expression/”memory” of this deep truth. [5]These are the three qualities of Cosmogenesis, as referred to in PaGaian Cosmology, Chapter 4, “Cosmogenesis and the Female Metaphor”: https://pagaian.org/book/chapter-4/ [6]Brian Swimme, The Universe is a Green Dragon, p.43. [7]Linda Holler, “Thinking with the Weight of the Earth: Feminist Contributions to an Epistemology of Concreteness”, Hypatia, Vol. 5 No. 1, p.2. [8]Linda Holler, “Thinking with the Weight of the Earth: Feminist Contributions to an Epistemology of Concreteness”,Hypatia, Vol. …
(Essay) Walking with Bb by Sara Wright

Walking with Bb: a story exploring the psychic connection between one woman and her bear. Preface: The black bear – hunting season in Maine is brutal – four months of bear hell – five if one includes the month where hunters can track bears for “practice” with hounds – separate mothers and cubs, terrorize them, tree them and do anything but legally kill them. During the legal slaughter, Hunters bait bears with junk food by putting old donuts etc. in cans and shoot the bear while he or she is eating. Most bears (82 percent) are slaughtered in this manner, the rest are killed by hounding and trapping. The season begins in August and lasts through December. Trapping, by the way, is illegal in every state but Maine. Black bears are hated, and that hatred will, of course, eventually result in their extirpation. I had a shy (male) year old black bear visiting my house this past summer with whom I developed a friendship, and what follows is part of our story: Last Saturday I was walking down the road when I remembered that I had not done my daily “circle of protection” imaging for Bb (standing as he was the day he visited me at the window early in August). When I began to do this another picture of Bb moving on all four feet with his face turned towards mine super-imposed itself over his standing image. I could almost see his expression, but not quite. I didn’t know what this imaging meant beyond that we were communicating in some unknown way, and he was in the area (not a good thing on hunting Saturdays). He had not been coming in most nights and I was worried… That night he came. He is still making nightly visits five days later, the most sequentially consistent visits since September 15th, the day I believed that he had been shot. This experience prompted me to write about telepathy and precognition. It is close to All Hallows and the full Hunter’s moon (Nov 3). I keep listening to Charlie Russell’ story which reminds me that loving bears (especially male bears) is hard, almost a sure recipe for disaster, and that I was not alone in this deep concern for and fear of losing Bb. I can barely stand to remember my other bear losses and I can’t stand feeling them. Even after I wrote about the incident with Bb, the experience seemed to carry a charge that didn’t dissipate. Had I missed something? Next I wrote “Root Healer,” exploring the possibility that as I continued to act as Bb’s “little bear mother” now employing psychic techniques to keep him safe (in some desperation as it was the only means left open to me to protect this very vulnerable yearling), that Bb’s presence might also include a gift for me and that it might involve some kind of root healing for my body because Nature thrives on reciprocity. One idea I missed completely, for it was so obvious. Bb’s image was communicating to me that we were having a psychic conversation in that very moment. It was the first time in three months of imaging protective circles that moved with him that I had confirmation from him that we were communicating effectively in this unknown way. This rarely happens. Normally when I do this kind of work, I just do it. I don’t get direct confirmation that it’s working from the animal itself (except with Lily b). Knowing this helped me make another decision I might not have made so intentionally. The hunting season will last into mid December, and I will be traveling during that last month. I keep thinking that putting actual physical distance between Bb and I might pose more of a threat for his life and I have to remind myself that psychic phenomena are not distance dependent. I should be able to image that protective circle every day and feel that it is working. Bb has already shown me that it can but I fear adding distance because I don’t completely trust my own perceptions.* I suspect believing might be an additional dimension of ensuring success when it comes to psychic protection for this bear. But how do I incorporate belief into a picture that is so clouded with personal/cultural doubt? Half the time I don’t believe myself and virtually no one except Rupert Sheldrake, Iren and Harriet have ever taken my experiences seriously. I have to remind myself that I have done this work many times dealing with doubt and it worked anyway. The point of writing this reflection might be to put me on a new edge of increasing Bb’s odds of survival. If it’s possible that an attitude that embraces believing in what I do could help me protect Bb more effectively until hunting is over and its time for him to den in peace I want to claim it. The question I need to answer now is how to go about moving into a more trusting self as a woman who continues to walk with a bear at her side? The night after I wrote the above paragraph I dream of the doubters in the roles of my parents, and in a friend. I take these dreams seriously as doubters inside me and out. These dreams may be telling me that it is unreasonable to expect me to believe that what I do works when no one else does? The problem with this idea is that on some level I do believe. I feel as if I am walking with this bear, every single day. I think about him constantly. The only thing that got me out of the house yesterday was that he was out of chocolate donuts. Something is intensifying my relationship with Bb although I never see him. I am caught in a field of bear energy and information, perhaps through some version of beauty and the beast. That an archetype is …
(Prose) Halcyon for the Season by Deanne Quarrie

A bird for this season is the Kingfisher, also known as the Halcyon. The Kingfisher is associated in Greek myth with the Winter Solstice. There were fourteen “halcyon days” in every year, seven of which fell before the winter solstice, seven after; peaceful days when the sea was smooth as a pond and the hen-halcyon built a floating nest and hatched out her young. She also had another habit, that of carrying her dead mate on her back over the sea and mourning him with a plaintive cry. Pliny reported that the halcyon was rarely seen and then only at the winter and summer solstices and at the setting of the Pleiades. She was therefore, a manifestation of the Moon-Goddess who was worshiped at the two solstices as the Goddess of Life in Death and Death in Life and, when the Pleiades set, she sent the sacred king his summons for death. Kingfishers are typically stocky, short-legged birds with large heads and large, heron-like beaks. They feed primarily on fish, hovering over the water or watching intently from perches and they plunge headlong into the water to catch their prey. Their name, Alcedinidae, stems from classical Greek mythology. Alcyone, Daughter of the Wind, was so distraught when her husband perished in a shipwreck that she threw herself into the sea. Both were then transformed into kingfishers and roamed the waves together. When they nested on the open sea, the winds remained calm and the weather balmy. Still another Alcyone, Queen of Sailing, was the mystical leader of the seven Pleiades. The heliacal rising of the Pleiades in May marked the beginning of the navigational year and their setting marked the end. Alcyone, as Sea Goddess protected sailors from rocks and rough weather. The bird, halcyon continued for centuries to be credited with the magical power of allaying storms. Shakespeare refers to this legend in this passage from Hamlet: Some say that ever ‘gainst that season comes Wherein our Saviour’s birth is celebrated, The bird of dawning singeth all night long; And then, they say, no spirit can walk abroad; The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike, No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm, So hallow’d and so gracious is the time. Hamlet, I, i 157 When I was a young mother, and my children were little, we lived in a house that had a creek in the back yard. There were small trees along the far bank of this creek and every day, a kingfisher would sit in the branches overlooking the creek. Sometimes he sat there very quietly for a very long time. Suddenly he would dive from his perch straight into the creek. Every time he did he came out and up into the air with a fish. It gave me great pleasure to watch him from my kitchen window. I love birds. I love learning about their habits because it teaches me ways of being that are closer to nature. I love drawing birds as well. When I was a young and more able, I was an avid bird watcher, out with my friends hoping for a sight never seen before. I love the story of the kingfisher and her connection to the Halcyon Days of the Winter Solstice. It is for most of us the busiest time of year. Whether it is for the Solstice or Christmas (often both) we are in a frenzy to get things done, making sure everything is just right and perfect. I celebrate the Winter Solstice. As a priestess, my days right now are very busy creating ritual. It is at the Solstice that many passage rites are happening with the women I work with. And of course, I celebrate with my family with our magical Yule Log each year. But I try to honor those seven days before and the seven days after by trying to have the frantic moments before the Halcyon Days begin and then even when busy, hold the peace and calm of that beautiful smooth sea in my mind. Peace and love and joy surrounding the Winter Solstice make it perfect. May the Peace of a Halcyon Sea be yours in this Solstice Season. Do hold the image of that little kingfisher in mind! Meet Mago Contributor, Deanne Quarrie
Imbolc: Through Goddess Eyes by Carolyn Lee Boyd

Photo by Carolyn Lee Boyd In times past, Creation’s Winter cupped me in her icy hand of sanctuary Gathered in, I sucked dormant life, and slumbered Till Earth’s rebirthing groans awakened my new body Now, older and full of life’s weeping and wondering awe At all that has happened in my decades on Earth I must shake myself into consciousness My seed’s opaque, blinding hull disintegrates and Bodyless, at last I can see through Goddess eyes I ache as my blood paints each flower petal I spin the whirlwind that cannot stop creating abundance I push the seasons through the year that mortals believe revolve of their own accord. Through Goddess eyes I can see me, I inhabit Winter’s hand as my own. I make the cold to slow creation of outside of me To gather the seed into fertile stillness within. That burgeons in my own time. https://www.magoism.net/2016/08/meet-mago-contributor-carolyn-lee-boyd/
(Slideshow) Summer Solstice Goddess by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

Sekhmet by Katlyn Each year between December 20-23 Sun reaches Her peak in the Southern Hemisphere: it is the Summer Solstice Moment. Poetry of the Season may be expressed in this way: This is the time when the light part of day is longest. You are invited to celebrate SUMMER SOLSTICE Light reaches Her fullness, and yet… She turns, and the seed of Darkness is born. This is the Season of blossom and thorn – for pouring forth the Gift of Being. The story of Old tells that on this day Beloved and Lover dissolve into the single Song of ecstasy – that moves the worlds. Self expands in the bliss of creativity. Sun ripens in us: we are the Bread of Life. We celebrate Her deep Communion and Reciprocity. Glenys Livingstone, 2005 The choice of images for the Season is arbitrary; there are so many more that may express Her fullness of being, Her relational essence and Her Gateway quality at this time. 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 Summer Solstice. 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=syTBjWpw3XU Shalako Mana Hopi 1900C.E. (Hallie Iglehart Austen, The Heart of the Goddess), Corn Mother. Food is a miracle, food is sacred. She IS the corn, the corn IS Her. She gives Herself to feed all. The food/She is essential to survival, hospitality and ceremony … and all of this is transmuted in our beings. Sekhmet Contemporary image by Katlyn. Egyptian Sun Goddess. Katlyn says: Her story includes the compassionate nature of destruction. The fierce protection of the Mother is sometimes called to destroy in order to preserve well being. And Anne Key expresses: She represents “the awesome and awe-full power of the Sun. This power spans the destructive acts of creation and the creative acts of destruction.”- (p.135 Desert Priestess: a memoir).A chant in Her praise by Abigail Spinner McBride: Sheila-na-gig 900C.E. British Isles. (Hallie Iglehart Austen, The Heart of the Goddess). From Elinor Gadon The Once and Future Goddess (p.338): “She is remembered in Ireland as the Old Woman who gave birth to all races of human…. In churches her function was to ward off evil”, or to attract the Pagan peoples to the church. From Adele Getty Goddess (p.66): “The first rite of passage of all human beings begins in the womb and ends between the thighs of the Great Mother. In India, the vulva “known as the yoni, is also called cunti or kunda, the root word of cunning, cunt and kin … (the yoni) was worshipped as an object of great mystery … the place of birth and the place where the dead are laid to rest were often one and the same.” Getty says her message here in this image “is double-edged: the opening of her vulva and the smile on her face elicit both awe and terror; one might venture too far inside her and never return to the light of day …” as with all caves and gates of initiation. In the Christian mind the yoni clearly became the “gates of hell”. And as Helene Cixous said in her famous feminist article “The Laugh of the Medusa”: “Let the priests tremble, we’re going to show them our sexts!” (SIGNS Summer 1976) Kunapipi (Australia) “the Aboriginal mother of all living things, came from a land across the sea to establish her clan in Northern Australia, where She is found in both fresh and salt water. In the Northern Territory She is known as Warramurrungundgi. She may also manifest Herself as Julunggul, the rainbow snake goddess of initiations who threatens to swallow children and then regurgitate them, thereby reinforcing the cycle of death and rebirth. In Arnhem Land She is Ngaljod …” (Visions of the Goddess by Courtney Milne and Sherrill Miller – thanks to Lydia Ruyle). More information: re Kunapipi. NOTE the similarity to Gobekli Tepe Sheela Turkey 9600B.C.E., thanks Lydia Ruyle.Lydia Ruyle’s Gobekli Tepe banner. Inanna/Ishtar Mesopotamia 400 B.C.E. (Adele Getty, Goddess: Mother of Living Nature) She holds Her breasts displaying her potency. She is a superpower who feeds the world, nourishes it with Her being. We all desire to feel this potency of being: Swimme and Berry express: “the infinite striving of the sentient being”. Adele Getty calls this offering of breasts to the world “a timeless sacred gesture”. Mary Mother of God 1400 C.E. Europe (Hallie Iglehart Austen, The Heart of the Goddess). A recognition, even in the patriarchal context that She contains it all. Wisdom and Compassion Tibetan Goddess and God in Union. This is Visvatara and Vajrasattva 1800C.E. (Sacred Sexuality A.T. Mann and Jane Lyle). Sri Yantra Hindu meditation diagram of union of Goddess and God. 1500 C.E. (Sacred Sexuality A.T. Mann and Jane Lyle, p.75). “Goddess and God” is the common metaphor, but it could be “Beloved and Lover”, and so it is in the mind of many mystics and poets: that is, the sacred union is of small self with larger Self. Prajnaparamita the Mother of all Buddhas. (The Great Mother Erich Neumann, pl 183). She is the Wisdom to whom Buddha aspired, Whom he attained. Medusa Contemporary, artist unknown. She is a Sun Goddess: this is one reason why it was difficult to look Her in the eye. See Patricia Monaghan, O Mother Sun! REFERENCES: Gadon, Elinor W. The Once and Future Goddess. Northamptonshire: Aquarian, 1990. Getty, Adele. Goddess: Mother of Living Nature. London: Thames and Hudson, 1990. Iglehart Austen, Hallie. The Heart of the Goddess.Berkeley: Wingbow, 1990. Katlyn, artist https://www.mermadearts.com/b/altar-images-art-by-katlyn Key, Anne. Desert Priestess: a memoir. NV: Goddess Ink, 2011. Mann A.T. and …

(Bell Essay 2) Ancient Korean Bells and Magoism by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

Part II Overall Structure and Parts of the Ancient Korean Bell The ancient Korean bell takes on the female form figuratively. In other words, its female implication is expressed symbolically rather than descriptively. Unlike the ancient Greek bell that literally depicts a woman’s body (See Bell Essay 1), the ancient Korean bell characterizes female anatomy with symbols and designs. Neither limbs nor a human face is seen. Instead, breasts and nipples are stylized. The head is represented by a dragon. The belly is adorned with the relief of celestial nymphs. The female symbology that the bell invokes is not limited to the material body of the bell only, however. The legend of a female child sacrifice to the casting of the bell should be taken in the light of its female symbology. Likewise, the inscription made on the Sangwonsa Jong indicating that the commissioner was a woman needs to be taken into consideration. Foremost, the Magoist cosmogony that attributes cosmic music to ultimate creativity holds the key to unlock the very purpose of the bell: The bell is created to sound the Call of Mago, the Great Goddess. Visualizing Her, the bell emits the Sound of Mago for which its sacredness is explained. The bell, if we call it Buddhist, redefines Buddhism, Korean Buddhism, to be precise. It calls people to the arcane knowledge of the female origin. These points are to be discussed in more detail in the forthcoming sequels. In this part, I discuss the overall structure of the bell and examine some major characteristics of its parts. An ancient Korean bell consists of two parts: the bell’s body (jongsin) and the dragon loop (yongnu). The bell’s body part includes the Nipples, the Bell Breast, the Breast Circumference, Bell’s Belly, Celestial Nymphs, Bell’s Mouth, the Striking Seat, the Heavenly Plate, the Upper Support, and the Lower Support. And the dragon loop part includes the Dragon Loop and the Dragon Tube (Sound Tube). In addition, the piece of wood (mallet) that is designed to strike the bell on Dangjwa (Striking Seat) is called Dangmok (the Striking Wood). It also requires an Ullimtong (Depressed Ground for Sound Transmission) for the sound waves to travel. Each part, as a microcosm, adds to the beauty and function of the bell. Images sculpted including foliage, flower, lotus, humans, celestial nymphs, breasts, nipples, and dragon are achieved in sophistication. Artistic mastery is sublime. Behold! The bell is a metaphor of not only the body of a woman, the vulva in particular, but also what she is, her purpose! The bell transforms the female to the divine, the Goddess. Now I invite the reader to take note of the overall shape of the bell made in the form of a large Korean crock (hangari) placed upside down. The curved line drawn from top to bottom with the diameter of its mouth smaller than that of the belly is another distinguishing feature. In fact, there are quite a few features that distinguish ancient Korean bells from the bells of China and Japan. The parts that I illustrated above, in particular the nine Nipples, the Bell Breast, the Dragon Tube, Celestial Nymphs, and the Striking Seat, are its representative characteristics. As a percussion instrument, the ancient Korean bell epitomizes precision and sophistication. Everything contained on the surface of the bell is made to resonate with the inner hollow to maximize the travel of sound waves. As shown below in the figure, even the metal residue remaining on the inner wall plays a key role, creating the sound waves. Without those irregular lumps, the sound will have a far lower frequency making fewer waves. In other words, the rough surface of the inner hollow is intentional. Beauty and functionality are conjoined to create the sound of the Goddess. Functional parts such as the Dragon Loop, Dragon Tube (or Sound Tube), and the Striking Seat are seamlessly integrated with the artistry. The Dragon Loop is there to represent the divinity of the Goddess and at once to be used as a hook for hanging. The Dragon Tube open-ended upward is there to vent out the impurity of the sound. When all is said and done, it is designed not just to please the eye but to awaken the mind to seek. The bell in its mesmerizing beauty wakes up the mind of people, otherwise made dull or dormant under patriarchal inflictive routines. Buddhists might say that the reality to which the sound calls is “the way things are” or “suchness.” However, such understanding is only a tingle of the patriarchal mind that refuses to hear the deeper call. The bell awakens people to the reality of the Goddess. Each striking carries the pulse of Mago, the Great Goddess. Sources: Norugwi. [http://blog.daum.net/euijj31/11296149] Cultural Heritage Administration [http://www.cha.go.kr/main/KorIndex!korMain.action] Sin Hyeongjun. “Why is the Sound of Bell beautiful? The Delicacy of the Striking Spot… The Uneven Thickness Creates Sound Waves” Choson Ilbo, October, 9, 2001. (To be continued in Part III, Read Part I)
(Budoji Essay 4) The Magoist Cosmogony by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

Part 4: Magoist Origin of Immortals “I maintain that Immortals originally refers to Mago’s descendants in Mago Castle, the Primordial Paradise. They are the primordial clan community of the Mago Species, comprised of the divine, demigods, and humans.” [This is a translation and interpretation of the Budoji (Epic of the Emblem City), principal text of Magoism. Read the translation of Chapter 1 of the Budoji.] Magoist Origin of Immortals: All in the Mago Species are given the original nature of immortality or transcendence. Readers are advised to set aside the literal meaning in the English language of the words immortals or transcendents. Immortals is a translation of the East Asian term seon (仙, xian in Chinese). I choose the translation immortals over transcendents not because it is a better translation but because it is the most commonly used term by Western Daoist translators.[i] Although it is known as a Daoist term, I hold that it is pre-Daoist, namely Magoist, in origin. Primarily, it refers to the Mago Species (Mago and Her descendants) who dwelt in Mago Castle, the primordial home, to be discussed in detail in later chapters. Likewise, historical figures known as Immortals are Magoist rather than Daoist.
(Essay 2) Making the Gynocentric Case: Mago, the Great Goddess of East Asia, and Her Tradition Magoism by Helen Hwang

[Editor’s note: Numbers of endnotes differ from the original ones in the article] Reconstructing Gynocentric Korean Identity Scholars in the West, upon assessing a religion or deity of the non-Western world, tend to pair the topic with a modern nation. Thus, they often project their modern knowledge of the nation or culture onto the indigenous religion or deity they study. Such a methodology betrays the assumption that the modern notion of national identities is time-proven and bias-free. In this process, one’s perception of other people’s cultural expression is molded by Western-made modern knowledge of that people. This kind of knowledge ceases to exist outside the Western mind. Some go further to point out that the religious expression of a non-Western country in point is colored by the air of nationalism that is culturally on the rise in that country. This kind of assessment suggests the idea that a cultural expression fostered by nationalist zeal is inauthentic or impure and therefore of less value for study. While such conclusions are not necessarily wrong, I find it misguided. Done so, it prepares the ground for Western scholars to wield the authority of Western hegemony over the non-Western world. Precisely, it is blind to the fact that no cultural expression in modern times is free from nationalist ethos. Modern life is inherently shaped by the shade of nationalism whether it is in a non-Western world or a Western world. In my view, the question to be asked is: How can we assess a religious expression of a people beyond the modern notion of national identities? Or how can we go beneath the modern notion of national identities in order to assess a religious expression of a people? I hold that the modern category of national identities in particular causes harm to the study of the goddess. Modern nationalities go hand in hand with the impetus of patriarchal religions that do away with the female principle. There is an unmistakable difference between the male divine and the female divine when their manifestations are found cross-nationally. It is generally assumed that exchange of cultures between nations allows the male divine to be disseminated from one people to another. It is true that patriarchal religions have traveled around the globe and disseminated their gods into other nations. When it comes to the goddess whose worship is widespread across nations, such as the case of Mary in the West, however, this kind of reasoning proves to be inadequate. Antithetical is the idea that patriarchal religions actively promote the transmission of the great goddess from one nation to the other. Thus, the very perception of the transnational goddess is systematically thwarted in the realm of patriarchal religions. Androcentric researchers may choose to either dismiss as anomalous the topic of the goddess whose manifestation is found cross-nationally or treat her as a local deity severing her from her transnational context. This has been done to the topic of Mago. While Mago’s manifestation exists across the national boundaries of Korea, China, and Japan, it differs in nature, density, and complexity in these countries. Likewise, primary sources also show different traits according to the country. Korean sources surpass her Chinese counterparts not only in number but also in density and complexity. Mago’s supreme divinity is essentially affirmed in Korean sources, whereas it is treated as unknown in Chinese and Japanese counterparts. More to the point, the Budoji, the principal text that re-emerged in Korea in 1986, asserts that Koreans were the defenders of Old Magoism (Magoism in pre-patriarchal times) against the pseudo-Magoist Chinese regime. How can we understand the primacy of Korean Magoism without resorting to the modern notion of nationalist identities?