June 8, 2023June 4, 2023 Mago WorkLeave a comment

(Essay 2) Future of Identity: Reclaiming the Northern Pagan Tradition by Jillian Burnett

Cultural Change The new tribalism rejects the conformity of the previous generations and accepts countercultures into the mainstream. Dominant culture is not rejected, but is changing. Just as tattoos are Read More …

September 30, 2022June 12, 2023 Mago WorkLeave a comment

Divine Feminine: Expressed in Numbers in the Heart Sutra by Jillian Burnett

3500 years ago, humankind started scribing numbers. In Asia, from ancient India and Persia, Arabia and west, numbers were surrogate symbols holding and assigning meanings to what they Read More …

June 9, 2021June 5, 2023 Mago Work AdminLeave a comment

Original Devotion… Is Like This: A Translation of Sacred Song by Jillian Burnett

[Translator’s Note: To my belovéd guru without whom this work would never be written. Real Devotion … is Like This is my translation of the devotional song ऐसी लागी लगन Read More …

January 15, 2021June 12, 2023 Mago Work AdminLeave a comment

(Translation) The Heart’s Perfect Wisdom, Mantra of the Heart Sutra by J. A. Burnett

The Heart Sutra: A Dual Language Translation in Verse Shifts of consciousness and expanded awareness are effects that have interested humanity since the beginning. Using chanting and language—gaining signifiers bound Read More …

December 25, 2020June 12, 2023 Mago Work AdminLeave a comment

(Essay) Sacred Sound Healing: Goddess as Music by Jillian Burentt

For millennia humankind has looked to the celestial spheres as a place of divine music, to a place beyond this world where tones exist in the great void of deep Read More …

October 14, 2020July 6, 2023 Mago Work AdminLeave a comment

(Music) Infinite Ellipse by Jillian Burnett

This piece was an imaginative story of unlucky adventurers who came upon a dragon who guarded her treasure well…

September 10, 2020July 6, 2023 Mago Work AdminLeave a comment

(Music) Harp in the Time of Plague by Jillian Burnett

Harp in the Time of Plague is a serious toned work that considers the compassion for being that suffer in this time. This piece uses tone to find strength through hardship, and Read More …

August 30, 2020July 6, 2023 Mago Work Admin2 Comments

(Meet Mago Contributor) Jillian Burnett

Born in New York City, from a family of Indian and Puerto Rican immigrants Doctoral Candidate J.A. Burnett is a published poet and author of The Lost Key. She is Read More …

(Art) Seven Sisters Dreaming by Susan Abbott

About this painting a friend had commissioned me to do a painting that involved dogs, the Dogstar/Sirius, and the number 7. The request led me on a search about the Pleides/Seven Sisters constellation – for images of the seven star constellation and some of the stories and myths and dreaming across many indigenous cultures. I did not dwell on any one particular story but was moved by the idea of the seven sisters as I had recently learned that in my own extended bio-family constellation, I am one of seven sisters – a cluster of four of us from one mother and the other three of different mothers but all the same father. I dreamed of a time and ways that we had all known each other better, egged each other on to be our best, and grew old and wise together, stellar people that we were. (Meet Mago Contributor) Susan Abbott.
(Essay 5) Goddesses in Hinduism: “All the Mothers are One” by Mary Ann Beavis, Ph.D.

[Editor’s Note: This essay is from the same title, “Goddesses in Hinduism: “All the Mothers are One”‘ by Mary Ann Beavis with Scott Daniel Dunbar included in Goddesses in Myth, History and Culture (Mago Books, 2018).] VILLAGE GODDESSES These have been called “Untamed Goddesses of Village India.”[1] As opposed to the pantheon of orthodox Hinduism, the village Goddesses are popular or folk deities, particularly prominent in southern India. Richard Brubaker describes them as “powerfully ambivalent deities crucial to the welfare of their village”,[2] whose worship arises out of times of crisis: floods, famines, drought, epidemics. They are regarded as both the cause of these disasters and as their cure. Some are strictly localized to a specific village, some are more regionally recognized. Venerated physical images of the village Goddesses are often temporary, and rather crude, made specifically for their festivals. They may not be represented anthropomorphically, but by uncarved stones, trees, or small, imageless shrines.[3] Goddess festivals are held according to the mythological cycles of the various deities, but particularly when some calamity strikes. The crisis festival usually includes a blood sacrifice that represents the demonic force to be overthrown by the Goddess. The mythology of the village Goddesses often involves the theme of the injustices to women done by men;[4] they are often addressed as “Mother” (Ma), but they are not necessarily “mothers” of other deities. Perhaps this is because, for her worshippers, “She represents human survival—the well-being of their children, the continuity of life, and the success of crops dependent on favorable weather conditions as well as fertility of the soil. Their lineage should be secure for, if she is honored, people should not be bothered by barrenness or the death of children. She places humans in harmony with nature, reaffirming their connection to it.”[5] One of the myths associated with the Tamil (southeastern India) Goddess Mariyamman (or just Amman) identifies her with a young Brahman girl who was tricked into marrying an untouchable man; when she discovers the deception, she is furious and kills herself, is transformed into a Goddess, and burns the man to ashes. Mariyamman is a rain Goddess, associated with skin diseases like chicken pox, measles, rashes, etc. Although she is a village deity, she is popular enough to have temples both within and outside villages. Her local shrines are often adjacent to an anthill that might be a cobra’s lair, and eggs and milk are offered to the snake.[6] However, as Judy Grahn notes, “among others, two notable Indian scholars, Karin Kapadia and Pupul Jayakar, have each subverted this diminutive view. Jayakar refers to Mariamma as ‘the mighty goddess’ while Kapadia, who lived with and became friends with people of the village of Auruloor in Tamil Nadu, and who calls Mariamma a ‘great goddess,’ reports that the villagers think of their Mariamma as no less than ‘the autonomous ruling power of the universe’.”[7] Mariamma is similar to a village “pox” deity, Shitala,[8] and both are offered a rice porridge called pongal at a women-only festival held once a year. The Pongala Festival is participated in by Muslim and Christian women as well as Hindus.[9] New Goddesses As noted earlier, most of the prominent deities of contemporary Hinduism are not mentioned in the Vedas, the most sacred scriptures of Hinduism. The Hindu pantheon is not closed, and new deities can emerge or be added at any time. A new Goddess who has been studied quite extensively is Santoshi Ma (“Mother of Satisfaction/Contentment”), who emerged in the 1950s-1960s in central India. In her myth, she is identified as the daughter of Ganesha, son of Parvati. She is first revealed when she comes to the aid of a young woman who is abandoned and forgotten by her husband who left home to find work; the woman is left behind to be abused by her in-laws. Despite her troubles, she remains faithful to her husband, and when she observes a fast one day a week in honour of the Goddess, her husband is restored to her and they move into their own house. The release of the film Jai Santoshi Maa in 1975 popularized the Goddess, and her weekly fast (vrat). Philip Lutgendorf relates the popularity of the new Goddess, and particularly of the film, with the rise of middle class aspirations of women in the latter half of the 20th century.[10] A more recent example of a new Hindu Goddess is the AIDS Goddess (AIDS-Amma), a village Goddess created in the late 1990s by a high school science teacher, H.N. Girish, in the south Indian village of Menasikyathana to raise social awareness of the AIDS epidemic.[11] The Hindu Goddess and Feminism The question of whether the Hindu Goddess is a feminist is one that has arisen in recent decades.[12] Of course, the question is deliberately stated in provocative terms that make little sense: why would the Mahadevi, or any of her many manifestations, espouse a contemporary human social movement? It has often been observed that Goddess-worshipping cultures do not necessarily correlate with high status for women.[13] As Rajeswari Sunder Rajan puts it, in India, “the divide between goddesses and women as social beings can be maintained by patriarchy without any sense of contradiction.”[14] Moreover, in India, appropriations of the Goddess/es are intertwined with political, social and religious movements and struggles, including the Indian women’s movement, which may or may not resonate with western concepts of feminism.[15] A recent example of the political, cultural and religious entanglements that feminist appropriations of Hindu Goddesses can engender is the “Bruised Goddess” Campaign, sponsored by Save the Children India to draw attention to the gap between the Hindu reverence for Goddesses and the prevalence of violence against women in India. Here, hand-painted images of Lakshmi, Durga and Sarasvati portray the Goddesses as victims of domestic abuse: “Rendered in classic calendar art style, the goddesses are depicted in all their finery and beauty, but with disturbing bruises on their faces. The copy reads ‘Pray that we never see this day. …
(Poem) Śleṣa by Susan Hawthorne

notes This poem came about after translating Sanskrit poetry for some years and discovering the art of śleṣa (shlesha). In Sanskrit poetry, it is a way of saying two different sentences whose meaning can be completely distinct. Śleṣa has been called ‘extreme poetry’ because it enables the poet to express two different sentences with different meanings using what appears to be the same words. This is possible because in Sanskrit you can create very long compound words and split them in different places, thereby creating a different set of words and meanings. Because of the way English works it’s not possible to do this (or at least, I’ve not found anyone who has). As a lesbian poet I, nevertheless, find myself doing it through codes. Śleṣa has also been called ‘unnatural’. Yigal Bronner in his book on śleṣa, Extreme Poetry: The South Asian Movement of Simultaneous Narration, notes that not only has it been called ‘unnatural’ but also “an extravagant display that necessarily comes at the expense of plot and is therefore ‘decadent’, ‘torturous’, ‘disgusting’ and even ‘indecent’ and ‘criminal’. You can see why I could be enticed by this poetic technique. And to top it off, the word śleṣa means embrace. From The Sacking of the Muses (2019) https://www.magoism.net/2013/12/meet-mago-contributor-susan-hawthone
(Poem) Sisters of the Deep Waters and Making Space by Lucy Pierce

Sisters of the Deep Waters I am very grateful to the beautiful Jane Hardwick Collings for her enduring request for a mermaid image, inspiring me to connect with these watery beings of the fluid, emotive realms of the ocean. I hadn’t realised my inner mermaid until now! Prints available on Etsy (www.etsy.com/shop/lucypierce) Making Space I am making space. I am making a space within which I am enough, in and of myself. A space with an edge beyond which I end and you begin. I am making space in rejection of the belief that there is not room enough for me to exist, for me to shine and storm, to inconvenience and disrupt, to radiate and transform. I am reaching in through the flesh and the sinew, I am pulling on bones, stretching out muscles, making room within for all that I was born to be. I am being stretched and wrung, squeezing out all that is not love, all that would keep me small, all that would have me believe that I am not enough. I am wrestling out the voice that would tell me that I am only safe in the inbetween spaces of dark matter. I am making space for me to birth myself into being. I am making space in my pelvis so that the three million year old woman can come to rest there, and guide my every step from her ancient womb. I am making space in my heart for a thousand orgasmic blossoms to bloom, ecstatically fragrant, thunderously robust, exquisitely tender. I am making space in defiance of the story that I am a worthy receptacle for other people’s pain, the contract that I make with them to take them into myself and have them seek their healing through me. No more! I am making space and I give you back to yourself. I am making space in order that when I travel out to the far reaches of the cosmos a part of me stays close to home, to hold my self worth by the hearth fire with the Grandmothers, not allowing me to take all of me, all the way out there, in search of the loving boundary for the small, waiting child within me, because in this space that I have made for myself I know that I am loved and infinitely lovable, and here I am safe. I am making a space with an edge through which I can filter your opinion of me, so that even if you don’t like me, I can still like myself. I am making space for the fierce Mumma roar, the ancient wild protectress, who is unshakable in her mercy for the vulnerable and the innocent, for the unloved and the wounded. I am making space in my throat for the full bodied blooming of my song, the voice of my power to meet the world unbound and free, blossoming and bold. I am making space for vision to be received, and for the will to enact the call of what I know to be true, I am making space so that the gap between my vision and my actioning is seamless, because there is space to say Yes to what is mine to give and I am answerable to none but the ancient lore of life. I am making space for the blood to flow, and to be reclaimed by the land and to receive the ancient lineage of my dream speak through the precious thread of my moon time, and to drink deep of the Earth, primal, raw and sensual. I am making space to swell and to undulate, to unravel and enfold, to dance and to sing, to sleep and to dream, to love and to play. I am making a space where I am sovereign queen, from here I do not give myself away, from here I am whole, from here there is time and space for me. I am making space to hold my tender, frightened child with such a fierce authority of love, I am making the space to take responsibility for myself, and my unmet need so that I can set my loved ones free. I am making space to suckle from the stars, the sweet milk of vision and mystery and the ancient story of our belonging. I am making space to let the Earth mate with the Cosmos, in sacred union, through the holy passage of my body I am making space for my ancestors to shudder through my bones, their raucous No to all that does not serve my purest becoming, and their Yes to that which gently opens a clean fold of being that will serve all of our futures. (Meet Mago Contributor) Lucy Pierce
(Prose) Sequana and Blessed Water by Deanne Quarrie

Water is the daily necessity for earth’s creatures. When the Continental Celts were looking for a new homeland, they ventured west from the known river valleys of the great landmass we call Eurasia. Just beyond the great mountains, the Alps, they discovered sweet and abundant water, fertile soil, expansive woodlands, and the plentiful fish, game, berries, grasses, fungi and broad-leafed plants necessary to support their tribe.
(Prose Part 2) Sacred Engagement by Yia Alias

Art as Activism The Bride Stripped Bare I have had the opportunity to create large installations in warehouse galleries and it is here, in the public arena, that I have been able to bring together Goddess Feminism, Activism and Spirituality as an act of social comment. The Bride Stripped Bare was the name of a piece that depicted Nature as Bride/Persephone. I created a large shop window. Within, and spilling out from this structure was a bridal gown, trapped in the hem and the train was rubbish, collected from the city streets. On the back wall, attached
(Art) Caoránach, Irish Mother Goddess by Andrea Redmond

Irish Goddess Caoránach by Andrea Redmond. Acrylic on paper. Caoránach is a dragon serpent, an Oillipheist, from Lough Derg, Donegal, Ireland. The Druids called her Caorthannach, Caoránach, or Corra. She is said to have been brought here by the Tuatha Dé Dannan, others that she may have been the Great Serpent Goddess of Ireland and Scotland. There are stories of these creatures in Ireland, referred to as dragons, included sea serpents and a dragon-like giant worm. These creatures were believed to inhabit many marshes, lakes and rivers. Both the serpent and the dragon were ancient symbols of life, fertility, rebirth, healing, immortality and the Goddess. The Druids believed that these primordial beings had ancient knowledge and wisdom of the earth. Dragons and great serpents are common across the world, and their connection often, to the Great Goddess is quite clear. They represent personifications of the Older Pagan belief systems and specific connections with bodies of water and the Other/Under world. In European mythology the Mother Goddess Danu appeared as the dragon Vrta blocking rivers. While the presence of serpentine motifs can be found in much pre-Christian art in Ireland, they truly became part of popular Irish culture with the coming of Christianity, and the heroic efforts of male saints or heroes in their defeat. Caoránach was the mother of all of the great dragon worms of Ireland; Patrick refers to her as the Mother of demons, therefore, a matrilineal Goddess. She is even referred to in some tales as the Cailleach. A number of stories relate to her demise at the hands of Patrick and earlier heroes. Mary Condren in her excellent book The Serpent and the Goddess, documents the suppression of these early Irish matricentrific goddesses, including those of the serpent/dragon ilk,by the Christian male patriarchial religion. But patriarchial endeavours to undermine the Goddess is evident even in pre-Christian times. According to early legends, Fionn mac Cumhaill and his band of Fianna are asked to slay a hag or witch- and from her body come a worm that metamorphoses into Caoránach who begins to eat the cattle in the land. Lough Derg, and the several islands in this lake, gets its name from the blood of Caoránach, which dyed the lake and rocks red after her defeat(s). Patrick is also said, in one account, to have banished her to a cave in Lough Derg, where she lives today. The irony, not lost on many followers of the Goddess, is that the site of her demise (?) is located at a place of pilgrimage, St. Patrick’s Purgatory. It has been a pilgrimage site for Christians since the 5th Century. However, a prehistoric mound visible today, where a basilica and retreat sanctuary are located, indicate that it was, also, an important pre-Christian site for devotion to the Goddess Caoránach .   https://www.magoism.net/2023/09/meet-mago-contributor-andrea-redmond/
(Art 1) Gather the Women by Pegi Eyers

Gather the Women 1/2 Art by Pegi Eyers The shared support and connection between women allows us to heal from the patriarchy that has waged war on us for millennia, and joining together in the true spirit of sisterhood is a revolutionary act. By forming diverse networks we enhance our own lives, our communities and the earth. The co-creation of women’s culture is a space where we can feel safe, celebrated and empowered, and when we gather together in circles of unity, miracles can happen. (This is included in She Rises: What… Goddess Feminism, Activism and Spirituality? Volume 3)(Meet Mago Contributor) Pegi Eyers.
Hemlock Haunting by Sara Wright

Photo by Sara Wright When I stand under one of these giants I sink into the dark spiraling into Deep Time. If Hemlock does not succumb to insects a poisoned sky this tree might live out a natural life… 800 years is eight to ten times longer than this piercing pain of mine – So why is anguish stretching me into ‘forever’ mourning trees without hope? One difference is that Hemlock lives in community with others that care – the kindness of kin both young and old Roots entwine, support… communicate. Comfort seeds the air. Hemlocks can tolerate the darkest forest gloom, the sparse spongy needle strewn floor stores a multitude of seeds… for hundreds of years… Witch hobble thrives above, golden beech composts future… 400 million years of Life buried a few feet deep…. If nature’s patterns wed to genes story a future when Earth is ready to birth, these trees might rise again as Blessed Green Beings once despised and rejected insect infected Now thriving in Balance with All That Is… _____________________________________________________________________ Tree of Life? Every culture has a creation myth about the “tree of life” except the western one unless we include the Christmas tree which today is often made of plastic. As we approach the holiday season I am sickened by the thought of more live trees being cut down, only to be thrown out the door as soon as the presents are opened. I see the tree as a kind of backdrop for the human drama. The Christmas tree seems to be a symbol for excessive consumption. Contrast this with the Indigenous Skywoman’s story in which the tree of life holds every aspect of the living natural world in her arms including the mosses that live in the tree’s knotholes! Nature no longer structures our collective reality in any meaningful way, and trees if they are noticed at all viewed as a kind of indoor or outdoor wallpaper. Trees were once considered to be protectors. In Greek mythology they saved women from rape. Witches once danced around trees under the full moon, held rituals underneath them. These customs have been revived today by some but are still considered suspicious, ‘cultish’, dangerous by the dominant culture. Even the word ‘ritual’ has negative connotations. Indigenous peoples continue to honor trees as wisdom – keepers and elders. These people still know how to listen to trees and to follow their instructions. Scientists like Suzanne Simard teach us about the importance of trees and forests for human survival, but few are listening. Like Rachel Carson who wrote Silent Spring 60 years ago forecasting the loss of non – human species due to pesticides – Simard (Finding the Mother Tree) and others like her -especially women scientists – are simply dismissed. Irrelevant. It might be argued that women and trees belong together. Both are seen as decorative wallpaper, raped routinely, and easily replaced. Because trees are fundamental to my well being I am always in relationship with forests as a whole, and cyclically move through periods where a particular tree becomes my tree of life. This year the tree that emerged out of the forest is the hemlock. How this happens is always a bit of a mystery but what captured me this year was noticing that hemlocks seem to embody a powerful charge that I could feel in their presence. The more time I spent with them the more I questioned their role in the forests they lived in because in healthy hemlock areas there is tremendous diversity not seen elsewhere. It wasn’t until I did some research that I learned some amazing facts. I want to include some here because so often a tree is pictured as symbol or background; rarely do we actually bring a tree to life. In addition to being the most shade tolerant tree, eastern hemlocks are also the most patient of trees. When a space in the canopy opens even a tree that is already 75 – 100 years old will shoot up to the sky, branching its ladders to reach the sun. A pencil thin hemlock can be 100 years old! Tiny flat forest green needles create and layer their own canopy in a patterned way that allows every stream of light to be maximized by the tree – an incredible strategy to make the most of low light. Animals thrive in hemlock territory; the red eft (salamander) is one that appears regularly after a rain. Deer browse and seek cover under hemlock boughs. Red squirrels and mice feast on hemlock seeds. Bears den under snowy boughs. Hares like the foliage. Many insects inhabit the rich humus under hemlocks and in the branches of these trees songbirds flourish. Blue throated green warblers, blackburnian warblers, Acadian flycatchers, hermit thrushes, winter wrens, nuthatches are just a few examples. The blackburnian warbler nests nowhere else. Most of the warblers that I heard this summer were hiding in hemlocks! Ruffed grouse, barred and saw whet owls roost in hemlocks branches. Hawks like them too. Brook trout need hemlocks to keep the water pure and cool. Hemlocks can also photosynthesize at very low temperatures – just above freezing. In the spring before leaf out the hemlocks absorb high light creating optimal conditions for growth. Besides pine, beech and oak, in untrammeled forested areas hemlocks are also peppered with mountain laurel, hobblebush, and witch hazel, understory plants that can also tolerate lower light. Hemlocks make remarkable parents – their ability to seed themselves so close to adults – within a hundred feet – allows the seedlings to be nourished through roots from the mother trees (both male and female reproductive structures are found in each tree). Hemlock roots are attached to a complex underground mycorrhizal (symbiotic) mycelial network that stretches across the forest floor. When adult trees die their nutrients seep into the ground because this tree decays very slowly nourishing the rest of the trees and plants of the forest around them. Many mushrooms, fruiting …

(Special Post 1) "The Oldest Civilization" and its Agendas by Mago Circle Members

[Editor’s Note: The following discussion took place in response to an article listed blow by the members of The Mago Cirlce, Facebook group of Goddessians/Magoists from May 6 to May 10, 2016. Readers are recommended to read the original article linked below that has invoked the converation.] “The Danube Civilization: Oldest in the World” in The Ancient Ones upon the ruins of our ancestors, published April 3, 2016.
(Special Post 2) Why Goddess Feminism, Activism, or Spirituality? A Collective Writing

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

(Essay) Conceiving, Imagining the New at Samhain by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

It is the Season of Samhain/Deep Autumn in the Southern Hemisphere at this time. In the PaGaian version of Samhain/Deep Autumn ceremony participants journey to the “Luminous World Egg” … a term taken from Starhawk in her book The Spiral Dance[i], where she also names that place as the “Shining Isle”, which is of course, the Seed of conception, a metaphor for the origins of all and/or the female egg: it is the place for rebirth. Artist: Bundeluk, Blue Mountains, Australia. The “luminous world egg” is a numinous place within, the MotherStar of conception: that is, a place of unfolding/becoming. The journey to this numinous place within requires first a journey back, through some of each one’s transformations, however each may wish to name those transformations at this time. The transformations for each and every being are infinite in their number, for there is “nothing we have not been” as has been told by Celts and others of Old, and also by Western science in the evolutionary story (a story told so well by evolutionary biologist Elisabet Sahtouris, particularly in her video Journey of a Silica Atom.) Ceremonial participants may choose selves from biological, present historical self, or may choose selves from the mythic with whom they feel connection; from any lineage – biological or otherwise. Selves may also be chosen from Gaia’s evolutionary story – earlier creatures, winged or scaled ones … with whom one wishes to identify at this time. Each participant is praised for their “becoming” for each self they share. When all have completed these journeys/stories of transformation, the circle is lauded dramatically by the celebrant for their courage to transform; and she likens them all to Gaia Herself who has made such transitions for eons. The celebrant awards each with a gingerbread snake, “Gaian totems of life renewed”[ii]. gingerbread snakes Participants sit and consume these gingerbread snakes in three parts: (i) as all the “old shapes” of self that were named; and (ii) remembering the ancestors, those whose lives have been harvested, whose lives have fed our own, remembering that we too are the ancestors, that we will be consumed; and (iii) remembering and consuming the stories of our world that they desire to change, the stories that fire their wrath or sympathy: in the consuming, absorbing them (as we do), each may transform them by thoughts and actions – “in our own bodyminds”. When all that is consumed “wasting no part”, it is said that “we are then free to radiate whatever we conceive”, to “exclaim the strongest natural fibre known” – our creative selves, “into such art, such architecture, as can house a world made sacred” by our building[iii]. This “natural fibre” is a reference to the spider’s thread from within her own body, with which she weaves her web, her home; and Spider has frequently been felt in indigenous cultures around the globe as Weaver and Creator of the Cosmos. Spider the Creatrix, North America, C. 1300 C.E., Hallie Iglehart Austen, The Heart of the Goddess, p.13 In the ceremony, participants linked with a thread that they weave around the circle, may sail together for a new world “across the vast sunless sea between endings and beginnings, across the Womb of magic and transformation, to the “Not-Yet” who beckons”[iv]: to the Luminous World Egg whereupon the new may be conceived and dreamed up. Samhain/Deep Autumn ceremony is an excellent place for co-creating ourselves, for imaginingthe More that we may become, and wish to become. This is where creation and co-creation happens … in the Womb of Space[v], in which we are immersed – at all times: and Samhain is a good season for feeling it. References: Livingstone, Glenys. PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion. NE: iUniverse, 2005 Sahtouris, Elisabet. Earthdance: Living Systems in Evolution. Lincoln NE:iUniversity Press, 2000. Starhawk, The Spiral Dance: A Rebirth of the Ancient Religion of the Great Goddess. NY: Harper and Row, 1999. Swimme, Brian. The Earth’s Imagination.DVD series 1998. NOTES: [i]p.210 [ii]a version of this Samhain script is offered in Chapter 7 PaGaian Cosmology [iii]These quoted phrases are from Robin Morgan, “The Network of the Imaginary Mother”, in Lady of the Beasts, p.84. This poem is a core inspiration of the ceremony. [iv]“Not-Yet” is a term used by Brian Swimme, The Earth’s Imagination, video 8 “The Surprise of Cosmogenesis”. [v]note that creation does not happen at the point of some god’s index finger, as imagined in the Sistine Chapel – what a takeover that is!
(Essay and Video) Cosmogenesis Dance: Celebrating Her Unfolding by Glenys Livingstone

The dance begins with two concentric circles, which will flow in and out of each other throughout the dance, resulting thus in a third concentric circle that comes and goes. The three circles/layers are understood to represent the three aspects of Goddess, the Creative Triple Dynamic that many ancients were apparently aware of, and imagined in so many different ways across the globe. In Her representation in Ireland as the Triple Spiral motif, which is inscribed on the inner chamber wall at Bru-na-Boinne (known as Newgrange)[1], She seems to be understood as a dynamic essential to on-going Cosmic Creativity, as this ancient motif is dramatically lit up by the Winter Solstice dawn. It seems that this was important to the Indigenous people of this place at the time of Winter Solstice, which celebrates Origins, the continuing birth of all. Thus I like to do this Cosmogenesis Dance, as I have named it[2], at the Winter Solstice in particular. The three aspects that the dance may embody, and are poetically understood as Goddess, celebrate (i) Virgin/Young One – Urge to Be as I have named this quality – the ever new differentiated being (also known as Fodla in the region of the Triple Spiral)[3]. This is the outer circle of individuals. (ii) Mother – the deeply related interwoven web – Dynamic Place of Being as I have named this quality – the communion that our habitat is (also known as Eriu in the region of the Triple Spiral)[4]. This is the woven middle circle where all are linked and swaying in rhythm. (iii) Crone/Old One – the eternal creative return to All-That-Is – She who Creates the Space to Be as I have named this quality (also known as Banba in the region of the Triple Spiral)[5]. This is the inner circle where linked hands are raised and stillness is held. The three concentric layers of the dance may be understood to embody these. The Cosmogenesis Dance represents the flow and balance of these three – a flow and balance of Self, Other and All-That-Is. It may be experienced like a breath, that we breathe together – as we do co-create the Cosmos. Thomas Berry and Brian Swimme have named the three qualities of Cosmogenesis in the following way: – differentiation … to be is to be unique – communion … to be is to be related – autopoiesis/subjectivity … to be is to be a centre of creativity.[6] The three layers of the dance may be felt to celebrate each unique being, in deep relationship with other, directly participating in the sentient Cosmos, the Well of Creativity. The Cosmogenesis Dance as it is done within PaGaian Winter Solstice ceremony expresses the whole Creative Process we are immersed in. It is a process of complete reciprocity, a flow of Creator and Created, like a breath. There is dynamic exchange in every moment: that is the nature of the Place we inhabit. The dance may help awaken us to it, and to invoke it. The Cosmogenesis Dance on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dR73MDMM9Fk For more story: Cosmogenesis Dance for Winter Ritual For Dance Instructions: PaGaian Cosmology Appendix I Meet Mago Contributor Glenys Livingstone NOTES: [1] The Triple Spiral engraving is dated at 2,400 B.C.E. [2] This dance is originally named as “The Stillpoint Dance”, or sometimes “Adoramus Te Domine” which is the name of the music used for it. I learned it from Dr. Jean Houston in 1990 at a workshop of hers in Sydney, Australia. I began to use the dance for Winter Solstice ceremony in 1997, and it was only in the second year of doing so that I realised its three layers were resonant with the three traditional qualities of the Female Metaphor/Goddess, and also the three faces of Cosmogenesis. I thereafter re-named and storied the dance that way in the ceremonial preparation and teaching for Winter Solstice. See Glenys Livingstone, PaGaian Cosmology: pp. 280-281 and 311. [3] Michael Dames, Ireland: a Sacred Journey, p.192. [4] Michael Dames, Ireland: a Sacred Journey, p. 192. [5] Michael Dames, Ireland: a Sacred Journey, p. 192. [6] Brian Swimme and Thomas Berry, The Universe Story, p. 71-79. I have identified these qualities with the Triple Goddess, and the Triple Spiral in the synthesis of PaGaian Cosmology: see Glenys Livingstone, PaGaian Cosmology, particularly Chapter 4: https://pagaian.org/book/chapter-4/ References: Dames, Michael. Ireland: a Sacred Journey, Element Books, 2000. Livingstone, Glenys. PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion. Lincoln NE: iUniverse, 2005. Swimme, Brian and Berry, Thomas. The Universe Story: From the Primordial Flaring Forth to the Ecozoic Era. NY: HarperCollins, 1992.
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.
(Mago Almanac Excerpt 7) Introducing the Magoist Calendar by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

Mago Almanac: 13 Month 28 Day Calendar (Book A) at Mago Bookstore. YEARLY LEAP DAY AND EVERY FOURTH YEAR LEAP DAY Each Sa includes a Dan of the big Sa. A Dan is equal to one day. That adds to 365 days. At the half point of the third Sa, there is a Pan of the big Sak (the year of the great dark moon). A Pan comes at a half point of Sa. This is of Beopsu (Lawful Number) 2, 5, 8. A Pan is equal to a day. Therefore, the fourth Sa has 366 days. Each year has a leap day (Dan), which makes a total of 365 days. Every fourth year is a leap year that has a leap day (Pan), which makes a total of 366 days. The Dan day comes before the New Year in the winter solstice month. And the Pan day comes before the first day of the summer solstice month in the fourth year. The above, however, does not indicate when the New Year comes. Logographic characters of Dan and Pan each suggest their meanings. While each year includes the Dan day (the morning), every fourth year has the Pan day. A unit of four years makes the Big Calendar. Dan (旦 Morning) Leap day for every first three years Pan (昄 Big) Leap day for every fourth year I have postulated that the year begins on the Dan day (one leap day), a day before New Year that comes in the month of Winter Solstice in the Norther Hemisphere. And the Pan day comes on the day before the first day of the 7th month that has Summer Solstice in the fourth year in the Norther Hemisphere. Years Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year 4 Months Dan Dan Dan Dan 1 1 1 1 2 2 2 2 3 3 3 3 4 4 4 4 5 5 5 5 6 6 6 6 Pan 7 7 7 7 8 8 8 8 9 9 9 9 10 10 10 10 11 11 11 11 12 12 12 12 13 13 13 13 Days 365 365 365 366 The Magoist Calendar’s intercalation involves one leap day every year and one leap day every four years. That is, each year has one extra day to make it 365 days. Every fourth year has an extra day to make it 366 days. Four years has a total of 1461 days (365×3+366), which makes the mean of 365.25 days. Considering that the month is following the sidereal period rather than the synodic period, it is inferred that the year also follows the sidereal year rather than the solar year. In fact, Magoist Calendar’s one year is very close to today’s 365.25636 days of the sidereal year compared to 365.24217 days of the solar year or the tropical year. Given that, as seen below, the Budoji mentions the tiniest discrepancy of one leap day for 31,788,900 years, the discrepancy between 365.25 and 365.25636 (0.00636 day) can be explained that the year was actually 365.25 days at the time of Budo circa 2333 BCE, 4440 years ago. In other words, there is a discrepancy of 0.12375936 seconds between 2017 CE and 2333 BCE. Regarding Lawful Numbers 2, 5, 8, it is involved as follows: 365 days (3+6+5=14, 1+4=5) Lawful Numbers 2, 5, 8 refers the unit of 365 days (364 days with one intercalary day). Further dynamics are unknown. The sidereal year refers to the time taken by the Earth to orbit the sun once with respect to the distant stars. In contrast, the solar or tropical year means the time taken by the Earth to orbit the sun once with respect to the sun. The sidereal year, 365.25636 days, is about 20 minutes and 24 seconds longer than the mean tropical year (365.24217 days) and about 19 minutes and 57 seconds longer than the average Gregorian year of 365.2425 days. The difference occurs primarily because the solar system spins on its own axis and around the Milky Way galactic center making the solar year’s observed position relative. Time is no independent concept apart from space and the agent. The very concept of time is preceded by the agent bound in a space. It is always contextualized. In Magoism, both calendar and time are born out of the cosmogonic universe, the universe that is in self-creation. Like calendar, time is to be discovered or measured. It is a numinous concept. The very concept of time testifies to the reality of the Creatrix. Time proves the orderly movement of the universe into which we are born. Calendar patterns time, whereas time undergirds calendar. How can we measure time? We are given the time of the Earth that comes from its rotation, revolution, and precession in sync with the moon and the sun (and its planets). One type of time is the solar time. The solar time is a calculation of time based on the position of the sun. Traditionally, the solar time is measured by the sundial. The solar time is, however, specific to the Earth only. It is valid only for the-same-observed-location. It is not made to be used for the time of another celestial body. For example, Mars’ solar time has to be measured independently based on its own rotation and revolution rates. The solar time is an isolated time. It is static and exclusive, not made for the time of other celestial bodies. By nature, it is unfit for connection and communication across celestial bodies. The second type is the sidereal time. The sidereal time is a time scale based on the rate of Earth’s rotations measured relative to the distant stars.[29] Because the observed position is in the far distant stars beyond the solar system, the sidereal time may as well be called an extrasolar stellar time. We can think of the observer’s position of an imaginary cosmic bird far out there, infinitely far beyond not only the solar system and …
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 …
(Poetry & Photo Essay) Pongal by Susan Hawthorne

I am a secularist rather than a ritualist, but I can’t help but be drawn into the celebrations that people make when they honour the passing of the seasons. Even as a child I felt the disconnect between Christmas and the hot dusty days of summer. When Christians invaded and colonised Australia they brought their holidays but did not consider changing the dates to match the seasons. I was in India recently, invited as a speaker at the Hindu Lit For Life Festival in Chennai where I had lived ten years ago. The last day of the festival was the first day of Pongal. A friend, feminist economist Devaki Jain, who had grown up in Chennai eighty years earlier invited me to join her in a car ride to see Pongal celebrations in the streets. This is a Tamil festival dating back at least a thousand years, a sun festival, welcoming the next six months of the sun’s journey, also a harvest festival. During this time many women produce beautiful drawings, known as kolam. In my book Cow I wrote a poem about kolam which I think says more than I can explain here. what she says about kolam where they are drawn and when is all important early morning is auspicious it sets the shape of the day the hard ground is cleaned points of white grain sprinkled she works quickly she knows her design for the day runs the powdered grain from point to point it is a mandala a yantra a sign so the forces of the universe align themselves with her intentions Back to Pongal. The festival goes for four days. On the first day, which is called Bhogi, people are on the streets with the fruits of harvest, piles of tumeric and stacks of sugar cane tied in bunches. My friend, Devaki, bought flowers to take back to her room in the hotel. The second day, called Thai Pongal, I was invited to a harvest lunch at the house of my friend Mangai who is a playwright, theatre director and human rights activist. The word ‘pongal’ means ‘boiling over’ or’ overflow’ and I saw this in the cooking of the sweetened rice dish into which each of the twelve people present poured some water and milk as it almost overflowed the pot. This sweet rice dish was added to the collection of other dishes on the table. I cannot tell you what they were, but the meal was delicious. After lunch everyone relaxed, someone sang, we talked and caught up on news. The third day, is called Maatu Pongal, and cattle are at the centre of celebrations on that day. I don’t know if this line up of cattle had anything to do with the day’s celebration but there they were tied up alongside a very busy main road. These were not cows and I did not see any cows with decorated horns and flowers on their heads. on that day as I have on other occasions. On the fourth day, Kaanum Pongal, things begin to wind down. One of my co-speakers at the festival said she would be visiting family members on that day. The kolams are drawn again, sugar cane is consumed and people go back to their daily lives. What I liked about being in Tamil Nadu during the Pongal festival is that it felt absolutely right. The time of the year, the connection with harvest, so I did not feel the discomfort I so often feel in the midst of the out-of-season commercialised holidays as they are celebrated in Australia. Susan Hawthorne’s book Cow is available worldwide from distributors in USA, Canada, UK, from all the usual online retailers or from Spinifex Press. http://www.spinifexpress.com.au/Bookstore/book/id=215/ © Susan Hawthorne, 2019 (Meet Mago Contributor) Susan Hawthorne.

(Tribute) In Loving Memory of Lydia Ruyle (1935-2016) by Mago Circle Members

We posthumously honor Lydia Ruyle (August 5, 1935-March 26, 2016) as Patron of Goddess Feminism, Activism, and Spirituality. Mago Circle Members on June 11, 2016. Glenys Livingstone I feel blessed to have known Lydia and to have been in occasional personal communication with her for several years … initially via the Goddess Scholars list. Lydia sent me great information of some of her journeys, was always encouraging and generously supported my CD crowdfunding project in 2015. I feel honoured to have carried her Goddess banners to Australia in 2014.
(K-Drama Review 1) Liminal Space/Time into WE: What Hotel del Luna Displays by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

[Author’s Note: Hotel del Luna is a 16-episode Korean television drama aired in 2919. Caution is required for the spoiler. This essay is prompted by this drama, which was discussed in a new class, Experience Korean Culture through Film (EKCF) offered by Mago Academy. I am ever grateful for this opportunity to assess matriversal (read Magoist) soteriology, eschatology, and cosmology implicated in this drama. This drama takes viewers to a liminal time/space. At the liminal timespace, we see how one meets the other. Almost all objects of the drama remind viewers of their liminal property. The female main character, neither living nor dead, stands between the living and the dead. The ghost-serving moon lodge she operates is visible to both ghosts and people. So is the tree of the moon spirit, a symbol for the tree of life or the world tree, which summons the moon lodge to take place. And so are all beings with physical forms. The liminal timespace is where we find ourselves in the Reality of WE/HERE/NOW.] Copyright origin unknown. Part I: Introduction with Synopsis Jang Manwol, the female protagonist, is fixated to the tree of the moon spirit (wolryeongsu 월령수) and entrusted as the representative of the moon lodge, which serves ghosts charged with unrelenting resentments, by the Mago Divine. Mago Halmi (Great Mother, Creatrix), by providing new opportunities, awaits Manwol until she takes actions to relieve her unyielding grudge, caused by the complex socio-political misfortunes in the 7th century. Manwol is, currently neither living nor dead, expected to die and take a ride to the realm of after-life (returning to the origin) just like other ghosts in her lodge. Together with her ghost employees, she operates a large luxurious hotel, Hotel del Luna, the latest name of the moon lodge. Standing in the liminal time/space, the hotel is equipped with an elegantly decorated spacious lobby, a sky-viewing terrace, a horizon-surrounded beach, and an amusement park as well as a multiple number of rooms, each of which is catered to serve the special needs of a ghost guest. At the heart of the lodge is the tree of the moon spirit. The hoteliers welcome ghosts, diagnose the story of han (unresolved resentments) that they carry in themselves and its remedy, and execute plots to resolve resentments in a peaceful manner, to be beneficial to ALL. Upon being healed and rejuvenated with a new perspective on their past lives and the Reality of Intercosmic Life, the ghosts leave the lodge to take the ride to the realm of after-life (jeoseung 저승). The dead are supposed to take this ride to the Origin. Ghosts with unrelenting resentments escapes this route and lingers in the in-between reality of the living and the dead. Until accepting the help of the male protagonist, Gu Chanseong, sent by the Mago Divine, Manwol stubbornly continues to roam around her inbetween space/time. Insofar as she holds onto her own oath to avenge, the tree of the moon spirit remains dormant, seemingly dead. The tree, a visual locus reflecting the inner landscape of Manwol (her predecessors and successors alike), connects ghosts and people and reveals the reality of Life to them. The young man, Chanseong, misses no opportunity to choose the good and to right the wrong in ghosts and people, which is the key to straightening up the entangled karmic consequences. He prompts Manwol to heal herself: She realizes the truth about her betrayer (she was consumed by her anger against him so much so that she could not know the truth; he did not betray her but saved her) and let go of her over-1,300 year-long desire to destroy him. Affected by the grudge-releasing actions of Chanseong, she gradually chooses the path to reconcile with her past, as the Mago Divine wishes for her. The tree of the moon spirit, showing a sign of life again by putting out leaves and flowers, harbingers the end of the moon lodge. Manwol and her ghost employees as well as Chanseong reach the timespace of saying good-bye to move on to the next stage of Life’s cycle. Mawol becomes the last ghost who get helped in her lodge. The Mago Divine is seeking a new owner for the lodge so that ghosts with resentments can continue to be served. The drama is potentially transforming the human psyche from within. Tantalizing, heart-breaking, and frightening stories of the dead and the living stretch the horizon to the whole — the realm of physical life (iseung 이승), the realm of afterlife (jeoseung 저승), and the in-between realm of ghosts. In the sense that its narrative structure is built on the Korean folk belief of Mago Halmi (Great Mother, Crone, and Creatrix), and Magoism, the Way of the Creatrix, I find this drama a composite text of Magoist thealogy (a systematic understanding of Mago, the Creatrix) at the core. What the hoteliers are doing is in fact the role of Mudangs (Korean Shamans). Although Mudangs and Muism (Korean Shamanism) are strikingly absent, the drama resonates with the Muist worldview. The core message is to release unrelenting resentments of the dead on the part of the living. Intriguingly, this drama does not speak directly to humans, “Humans, do not create cheok (hatred or suffering in other beings).” Perhaps, such is too clear a message to articulate. At any rate, we are supposed to gain the lesson by listening to the stories of ghosts. What we see is that troubled ghosts with resentment are helped and guided to the journey of afterlife. The dead are expected to take the ride to the realm of after-life immediately. Ghosts are those who would not follow the path of the dead. Viewers are told why some people become haunting ghosts upon death, why ghosts seek to interfere with humans, and why ghosts are tempted to take revenge upon humans. We may say that ghosts are the confused or disrupted souls. Ghosts face extermination by the Mago Divine if they harm humans or assist an evil ghost. Consequently, evil ghosts are precluded from the cycle of rebirth. That is …
(Essay 2) Returning Home with Mago, the Great Goddess, from East Asia by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

[Author’s Note: This essay was first published in Trivia, Voices of Feminism, Issue 6, September 2007. Also to be included in the forthcoming anthology She Rises: Why Goddess Feminism, Activism, and Spirituality?] An Introduction to Magoism Mago is the Great Goddess of East Asia. Nonetheless, she remains barely known to the world. Her equals, Xiwangmu (the Supreme Goddess of Daoism) and Amaterasu (the Sun Goddess of the Japanese imperial family), are said to comprise the pantheon of East Asian cosmic goddesses. Considering that these goddesses are often aligned with the ancient culture of China or Japan, one notices that the pantheon of East Asian Great Goddesses thus omits both Mago and “Korean culture.”