December 30, 2022December 22, 2022 Mago WorkLeave a comment

(Essay 2) Encountering Motherhood Divine: Towards a Sacred Economy by Nané Ariadne Jordan, Ph.D.

[Author’s note for 2022: This essay was presented in March of 2006, at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Religion, Western Region, at Claremont Graduate University in Claremont, Read More …

November 8, 2022November 8, 2022 Mago WorkLeave a comment

(Essay 1) Encountering Motherhood Divine: Towards a Sacred Economy by Nané Ariadne Jordan, Ph.D.

January 6, 2022December 31, 2021 Mago Work AdminLeave a comment

(Book Excerpt 3) Pagan, Goddess, Mother by Nane Jordan, Ph.D.

[Author’s Note: This is the Introduction chapter from: Pagan, Goddess, Mother, edited by Nané Jordan and Chandra Alexandre, Demeter Press, 2021, pp. 11-28, https://demeterpress.org/books/pagan-goddess-mother/.] Introduction (continued) Following Pagan, Goddess, Mother Read More …

December 23, 2021December 13, 2021 Mago Work AdminLeave a comment

(Book Excerpt 2) Pagan, Goddess, Mother by Nane Jordan, Ph.D.

October 28, 2021November 14, 2021 Mago Work AdminLeave a comment

(Book Excerpt 1) Pagan, Goddess, Mother by Nane Jordan, Ph.D.

January 30, 2020January 24, 2020 Mago Work AdminLeave a comment

(Prose) Becoming the earth by Nane Jordan

Becoming the earth “Despite the difficulty and challenge of writing, I write to find the pleasure of its making, to put body and senses to text, in what Hélène Cixous Read More …

(Video 10) Genevieve Vaughan & Chiquie Estrada in Maternal Gift Economy: Breaking Through by Genevieve Vaughan

(Words of Invitation) Drawing on Maternal Gift Economy theory, the suppressed wisdom of women, and the traditions and ethics of Indigenous societies, this integrated programme of presentations sponsored by the International Feminists for a Gift Economy Network will offer new insights, perspectives, and challenges to the underlying market-based mentality of the dominant world order. In this time of crisis and systemic upheaval, the model of the Maternal Gift Economy on which our survival depends at the beginning of life, is being revealed and celebrated. The interdependence of all living beings can now be made visible and honored. Mother Earth provides the model of an economy based on gifting that we receive as young children from our nurturers—before we are alienated into market exchange. We must make the transition from the exploitive Euro-American patriarchal/dominating and capitalistic ideology to a gift-based economy and culture grounded in the values of nurturing and care rather than competition and greed. We invite you to join us in exploring the possibilities in this series of presentations and dialogues that bring together those who have been laboring to articulate the principles of the Maternal Gift Economy, protect Indigenous values, and practice peaceful and just community building. The time is now for all humans to cooperate rather than compete. Please join us! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tlyeb_O6LuE For more information on the Maternal Gift Economy, see here. https://www.magoism.net/2014/06/meet-mago-contributor-genevieve-vaughan/
(Music 4) Hunger by Alison Newvine

Public domain image https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Udr8ohadzdo hunger wakes mama bear from her slumber is it pain is it desire is it the razor edge between them that draws us forth from suspension into differentiation into the cold into the quest toward the sun’s light hunger wakes us from deep sleep it is pain it is desire hunger carries us from dream visions into manifestation it is time fuel the fire hunger propels us toward creation Hunger is the fourth and final installment of the Bear Medicine Initiation series. It begins with a steady, insistent knocking at the cave door. The dreamy voices of the ancestors are suddenly awake, dancing around the fire, conjuring the material realm through their famished wails and distant chanting. There is contemplation, a moment of pause before gathering the strength to emerge into the light. Spiral Muse creates music devoted to the awe inspiring power of the Sacred Mother. We write and produce songs of praise, protest and healing, centering around Goddess and women’s lived experiences. The Bear Medicine Series is a solo project by Spiral Muse singer, songwriter, drummer and guitarist Dionne Kohler whose channeled voices and rhythms invite us into different dimensions of consciousness. https://www.magoism.net/2023/10/meet-mago-contributor-alison-newvine/
(Prose) Tlachtga by Deanne Quarrie

This is the story of Tlachtga. Her name means “earth spear.” Her story gives us the name for a famous place in Ireland where to this day, the rites of Samhain are held in her honor. This location is called the Hill of Ward and it is near Tara. At this gathering Druids would light the bonfire on Samhain, from which embers were carried far and wide and were used to light the new fires for the new year. The location of the celebration was critical because they believed it to the place where this world and the Otherworld were the closest together. Tlachtga is mentioned in two pieces of Irish literature, the Banshenchas, “the Lore of Women” and in the Dindsenchas, “the Lore of Places.” In translations by Christian monks, her story has been confused with biblical characters and Tlachtga has been all but forgotten. From all of these stories of Tlachtga the earliest we can find reveals her as a goddess (druid) who arrived with the Firbolgs, long before the Tuatha De Dannan and Milesians. She was the daughter of the Chief Druid, Mogh Ruith of Munster. His name means devotee of the wheel, which relates to the sun. Mogh Ruith, a blind man, taught his daughter Tlachtga all his skills. Together they worked with all the best masters of magical knowledge in Ireland and Scotland. In one story Moug Ruith and Tlachtga constructed a fabulous flying wheel named Roath Ramach, a machine they used for sailing through the air. It was said to be made from two pillars of stone. She made the Rolling Wheel for Trian, the Stone in Forcathu and the Pillar in Cnamchaill (Cnamchaill means bone damage). These devices were feared by all and stories were told that any who touched them died, any who saw them were blinded, and any who heard them were deafened. The pillars themselves, represent lightning, which does tie in with the meaning of her name, Earth Spear. Lightning certainly could be seen as a spear thrown to the ground and it could also kill, deafen and blind those touched by it. Tlachtga was most likely a goddess of death and rebirth as well as the sun and lightning. Hers is a tragic story, for as she gave birth to three boys, her subsequent death gave power to the land in the process. Her sons, Doirb, Cumma and Muach became the rulers of Munster, Leinster and Connaught. It was said that as long as they were remembered no one could claim the land. (spoken of in the poem below) However, as we know that did not last forever. And who knows, it may well be because they were all but forgotten. So, it is that Tlachtga is intimately linked with the symbolic death and rebirth of the land at Samhain. Tlachtga For Trian – no honour -Tlachtga Created the red mobile wheel, With the great Mogh, and Simon she brought Her wisdom, thus leaving the moving wheel. Finished stone of Forcarthus she left and pillar of Cnamchaill. Whoever sees it becomes blind. Whoever hears it becomes deaf. Anyone taking from the wheel will die. [Missing lines in text…] After the woman came from the east, She gave birth to three sons in hard labour. She died, the light & wise one. This urgent unconceivable news was to be heard by all. The son’s names were of great import… Muach and Cumma and Doirb Others [text missing again] As long as Banba remembers the names of the Three sons as the truthful story tells …………. No catastrophe will befall its inhabitants. The hill where Tlachtga is buried, Surpasses all other women, Remember the name it was given.. The Hill of Tlachtga. Irish Manuscript Text Translated by S. Geoghegan. Tlachtga’s story is tragic. It is possible that she was once a Sun Goddess, highly revered for her fertility and the land. Tragically her story changed and it is her tragic death that is remembered. For this reason, as a goddess of birth and death, “The Hill of Ward” has been regarded by Druids for eons as the “Temple of Tlachtga.” It is here where the old fires of the Celtic Year are ritually smothered out and a new pure flame is lit for the year ahead. May Tlachtga be remembered as brave, courageous, and wise, her brightness dimmed by the new patriarchal powers that invaded the land. May her light of the new year carry you bravely into the dark months ahead and may her light stay kindled until we great the rising sun at its new birth. Meet contributor, Deanne Quarrie
(Bell Essay 6) The Magoist Whale Bell: Unraveling the Cetacean Code of Korean Temple Bells by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang, Ph.D.

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

Glena Rogers, Lilith with Bird II, Monoprint, 22″ x 14″ Artist Glena Rogers honors women and the sacred feminine in her paintings, monoprints and drawings. Her figures radiate independence, as they acknowledge the arbitrary barriers and obstacles that women encounter in their lives. In this visionary world, women hold a shared wisdom as divine creators and, through ritual and ceremony, reclaim ancient rites of passage. In this monotype print, the disparaged figure from the Bible, Lilith, is in her power – communing with the Spirit Guide on her shoulder. https://www.magoism.net/2021/01/meet-mago-contributor-glen-rogers/
(Art Essay) Seshat Mistress of the Yoniverse by Claire Dorey

Seshat one by Claire Dorey Lapis eyes shut, drifting along the edge of consciousness, noctambulist Seshat measures the sand-scape, stretching and shifting the cord. Beneath this witching sky the creative landscape is female. In meditative silence, She walks the cool of the night, plotting the ‘four corners’, aware morning is near. It’s precision work. Shifting cord. Shifting sand. Shifting cosmos. What is she measuring and what forces guide her? Seshat, ancient Egyptian Goddess of writing, knowledge, measurement and book keeping holds considerable significance because women were cast into the “footnotes of history” – men wrote about men, meanwhile distant constellations illuminate the shadows of herstory. Wisps of writings confirm women shaped the past intellectual landscape. Enheduanna, the first ‘known’ writer, was female. Shredded remnants of Naunakhte’s will show women owned and inherited property. Tomb hieroglyphs describe Peseshet as ‘Overseer of Woman Physicians.” One single page, the Chrysopoeia, hints at Cleopatra the Alchemist’s scientific research. Sappho’s nocturnal awakenings exist as charred fragments. “Someone, I tell you, in another time will remember us.” – Sappho. Goodreads. Now is that ‘other time’. Let’s talk about the looting, desecration and incineration of knowledge; ancient libraries torched and ‘witches’ burnt; Pagan temples tramped under churches or lost to desert sand. My search for the Divine Female within symbol has led to Seshat. Seven horns, seven-pointed star, sundial, star clock, world tree, papyrus frond, cannabis leaf: interpreting Her headdress symbolism is subjective. In the absence of words, symbol asks we tune into the creativity of ancient artists to see how they see. Working with Divine Female energy in symbolism invokes She Who Spins. Clotho, Neith, Grandmother Spider, Ariadne and over-arcing Nut – a few Goddesses in ‘celestial spin’ – draw cosmic energy to weave reality and destiny. The cosmos in motion, as metaphor for the omnipotent Goddess, is drawn as an astral alignment in one Pictish symbol. On Samarra pottery and in one illustration in the Voynich manuscript, the female form spins, where Ursa Major spins, around the omphalos, Polaris. Both are variations of the swastika. Demonising this ancient divinity symbol is possibly the ultimate example of patriarchal reversal – both meaning and direction of spin were reversed. How does the Divine Female, constantly in motion, relate to Stretcher of the Cord and Mistress of the House of Architects, Seshat, measuring and plotting the layout of temples? Her seven-pointed star may point to the Pleiades, but is more likely to evince the seven stars in the Ursa Major constellation. “I take the measuring cord in the company of Seshat. I observe the progressive movement of the stars. My eye is now fixed upon Meskhetiu (Ursa Major). The god of time-keeping stands by me, in front of his merkhet (star clock). Then, I have established the four corners of the temple.” – inscription, Temple of Horus, Edfu. Seshat: Mistress of the Books, We Are Star Stuff. Seshat two by Claire Dorey Seshat’s ‘seven-pointed star’ is framed by two arcs – possibly horns; lunar crescents; over-arching Nut; an inverted breast [think Milky Way]; or a sky dome, through which consciousness rises. Gardiner’s glyph N13, ‘half month festival’ is similar. Meaning in symbolism is multi-layered, so these cleaved orbits may describe Venus, as the morning and evening star, permanently in retrograde, spinning in the opposite direction to Earth, or the waxing and waning moon crescent. Both frame, either the nocturnal portal, or the calendric time frame for working with star energy. I think it’s a mistake to assume Her headdress (as it appears in the Luxor Temple) is solely a seven-pointed star because there are eight directions in this symbol: seven rising, with the eighth, descending through her crown chakra, overlooked. In the Voynich manuscript a square, formed of eight circles, circumscribes Polaris, possibly representing the four rotational positions of Merak and source of apotropaic magic, ‘corner star’, Alkaid – stars forming part of the Ursa Major constellation. I found using this key to map the Luxor temple has been revelatory. I’m using the Luxor temple because it is dedicated to the Royal-Ka (soul), Ursa Major is a symbol of rejuvenation and Seshat, as architect of the King’s life-span, has potency there. The Luxor temple was built over time, so I’m using the completed complex to illustrate how this temple plotting method works. Superimposing an image of the four directions of Ursa Major, onto a floor plan of the Luxor Temple, positioning ‘fixed star’ Polaris at the centre of the Peristyle courtyard of Ramesses II, whilst positioning Merak at the external corner of the Sun court, and rotating the star map, just as the constellation rotates in the heavens, the temple corners can be mapped. Aligning pointer stars Merak and Dubhe along the Avenue of Sphinxes, towards Karnak, explains temple ‘kink’. The technique of rotating and marking in increments eventually plots the positions and proportions of walls, shrines, chambers, doorways, pylons, buttresses, colonnades, widths of corridor, walls and entrances. This is an intuitive technique. Peering through the stars to Earth, from within the spooling cosmos, temple mapping is seen as divine mark making on an epic scale. Writing is divine mark making on a smaller scale – both were sacred and magical. “I write only because There is a voice within me That will not be still” – Sylvia Plath, “Letters Home” – AZ Quotes. Seshat takes a tantric turn when She pulls cosmic wisdom down into the temple of ‘self’. At the apex of her headdress is a third arc, possibly a ‘marker’ for pointer star Merak directing star magic down to the womb space. Superimposing the Tree of Life with the Ankh, the womb and Seshat’s headdress reveals commonalities in proportion. All embrace ideas of a cosmos, in perpetual motion, flowing through the body. We have a geocentric vision of self, from our fixed point on Earth, around which all else spins. Liberation is understanding we are part of a mechanism far vaster than our internalised stories. “We don’t see things as THEY are, we see them as …
(Photo Essay 4) Grandmothers by Kaalii Cargill

The so called “Venus” figurines are prehistoric figurines that I prefer to call “Grandmothers”. Over the last 5 years, I have been visiting with the Grandmothers from prehistory to classical times. This series of posts includes images and impressions of those visits. “When a woman raised in patriarchal culture … immerses herself in sacred space where various manifestations of the Goddess bring forth the Earth-body from the spinning void . . . She will body the myth with her own totemic being. She is the cosmic form of waxing, fullness, waning: virgin, mature creator, wise crone. She cannot be negated ever again. Her roots are too deep – and they are everywhere.” (Charlene Spretnak, 1991, States of Grace: The Recovery of Meaning in the Postmodern Age, p.143.) This part of my journey started in Rome in what may seem an unlikely place – the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican. The centre of Catholicism, the Vatican also holds images and symbols of other ways of worship, including the way of Goddess. Delphic Sibyl, Sistine Chapel ceiling – painted by Michelangelo, 1508-1512 In the Vatican Museum are statues of Mother Goddesses, including Neolithic Grandmothers, Isis and Sekhmet, and classical Goddesses. On the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, Michelangelo painted five large Pagan Sibyls. The Delphic, Cumaean, Libyan, Persian, and Erythraean Sibyls are interspersed with seven Old Testament Prophets – Zacharias, Isaias, Daniel, Jonas, Jeremias, Ezechiel, and Joel. One explanation is that the Sibyls predicted the coming of Christ; another explanation is that Michelangelo was making a statement about the enduring presence of paganism in Renaissance Rome. Michelangelo was sponsored by the Medici family in Florence, where he encountered the philosopher Marsilio Ficino. Ficino, like others of his time, wrestled with philosophies of transcendence vs immanence. He called himself a “physician of the soul” and wrote The Book of Life, which explores balance in all aspects of life. Ficino valued ancient pagan traditions, working with the elements of air, fire, water, and earth as well as studying colours, textures, sound and form. Cumean Sibyl, Sistine Chapel ceiling – painted by Michelangelo, 1508-1512 Outside Naples in the Campi Flegrei (Fiery Fields) is the city of Cuma, the site of the ancient settlement of Cumae, the first Greek colony on mainland Italy (c 800 BCE). In Roman mythology there is an entrance to the Underworld at Avernus, a crater lake near Cuma. Smoke from the underground caldera near Cumae The area of the Phlegraean Fields lies above a massive underground caldera marked by lakes of boiling mud and sulphurous steam holes. The name comes from the Greek word for ‘burning’, so it is no wonder the ancients believed the area to be the gateway to the Underworld – a perfect setting for ancient rituals of descent and return. I came here to visit with the Cumean Sibyl. The Cumaean Sibyl is called the Sibyl of the Underworld – Amalthaea, Herophile, or Demophile. Mythology tells us that She brought nine books to king Tarquinius Priscus and asked for three hundred gold pieces. The king called Her mad and refused to pay the price. The Sibyl then burnt three of the books and demanded the same price for those that were left. Tarquinias again refused. When She burnt three more books and persisted in asking the same price, the king was moved and bought the remaining books for the three hundred pieces of gold. It is said the three books guided the fortunes of Rome until the collapse of the city. Entrance to the Cave of the Cumean Sibyl The Sibyl made her home in a grotto where She would write her predictions on leaves and spread them at one of the many mouths to her cave. The leaves might be found and read, or they might be scattered by the winds. Inside the passage to the womb-like cave The Cumaean Sibyl was already considered ancient when Cumae was a Greek colony and She had been turned into a priestess presiding over the Apollonian oracle. In medieval times She became known as a symbol of primeval feminine power. Surrounded by a grove dedicated to Artemis, the cave of the Cumean Sibyl is reached through a trapezoidal passage cut into the side of a hill. It was quiet the day I entered Her cave and walked slowly along the 130 metre passage to a chamber of rough stone where She still whispers secrets . . . Ancient calendar markings in the rock wall outside the Sibyl’s cave – 29 lines Vulva shaped marking in the rock wall outside the Sibyl’s cave Meet MAGO Contributor KAALII CARGILL
(Poem) Fling Open the Doors by Arlene Bailey

Gathering Ancient Knowledge, Debbie Hanna ©2020 Where are we going Mother And how will we get there Sister By staying connected Woman And allowing for difference There’s a storm brewing You can feel it on the wind As the veil thins and the old ones gather Concern on their faces and tears in their eyes For they know this storm only too well Lived through it lifetime after lifetime Since the dawning of time And the advent of humans One by one they came from different places With different stories and yet the Same tales of abuse and heartache, Betrayal and Death Each one different and yet still the same We fly with the raven and screech With the banshee, Dance naked with the Fairies And keen with the old ones We throw bones and read palms Scry with mirrors black While sacred knowings swirl about We are the future and we will not Go blindly into your patriarchal world In fact, we declare it over as we hear Her coming in all her glorious irreverence and Everything you think a woman should NOT be We declare your way dead and fling open the Doors of new tomorrows and new ways of Celebrating our juicy femaleness in ALL the Ways women appear… in ALL the ways women Act and in ALL the ways they live and breathe Where are we going Mother And how will we get there Sister By staying connected Woman And allowing for difference So let the Serpent coil around you As you hear the crunch of the Apple And feel the smiles of the new occupants As the doors to Eden are flung open wide embracing the All of the All of the All The Women Have Arrived. ___________________________________ Fling Open the Doors, Arlene Bailey ©2021 (Meet Mago Contributor) Arlene Bailey https://www.magoism.net/2020/04/meet-mago-contributor-arlene-bailey/
(Essay 4) The Myriad Faces, Marvelous Powers, and Thealogy of Greek Goddesses by Mara Lynn Keller, Ph.D.

Available at Mago Bookstore [Editor’s Note: This and the forthcoming sequels are originally published in Goddesses in Myth, History and Culture (2018 Mago Books). Part 4 discusses the Goddesses of pre-Hellenic myths and the Mycenean culture wherein the early matriarchal culture of Crete and the patriarchal Indo-European Mycenean culture coexisted.] The Cultural Shift from Mother Rite to Father Right—In Bronze Age Mycenaean Greece Ecofeminist philosopher Charlene Spretnak has researched and composed pre-patriarchal portraits of various Goddesses, in Lost Goddess of Early Greece: A Collection of Pre-Hellenic Myths.[1] She lyrically relates the sacred stories of Gaia, Pandora, Themis, Aphrodite, Artemis, Selene, Hecate, Hera, Athena, and Demeter and Persephone that emerged during the early matricultural traditions of Greece. These portraits are invaluable, as they allow us to imagine the possibilities for women and girls in non-patriarchal sub-cultures of today, and in a future post-patriarchal world. According to an oral tradition written down by Hesiod during the Archaic Age (circa 800 BCE), the first deity to emerge from Chaos was Gaia, Earth. Gaia, the first deity, who emerged from Chaos in the presence of Love, was the Great Earth Mother, Mother of all Living. She created the Sky as a partner, equal to herself: “And Earth first bare starry Heaven, equal to herself.”[2] She gave birth to all on the land, in the sea, and in the sky, and received back into her womb at death. From Gaia’s partnership with Sky, came the Titan deities. The Titan Goddesses included Rhea, Phoebe, Themis, Nemesis, Mnemosyne (Memory), and Hekate. They held cosmic, cultural, and personal powers: Rhea, another Earth Mother Goddess, in mating with her brother Kronos, brought forth the first of the next generation of Greek deities, who became the Olympian pantheon. She was worshipped in Anatolia Crete, and Greece. The Athenians remembered her as the Mother of all the Gods, and they built an altar to her at their Council House in the Agora. Phoebe was the Goddess of the Moon. The three phases of the waxing, full, and waning moon represented the three stages of female life as Maiden, Mother, and Grandmother-Crone. She was the mother of Leto who birthed the twin deities, Artemis and Apollo. Themis was the Goddess of social order and justice, necessary for the creation of community and social well-being. She was an oracle of the Earth Mother Gaia and the mother of the Fates and the Seasons. She was the conscience of the community. [3] Peoples of Crete celebrated “goodly Themis” and they called upon her sister Diké, Justice “to possess [hu]mankind.”[4] Diké, the primal Goddess of Justice, was a cosmological principle. The Greeks believed that Justice was woven into the fabric of the universe. She was closely related to the Seasons, and closely related among humans to Aleitheia, Truth. Nemesis was the Goddess who blocked a person’s path of error, arrogance, and hubris, standing like a brick wall in the path of the transgressor. Later she was only remembered as a Goddess of retribution. Mnemosyne/Memory was the font of cultural progress. She was the mother of the violet-crowned nine muses, of history, music, comedy, tragedy, choral dance, lyric and erotic poetry, religious hymns and dance, astronomy, and heroic, epic poetry. Hekate was another Great Goddess who held power in the three realms of Heaven, Earth, and the Sea. As Goddess of the Crossroads, she guided those facing divergent, consequential decisions. She was associated with Demeter and Persephone, with Artemis, and the Moon. Like Persephone, Hekate guided the dying into the Underworld. Like the Moon, Hekate was a Triple Goddess, for she incorporated in herself the living experience of Maiden, Mother, and Grandmother-Crone. Indo-European Hellenic clans descended in several waves into Greece during the Bronze Age, 2200-1100 BCE, bringing with them dominating male gods, warrior customs, the patriarchal family, and the horse. The shift from a culture of Mother Rite to one of Father Right can readily be seen in the Bronze Age Myceneans, who dominated the Greek mainland and Aegean Islands, circa 1600 to 1100 BCE. While they continued to worship Goddesses, the Greeks’ dominant religious ideology affirmed Zeus as the chief God of the pantheon that took up residence on Mount Olympus, the highest mountain in Greece. This historical change-over was most dramatically expressed in the tragedies performed in Classical Athens, in the trilogy of Aeschylus called the Oresteia; in the works of Sophocles, especially Antigone; and by Euripides, in his plays The Bacchantes, Medea, and The Trojan Women.[5] These tragedies vividly relate the key mytho-historical episodes in the violent clash of cultures and values and spiritual/religious beliefs that resulted in the establishment of patriarchal rule in Greece. The Mycenean culture was a mixture of the earlier matricultural, Goddess-centered civilization of Crete and the patriarchal God-centered clans of the Indo-European Mycenaeans, who had the military advantage because of domesticating the horse. Gimbutas describes this mixture of cultures as follows: The art, architecture, and written records of the Mycenaeans reveal a fascinating mixture of Old European and Indo-European elements. There is no doubt about the Indo-European ancestry of the Mycenaeans. They glorified war, and male warriors held prominence in society. Carrying on the Kurgan burial tradition, Mycenaean graves feature a prominent male warrior buried with his weapons, the dagger and sword, as well as with remarkable gold artifacts. Their pantheon featured male warrior deities. At the same time, the archaeological evidence shows that the Mycenaeans retained strong Old-European-Minoan beliefs. Much of the artwork—frescoes, signet rings and seals, pottery, and figurines—is quite similar to the Minoan. … The Mycenaeans represent an important transitional phase between Old European gynocentric culture and the classical Greek culture, where the male element came to dominate almost completely.[6] The Mycenaean era in Greek history, with its ongoing war-faring between city-states, ended with the collapse of civilization into three centuries of what are called the Greek Dark Ages, circa 1100 BCE to 800 BCE. Because of continual war, forests were decimated, communities were reduced to subsistence living, the skills of writing were …

(Special Post 6) 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.] Esther Essinger “Why Goddess, when “GD” is perpetrating so much grief? 1) First, it’s vital to know that Goddess is NOT “GD” in a skirt. It is demanded of NO one that they “believe” or “have faith”, so there can be no guilt (and no punishment! (No Hell below us, thank you John) in NOT choosing to interest oneself in these particular Stories, myths, legends and tales which center the Cosmic Female, the Universal Mother, Mother Earth /Mother Nature at their core. No evangelism happening here!
(Special Post Isis 2) Why the Color of Isis Matters by Mago Circle Members

[Editor’s note: The discussion took place in Mago Circle during the month of July, 2013. Our heartfelt thanks go to the members who participated in this discussion with openness and courage.] Part 2 The Color Talk in Goddesses Kahena Dorothea Athena was also whitened which is sad. However the statues were worshiped by many women to whom they brought comfort. And their origins were later remembered by the abundance of Black Virgins that became important in Italy and other parts of Europe. I don’t see Dark Goddesses as shadows but as having depths of Creativity and Knowledge. My main Goddess is Kirke and the bast relief I have of her is a chocolate brown. Diane Horton The worship of Isis broadened from Egypt to all the countries bordering the Mediterranean, as well as the Middle East and the isles called now the British Isles. She and Her worship were virtually everywhere in the westernly known world of the time! She IS the Goddess of 10,000 Names! And as such she was adapted to each culture’s vision of Her. She was the basis of all the” Black Madonnas”. I do not think of this as Isis/Auset representing the “dark” Goddess as something somehow bad or to be dealt with, but rather that ancient darkness represents infinite potential, eternal creativity/fertility, the beginning and ending of all things, and the always deepening knowledge of magick. Max Dashu However, there is a politics of representation that we all need to be aware of, that pushes original African iconography down and away, and fronts Europeanized images. There is no possibility of “colorblindness” in such a system; a restoration of the original must be actively striven toward. This is incumbent on all of us not of (recent) African descent. Otherwise we perpetuate the injurious status quo, instead of overturning it. Harita Meenee I agree with those who say that race is largely a social construct. Its roots seem to lie in colonialism and the slave trade. I would also like to add that racism is used to oppress people of different nationalities and colors. Ηere in Greece the IMF neo-liberal policies are destroying our economy (and lives); they go hand in hand with a vicious racist campaign against immigrants, along with the rise of a neo-Nazi party. This is part of an effort to redirect people’s anger away from the government and bankers, towards those who are poor and foreign and often have a different color or religion. Fortunately, many grassroots activists are responding to this by building a strong anti-racist, antifascist movement. You can see our Facebook page below. It’s in Greek but the photos are quite revealing. If anyone is interested in learning more about the situation here, please message me and I’ll try to find some articles in English for you. https://www.facebook.co/19JanuaryATHENSvsFASCISM?fref=ts 19 Γεναρη – ΑΘΗΝΑ ΠΟΛΗ Αντιφασιστικη Μπροστά στη κλιμάκωση της φασιστικής απειλής και της ρατσιστικής βίας, στη εμφάν…See More Naa Ayele Kumari Let me put this in the context of something you might understand. This is a goddess group that honors the feminine and the power it represents. People in this group understand the oppression and misrepresentation of women. We understand the implications of misogynistic patriarchal thinking. We understand the implications of stealing the information, rites, and traditions from goddess centered cultures and rephrasing them into male dominated themes… especially those that then went on to oppress women today. This is the same thing that has happened as it related to race and our cultures. It infuriates us when a man may say… why do we have to focus on the goddess? Let us just accept that we are all human and no special consideration should be given to anyone because of their gender. Or, this is just a distraction or social construct and it really doesn’t matter. We understand the blatant disregard and ignorance of those statements. Yet, the same is true for race and people of other races. Your attitude and casual disregard perpetuates a lie that you are comfortable with and don’t wish to move from that comfort zone. It means you don’t have to be accountable for the injustices or oppression it continues to perpetuate in the larger culture toward people who do not look like you. As far as I am concerned, I truly believe that the dark goddess for many with white skin IS their shadow… It is the part of themselves that they deny and fear. That you may have come from black people may scare you… even when the science proves it. That deep down… you fear what you don’t understand. To even confront it is frightening… something that you would rather ignore and deny… Yet… here we are. Black, Yellow, Red… people.. women… who have been oppressed for thousands of year because of this… and are asking… to be seen in their true likeness… not as you wish them to be… or fear them to be. Naa Ayele Kumari Thank you Max Dashu, I so appreciate your scholarship and dedication to the truth where ever you find it… and Helen Hwang for staying open to it as well. [Someone withdrew the threads.] Rick Williams No, you can’t passively aggressively slither your way out of this, reread your own statements and that last post contradicts most of your ascertains. I can’t believe that you honestly say fire away at you like you’re some sort of martyr and VICTIM of being misunderstood, not at all, I understand you very well. I don’t think you understand yourSELF. That’s the real tragedy. Rick Williams “The Lips of Wisdom are Closed except to the Ears of Understanding.” It is in quotes, and it’s part of Ancient Wisdom, of Tehuti, DJehuti, or Hermes Trimegitus… The Great Scribe of KMT.. they have alot of pretty pictures of him all over KMT(Egypt).. still have no idea what you are saying have the time. Max Dashu Thank you Naa Ayele for taking the time to make the extremely apt analogy of women’s oppression to clarify the politics of race oppression […]
(Review) Journey into Dreamtime by Munya Andrews, reviewed by Glenys Livingstone

Although the term “Dreamtime” is often not considered an adequate translation of the cosmology, religion or spirituality of Indigenous Australians, Munya Andrews of the Bardi people from the Kimberley region of Western Australia, acknowledges this and chooses to name her recently published book with it, explaining that: “I love the term … For me, it conjures up a magical and mysterious world.”, and she feels that the term aligns perfectly with the common global religious concept that Diety is beyond words and human understanding. For me, as Munya Andrews describes “Dreamtime”, it seems resonant with the sense of “ever-present Origins”[1]; that is, original space and time that is omnipresent. This is a space/place that I understand to be referred to as “between the worlds” and “beyond the bounds of space and time”, by Indigenous Europeans (Pagans), a tradition with which I am familiar. I understand it to be a sentient world in which we are immersed actually, and which may be revealed to the observant person in synchronous moments. With practice one may live with clearer everyday connections with this world, and Munya’s book is an important contribution to making those connections from within the cosmology of her people; and for “all beautiful souls to keep the Dreamtime alive”, as she says in the book’s dedication. This book provides informative story that should be part of every Australian’s education at various levels: it lays a groundwork and also elicits deepening understandings. The teachings offered in Journey into Dreamtime should be considered essential knowledge for living on this land named Australia, whereas heretofore most present occupants have often not had easy access to such learning. This very readable and small book provides some basic facts: for example, that there are “250 or so Indigenous nations, each having their own language, their own names and ‘country’ or tribal lands.”; and that terms such as Koori, Nunga or Murri are “pan-Aboriginal” names taken on since colonisation, for the sake of asserting a distinct Indigenous identity, in the face of forced removal from families and land. In the course of the seven chapters Munya develops understanding of Dreamtime, and also understandings of Indigenous Law, Songlines, sacred sites, bush doctors/bush medicine, Rainbow Snake, and Kindredness. I found all of this really helpful, an invitation into a world of being and relationship; and it is told with frequent analogies from Western science and academic and spiritual texts, with which the reader may be more familiar, enabling the bridge into Indigenous science and worldview. There is a list of suggested readings offered, along with links and details for further connection and learning. At the conclusion of each chapter of Journey into Dreamtime there are “Dreamtime Reflections”, posing questions for personal consideration, inviting personal participation and pathways into some actual sense of an alive self in relationship with the alive world described. This book needs to be in spaces/places where everyday people can read it, like waiting rooms of all kinds (where there are frequently Bibles); as well as in every library, and especially Australian libraries. I highly recommend Journey into Dreamtime as an educational resource, for your self, for educational programs, and/or for any group that you may gather. Aunty Munya, as she names herself, has an impressive track record of speaking engagements, mentioned at the conclusion of the book, and invites you to have her speak to your organisation. She describes her life purpose as “to create better understanding and appreciation of Aboriginal people and to leave behind a legacy of Dreamtime wisdom for generations to come.” May it be so, as readers of Journey into Dreamtime absorb its teaching and resources. To order a copy of Journey into Dreamtime visit Evolve Communities NOTES: [1]“ever-present origin” is the English translation of Jean Gebser’s Ursprung und Gegenwart, Stuttgart, Deutsche Verlag, 1966.

(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 …
(Essay) The Wheel of the Year and Climate Change by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

https://pagaian.org/pagaian-wheel-of-the-year/ The Wheel of the Year in a PaGaian cosmology essentially celebrates Cosmogenesis – the unfolding of the Cosmos, in which Earth’s extant Creativity participates directly, as does each unique being. The Creativity of Cosmogenesis is expressed through Earth-Sun relationship as it may manifest and be experienced within any region of our Planet. In PaGaian tradition this is expressed with Triple Goddess Poetry, which is understood to be metaphor for the creative dynamics unfolding the Cosmos. At the heart of the Earth-Sun relationship is the dance of light and dark, the waxing and waning of both these qualities, as Earth orbits around our Mother Sun. This dance, which results in the manifestation of form and its dissolution, as it does in the Seasons, happens because of Earth’s tilt in relationship with Sun: and that is because this tilt effects the intensity of regional receptivity to Sun’s energy over the period of the yearly orbit. This tilt was something that happened in the evolution of our planet in its earliest of days – some four and a half billion years ago, and then stabilised over time: and the climatic zones were further formed when Antarctica separated from Australia and South America, giving birth to the Antarctica Circumpolar Current, changing the circulation of water around all the continents … just some thirty million years ago[i]. Within the period since then, which also saw the advent of the earliest humans, Earth has gone through many climatic changes. It is likely that throughout those changes, the dance of light and dark in both hemispheres of the planet … one always the opposite of the other – has been fairly stable and predictable. The resultant effect on flora and fauna regionally however has varied enormously depending on many other factors of Earth’s ever changing ecology: She is an alive Planet who continues to move and re-shape Herself. She is Herself subject to the cosmic dynamics of creativity – the forming and the dissolving and the re-emerging. The earliest of humans must have received all this, ‘observed’ it, in a very participatory way: that is, not as a Western industrialized or dualistic mind would think of ‘observation’ today, but as kin with the events – identifying with their own experience of coming into being and passing away. There is evidence to suggest that humans have expressed awareness of, and response to, the phenomenon of coming into being and passing away, as early as one hundred thousand years ago: ritual burial sites of that age have been found[ii], and more recently a site of ongoing ritual activity as old as seventy thousand years has been found[iii]. The ceremonial celebration of the phenomenon of seasons probably came much later, particularly perhaps when humans began to settle down. These ceremonial celebrations of seasons apparently continued to reflect the awesomeness of existence as well as the marking of transitions of Sun back and forth across the horizon, which became an important method of telling the time for planting and harvesting and the movement of pastoral animals. https://pagaian.org/pagaian-wheel-of-the-year/ It seems that the resultant effect of the dance of light and dark on regional flora and fauna, has been fairly stable in recent millennia, the period during which many current Earth-based religious practices and expression arose. In our times, that is changing again. Humans have been, and are, a major part of bringing that change about. Ever since we migrated around the planet, humans have brought change, as any creature would: but humans have gained advantage and distinguished themselves by toolmaking, and increasingly domesticating/harnessing more of Earth’s powers – fire being perhaps the first, and this also aided our migration. In recent times this harnessing/appropriating of Earth’s powers became more intense and at the same time our numbers dramatically increased: and many of us filled with hubris, acting without consciousness or care of our relational context. We are currently living in times when our planet is tangibly and visibly transforming: the seasons themselves as we have known them for millennia – as our ancestors knew them – appear to be changing in most if not all regions of our Planet. Much predictable Poetry – sacred language – for expressing the quality of the Seasonal Moments will change, as regional flora changes, as the movement of animals and birds and sea creatures changes, as economies change[iv]. In Earth’s long story regional seasonal manifestation has changed before, but not so dramatically since the advent of much current Poetic expression for these transitions, as mixed as they are with layers of metaphor: that is, with layers of mythic eras, cultures and economies. We may learn and understand the traditional significance of much of the Poetry, the ceremony and symbol – the art – through which we could relate and converse with our place, as our ancestors may have done; but it will continue to evolve as all language must. At the moment the dance of dark and light remains predictable, but much else is in a process of transformation. As we observe and sense our Place, our Habitat, as our ancestors also did, we can, and may yet still make Poetry of the dance of dark and light, of this quality of relationship with Sun, and how it may be manifesting in a particular region and its significance for the inhabitants: we may still find Poetic expression with which to celebrate the sacred journey that we make everyday around Mother Sun, our Source of life and energy. It has been characteristic of humans for at least several tens of thousands of years, to create ceremony and symbol by which we could relate with the creative dynamics of our place, and perhaps it was initially a method of coming to terms with these dynamics – with the apparently uniquely human awareness of coming into being and passing away[v]. Our need for sacred ceremony of relationship with our place, can only be more dire in these times, as we are witness to, and aware of, …
The Passing of Last Summer’s Growth by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

The ‘passing of last Summer’s growth’ as is experienced and contemplated in the Season of Deep Autumn/Samhain, may be a metaphor for the passing of all/any that has come to fullness of being, or that has had a fullness, a blossoming of some kind, and borne fruit; and in the passing it has been received, and thus transforms. The ‘passing of last Summer’s growth’ may be in hearts and minds, an event or events, a period of time, or an era, that was a deep communion, now passed and dissolved into receptive hearts and minds, where it/they reside for reconstitution, within each unique being. Samhain is traditionally understood as ‘Summer’s end’: indeed that is what the word ‘Samhain’ means. In terms of the seasonal transitions in indigenous Old European traditions, Summer is understood as over when the Seasonal Moment of Lammas/Lughnasad comes around; it is the first marked transition after the fullness of Summer Solstice. The passing and losses may have been grieved, the bounty received, thanksgiving felt and expressed, perhaps ceremonially at Autumn Equinox/Mabon; yet now in this Season of Samhain/Deep Autumn it composts, clearly falls, as darkness and cooler/cold weather sets in, change is clearer. In the places where this Earth-based tradition arose, Winter could be sensed setting in at this time, and changes to everyday activity had to be made. In our times and in our personal lives, we may sense this kind of ending, when change becomes necessary, no longer arbitrary: and the Seasonal Moment of Samhain may be an excellent moment for expressing these deep truths, telling the deep story, and making meaning of the ending, as we witness such passing. What new shapes will emerge from the infinite well of creativity? And we may wonder what will return from the dissolution? What re-solution will be found? We may wonder what new shapes will emerge. In the compost of what has been, what new syntheses, new synergies, may come forth? Now is the time for dreaming, for drawing on the richness within, trusting the sentience, within which we are immersed, and which we are: and then awaiting the arrival, being patient with the fermentation and gestation. Seize the moment, this Moment – and converse with the depths within your own bodymind, wherein She is. Make space for the sacred conversation, the Conversing with your root and source of being, and take comfort in this presence. We may ponder what yet unkown beauty and wellness may emerge from this infinite well of creativity. The Samhain Moment in the Northern Hemisphere is 17:14 UT 7thNovember this year. Wishing you a sense of the deep communion present in the sacred space you make for this holy transition.
(Mago Almanac Excerpt 5) Introducing the Magoist Calendar by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

Mago Almanac: 13 Month 28 Day Calendar (Book A) Free PDF available at Mago Bookstore. THE 28-13-7 INTERPLAY How does the number, 28 (days), for the lunar cycle come about? Why is it 28 days and not 29 or 30, the latter implicated in the traditional lunar calendar of East Asia? It appears that 28 days is a value closer to the moon’s sidereal period (about 27.3 days) than the synodic period (about 29.5 days). Or is it that 28 days points to the median between the synodic lunar cycle and the sidereal lunar cycle? To answer these questions, it is important to note that a value in the Mago Time captures an inter-cosmic biological cusp/juncture derived from the matrix of sonic numerology. Distinguished from the patriarchal measure of time fixated into a solipsistic space, it makes visible the interconnectedness of all bodies. It never stands as an isolated single occasion. The 28 day, 13 month calendar has to do with how we perceive the moon. There are two ways of understanding the lunar cycle; the sidereal period and the synodic period (see Figure 2). The synodic period refers to the time, about 29.5 days, that we on earth see the moon complete one round of revolution, e.g. from the full moon to the full moon. In contrast, the sidereal period refers to the actual time, about 27.3 days, that the moon takes to complete one round of revolution. While the synodic time is measured relative to the Earth (the observer’s position is on earth), the sidereal time is measured relative to the distant “fixed” stars (the observer’s position is far out at the distant stars). Since the distant stars are considered at rest, the sidereal period is taken as a universal value, not affected by the location of the viewer, we on earth. There is, apparently, a discrepancy between the lunar cycle that we on earth see the moon return to the same phase and the lunar cycle that the moon actually completes a revolution. The former is based on our observation of the moon’s phases, whereas the latter is based on the moon’s actual orbital motions. The two differs basically because all celestial bodies, the moon, earth, and sun, in the solar system are in motion. It is not just the moon that we watch revolving but Earth also revolves around the sun. We are watching the movement of the moon on a moving vehicle, earth, so to speak. Therefore, the moon has to travel about 2 more days in order for us on earth to see it in the same phase (see the green portion in Figure 2 part). At the position A of the moon in Figure 2, the moon is in line with the sun and the distant stars, which is a new moon. In the position of B (the new moon), the moon is in line with the sun but not with the distant stars. The right hand line of the green portion in line with the distant stars is where the moon started as a new moon. The moon has traveled about 2 more days to be in line with the sun. That is why the synodic period is about 2 days longer than the sidereal period. When it comes to “the lunar calendar”, moderns tend to think of it as the waxing and waning phases of the moon (29.5 days, the synodic period). The problem lies in that, following the synodic period, people see nothing beyond the moon’s phases. They overlook the fact that the moon rotates and revolves on its own axis and around the earth approximately 13 degrees every day. The synodic lunisolar calendar is a navel-gazing vision. Attending to the moon’s phases may seem benign. However, that is a planned pitfall; the synodic lunisolar calendar with 12 months in a year is here to supersede the 28 day, 13 month gynocentric calendar. Its irregularity with the number of days in a month (29 or 30 days with about 11 extra days for intercalation) is an inherently critical flaw. Its inaccuracy when incorporated within the solar annual calendar (approximately 365.25 days) stands out. Seen below in the table, the synodic lunar track results in as many leap days as a total of 44 days for 4 years, whereas the sidereal lunar track has 2 days for 4 years. The synodic lunisolar calendar undercuts the moon’s given capacity – guiding earthly beings into the intergalactic voyage of WE/HERE/NOW. In it, both the moon and women are, glorified and objectified by the viewer, cast under the male voyeuristic eye. On the contrary, the sidereal lunisolar calendar, based on the cyclic synchrony between the moon and women, offers the lens to the interconnectedness of all bodies in the universe. Synodic Lunar Track (Patriarchal) Sidereal Lunar Track (Magoist) Focus Moon’s phases Moon’s motions Days of month 29 or 30 (irregular) 28 (regular) No. of months in a year 12 13 Women’s menstrual cycle Assumed sync Synced Luni-centric Astolonomy Unknown 28 Constellations Intercalations 11 days annually, a total of 44 days for 4 years 1 day annually & 1 day every 4 years, a total of 2 days for 4 years Sources prove that the sidereal lunation is, albeit esoterically, known across cultures to this day. Through the comparative study of ancient cultures of Babylon, Arabia, India and China, W. B. Yeats (1865-1939) observes the substantive difference in dynamic between the two lunation tracks, the synodic and the sidereal. He notes that the moon’s orbital motion, apart from the sun’s, charts out the celestial sphere as the 28 Mansions. I have learned that the 28 Mansions or 28 Constellations of the Moon is a popular form of the 28 day and 13 month Magoist calendar, widely circulated among East Asians especially Koreans from the ancient time. Yeats’ following insights corroborate the Budoji’s explication of the Magoist Calendar in general and the faulty nature of the patriarchal (ancient Chinese) calendar in …
Artful Ceremonial Expression by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

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

This essay is an excerpt from Chapter 3 of the author’s new book A Poiesis of the Creative Cosmos: Celebrating Her within PaGaian Sacred Ceremony. The Cosmos is a ceremony, a ritual. Dawn and dusk, seasons, supernovas – it is an ongoing Event of coming into being and passing away. The Cosmos is always in flux, and we exist as participants in this great ritual event, this “cosmic ceremony of seasonal and diurnal rhythms” which frame “epochal dramas of becoming,” as Charlene Spretnak describes it.[i] Swimme and Berry describe the universe as a dramatic reality, a Great Conversation of announcement and response.[ii]Ritual/ceremony[iii] may be the human conscious response to the announcements of the Universe – an act of conscious participation. Ceremony then may be understood as a microcosmos[iv] – a human-sized replication of the Drama, the Dynamic we find ourselves in. Swimme and Berry describe ritual as an ancient response humans have to the awesome experience of witnessing the coming to be and the passing away of things; they say that a “ritual mode of expression” is from its beginning “the manner in which humans respond to the universe, just as birds respond by flying or as fish respond by swimming.”[v] It is the way in which we as humans, as a species, may respond to this awesome experience of being and becoming, how we may hold the beauty and the terror. Humans have exhibited this tendency to ritualize since the earliest times of our unfolding: evidence so far reveals burial sites dating back one hundred thousand years, as mentioned in the previous chapter. We often went to huge effort in these matters, that is almost incomprehensible to the modern industrialised econocentric mind: the precise placing of huge stones in circles such as found at Stonehenge and the creation of complex sites such as Silbury Hill may be expressions of some priority, indicating that econocentric thinking – such as tool making, finding shelter and food, was not enough or not separate from the participation in Cosmic events. Ritual seems to have expressed, and still does actively express for some peoples, something essential to the human – a way of being integral with our Cosmic Place, which was not perceived as separate from material sustenance, the Source of existence: thus it was a way perhaps of sensing “meaning” as it might be termed these days – or “relationship.” Swimme and Berry note that the order of the Universe has been experienced especially in the seasonal sequence of dissolution and renewal; this most basic pattern has been an ultimate referent for existence.[vi] The seasonal pattern contains within it the most basic dynamics of the Cosmos – desire, fullfilment, loss, transformation, creation, growth, and more. The annual ceremonial celebration of the seasonal wheel – the Earth-Sun sacred site within which we tour – can be a pathway to the Centre of these dynamics, a way of making sense of the pattern, a way of sensing it. One enters the Universe’s story. The Seasonal Moments when marked and celebrated in the art form of ceremony may be sens-ible ‘gateways’ through the flesh of the world[vii] to the Centre – which is omnipresent Creativity. Humans do ritual everyday – we really can’t help ourselves. It is simply a question of what rituals we do, what story we are telling ourselves, what we are “spelling”[viii] ourselves with – individually and collectively. Ceremony is actually ‘doing,’ not just theorizing. We can talk about our personal and cultural disconnection endlessly, but we need to actually change our minds. Ceremony can be an enabling practice – a catalyst/practice for personal and cultural change. It is not just talking about eating the pear, it is eating the pear; it is not just talking about sitting on the cushion (meditating), it is sittingon the cushion. It is a cultural practice wherein we tell a story/stories about what we believe to be so most deeply, about who and what we are. Ceremony can be a place for practicing a new language, a new way of speaking, or spelling – a place for practicing “matristic storytelling”[ix] if you like: that is, for telling stories of the Mother, of Earth and Cosmos as if She were alive and sentient. We can “play like we know it,” so that we may come to know it.[x] Ceremony then is a form of social action. NOTES: [i] Spretnak, States of Grace, 145. [ii] Swimme and Berry, The Universe Story, 153. [iii] I will use either or both of these terms at different times: I generally prefer “ceremony” as Kathy Jones defines it in Priestess of Avalon, Priestess of the Goddess, 319. She says that ritual involves a repeated set of actions which may contain spiritual or “mundane” elements (such as a daily ritual of brushing one’s teeth), “whereas ceremony is always a spiritual practice and may or may not include ritual elements.” The PaGaian seasonal celebrations/events are thus most kin to “ceremony,” although I do not perceive any action as “mundane.” However, “ritual” is more commonly used to speak of how humans have conversed with cosmos/Earth. [iv] Spretnak, States of Grace, 145. [v] Swimme and Berry, The Universe Story, 152-153. [vi] Ibid. [vii] Abram speaks of “matter as flesh” in The Spell of the Sensuous, 66, citing Maurice Merleau-Ponty, The Invisible and the Invisible (Evanston, Illinois: Northwestern University Press, 1968). [viii] Starhawk used this term on her email list in 2004 to describe the story-telling we might do to bring forth the changes we desire. [ix] A term used by Gloria Feman Orenstein in The Reflowering of the Goddess (New York: Pergamon Press, 1990), 147. [x] As my doctoral thesis supervisor Dr. Susan Murphy once described it to me in conversation REFERENCES: Abram, David. The Spell of the Sensuous. New York: Vintage Books, 1997. Jones, Kathy. Priestess of Avalon, Priestess of the Goddess. Glastonbury: Ariadne Publications, 2006. Orenstein, Gloria Feman. The Reflowering of the Goddess. New York: Pergamon Press, 1990. Spretnak, Charlene. States of Grace: The Recovery of Meaning in the Postmodern Age. San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1993. Swimme, Brian and Berry, Thomas. The Universe Story: From the Primordial Flaring Forth to the Ecozoic Era. New York: HarperCollins, 1992.

(Essay 2) Why Reenact the Nine-Mago Movement? by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

[Author’s Note: The sequel of this essay is released in preparation for 2015 Nine-Day Solstice Celebration Project.] Part 2 Goddess Goma, the Magoist Shaman Ruler, and Her Nona-Mago Tradition Not until the autumn of 2012 did the pervasive manifestation of the number nine symbolism in Magoism surface in my consciousness. The information that the shrine of Gaeyang Halmi (Gaeyang Grandmother/Goddess), the Sea Goddess of Korea, was once called the Temple of Gurang (Nine Goddesses 九嫏祠) awakened a deep memory in me. It was a revelation to me and I began to connect the dots! That summer, I had joined the field research team of Konkuk University’s Korean Oral Literature graduate program. With them I visited the Shrine of the Sea Saint (Suseong-dang 水聖堂) in Buan, North Jeolla, S. Korea to collect folklore from the locals. Only when I was processing the data that the team gathered to write a report, did I come across the original name of the shrine, the Temple of the Nine Goddesses. And the Nine Goddesses refer to Gaeyang Halmi and her eight daughters. It is unknown how and when it was replaced by the current name, the Shrine of the Sea Saint. It is evident, however, that a linguistic femicide took place; the female-connoted term, the Nine Goddesses, was replaced by the sex/gender neutral term, the Sea Saint.
(Essay 1) Magoist Cetaceanism and the Myth of the Pacifying Flute (Manpasikjeok) by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang, Ph.D.

Pod of narwhals, northern Canada, August 2005. Image courtesy of Kristin Laidre. Wikemedia Commons Manpasikjeok (the pacifying flute that defeats all) is a legendary flute, purportedly made from a narwhal’s tusk, originating in the 7th century Silla (57 BCE-935 CE). King Sinmun (r. 681-692) had a revelation concerning “a bamboo tree” growing on a mysterious mountain floating in the Sea of Whales, today’s East Sea of Korea. From this tree, a flute was made with which he was able to protect the whole world. As a national treasure of Silla, this instrument was famed to defeat all enemies at the time of troubles. What we have is the accounts of the pacifying flute recounted in Korea’s official historical texts. Two sources from the Samguk Sagi (Historical Records of the Three States) and the Samguk Yusa (Memorabilia of the Three States) shall be examined. Not surprisingly, whales are made unrecognizable not only within the story but also in the official history books of Korea. Magoist Cetaceanism was subjected to erasure in the course of Korean official history, but apparently not in the time of King Sinmun of Silla. The myth of Manpasikjeok testifies to Sillan Magoist Cetaceanism upheld by 7th century Sillan rulers. We are reading a Magoist Cetacean myth, however, told by people of a later time when Magoist Cetaceanism was no longer recognized. The fact that these two official historical texts of Korea recount the narrative of Manpasikjeok speaks to its significance: The story is told with a sense of mystery or suspicion. While the Samguk Sagi overtly treats the author’s sense of disbelief, the Samguk Yusa provides a full narrative in tantalizing but mystified details. How was Manpasikjeok 萬波息笛 created in the first place? Below is the Samguk Sagi version of the story: According to Gogi (Ancient Records), “During the reign of King Sinmun, a little mountain emerged in the East Sea out of nowhere. It looked like a head of a turtle. Atop the mountain there was a bamboo tree growing, which became two during the day and became one at night. The king had his subject cut the bamboo tree and had it made a flute. He named it Manpasik (Pacifying and Defeating All).” Although it is written so, its account is weird and unreliable.[1] Written by Gim Busik (1075–1151), a Neo-Confucian historiographer, the above account betrays an unengaged author’s mind in the story. For Gim, Korean indigenous narratives like Manpasikjeok are anomalous, if not unreliable, by the norms of Chinese history. In contrast to the former, the Samguk Yusa details the Manpasikjeok story in a tantalizing sense of mystery. Its author Ilyeon (1206-1289) was a Buddhist monk, a religious historian who saw the history of Korea as fundamentally Buddhist from the beginning. He elaborates the story with factual data but fails to bring to surface the cetacean underpinning of the myth. It is possible that Magoist Cetaceanism had already submerged much earlier than his time. King Sinmun (r. 681-692) had built the temple, Gameun-sa (Graced Temple), to commemorate his late father King Munmu (r. 661-681) who willed to become a sea dragon upon death. The relic of King Munmu had been spread in Whale Ferry (Gyeongjin 鯨津), also known as the Rock of Ruler the Great (Daewang-am) located in the waterfront of the East Sea also known as the Sea of Whales. Evidence substantiates that King Munmu was a Magoist Cetacean devotee clad in a Buddhist attire. Or today’s Buddhologiests call it Esoteric Buddhism. The Manpasikjeok myth may be called the story of King Sinmun’s initiation to Magoist Cetaceanism. Before explicating the Samguk Yusa account, which is prolix and complex, I have summarized the Samguk Yusa’s account as follows: (Summary of the Manpasikjeok Myth) King Sinmun ordered the completion of Gameunsa (Graced Temple) to commemorate his deceased father, King Munmu. The main hall of Gameunsa was designed at the sea level to allow the dragon to enter and stroll through the ebb and flow of the sea waves. In the second year of his reign (682 CE), Marine Officer reported that a little mountain in the East Sea was approaching Gameunsa. The king had Solar Officer perform a divination. The divination foretold that he would be given a treasure with which he could protect Wolseong (Moon Stronghold), Silla’s capital. This would be a gift from King Munmu who became a sea dragon and Gim Yusin who became a heavenly being again. In seven days, the king went out to Yigyeondae (Platform of Gaining Vision) and saw the mountain floating like a turtle’s head in the sea. There was a bamboo tree growing on its top, which became two during the day and one at night. The king stayed overnight in Gameumsa to listen to the dragon who entered the yard and the substructure of the main hall. Then, there was darkness for seven days due to a storm in the sea. After the sea calmed, the king went into the mountain to meet the dragon. The dragon told him that, if he made a flute out of the bamboo tree, the whole world would be pacified. The king had the bamboo tree brought out of the sea and made it into a flute, which became a treasure of Silla. The mountain and the dragon disappeared. The flute, when played during times of the nation’s trouble, brought peace. Thus comes its name, Manpasikjeok (the pacifying flute that defeats all). During the reign of King Hyoso (r. 692-702), his son, the flute continued to make miracles. Thus it was renamed Manmanpapasikjeok (the pacifying flute that surely defeats all of all). One day, it was reported to King Sinmun that a little mountain was approaching Gameunsa. That mountain had a mysterious bamboo tree atop. On the seventh day from then, he went out to Yigyeondae (Platform of Gaining Vision), the whale watch place near Gameumsa. Then, he stayed overnight in Gameunsa to hear the dragon who entered the temple yard through the ebb and flow of the …
(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.