Sol Invictus: The Feast of the Unconquerable Sun.Winter Solstice – Mithra – Kore – Horus - Saturnalia – Juvenalia – Lenaia - Yule - Cailleach Nollaich
These ADVENT recordings are my gift to youThe First Week – Merry-Earth – The ‘Fire Trial‘ to ground our will, as we honor the physical mineral Kingdom. The 2nd Week fo Advent – The ‘Trial by Water‘, to clarify & enlighten our feeling life, as we acknowledge the etheric realm & the plant world The 3rd Week of Advent – The ‘Air Trial‘, to focus & free our thinking, as we purify the Astral Realm, which we shared in gratitude with the Animal Kingdom. The 4th Week of Advent – Video coming soon. ~hag.:.
Today on this Eve of the ‘Longest Night’ when the ‘Sun Stands Still’ at Winter Solstice - Let us pause – To reflect on the many customs associated with this powerful storytelling time of year. May we re-member what came before, so that we can reflect on the now & create the future anew.
It is the dark before the dawn - the time of renewal, giving us the most primordial myths of humankind. The Sun of Mid-Winter completely draws in its breath, opening in new life at this time of deepest darkness.
The esoteric meaning of this time of year can be gleaned from the ancient Mystery Schools. Initiates into the Mysteries of Isis had to undergo a ceremony of death & rebirth in which they entered the underworld to gaze upon the “Sun at Midnight.” This ceremony, speaks of the journey of the soul into the fecund depths of the subconscious mind, & even deeper into the great dark sea of space from which all creation comes forth, where the candidate could be purified & born anew.
Dion Fortune describes this process in her book, The Sea Priestess:
Throughout the ancient world, people gathered at sacred sites as far apart as Newgrange in Ireland & the Temple of Karnak in Egypt, to celebrate the miracle of the Sun’s return. In the pitch-black sanctuary caves & earth chambers, our ancestors waited for the birth of new light & life.
The ancient Romans celebrated from December 17th to December 24th with a festival called Saturnalia, during which all work was put aside in favor of feasting & gambling. The social order was reversed, with masters waiting on their slaves.
Saturnalia is named after Saturn, who is often depicted with a sickle, like the figures of Death or Old Father Time. Astrologically speaking, Saturn is saturnine: gloomy, old, dutiful & heavy, like the metal associated with it: lead. He was the god who ate his own children rather than let them surpass him. For new life to flourish, for the Sun to rise again, it is necessary to meet this gloomy old fellow. And then - the feasting & merriment of the midwinter season are required in order to combat the forces of gloom.
Following Saturnalia, was the Juvenalia, a holiday in honor of children, who were entertained, feasted & given good luck talismans. After vanquishing the Old King - Father Time, celebrate the New Year’s Baby.
The birthday of Jesus of Nazareth was not celebrated on December 25th until the 4th century. Before then, December 25th was best known as the birthday of the Persian hero & sun-god, Mithra (an earlier form of Michael). The myth tells that he sprang up full-grown from a rock, armed with a knife & carrying a torch. Mithra journeyed into the underworld, winning gifts for humankind before his miraculous rebirth.
Lenaia was a women-only Athenian midwinter festival. They held ecstatic dances where a bull, representing Dionysus, was cut into nine pieces.
In 274 AD, the Roman emperor Valerian declared December 25th the Birthday of Sol Invictus, the Unconquerable Sun.
In the early years of Christianity, Christ’s birthday was celebrated on January 6th known to us now as 12th Night & Epiphany, represented by the Wise Magi - Kings who could read the omens in the starry script. The Eastern Orthodox folks knew that this was connected with the Baptism, when the Cosmic Christ Being entered into human form.
On the same date in pre-Christian times, this was when the Virgin Kore gave birth, celebrated in Alexandria with a festival called the Koreion. The image of the goddess, decorated with gold stars, was carried seven times around her temple as the priests cried, “The Virgin has brought forth the new Aeon!”
This ritual recalls the Egyptian ceremony re-enacting the birth of the Solar god Horus, to Isis. All lights in the city were doused while Isis circled the sarcophagus seven times, then brought forth Horus who was called “the Light of the World.”
Statues of Isis holding the newly born Sun god on her lap, presenting him to the world, prefigure the later Madonna & child archetype.
In Europe on Winter Solstice the ceremonies involved kindling the new light with a Yule log. This is a tradition in my family. We light the fire with a piece of last years Yule Log. Then write down all the bad habits & things about ourselves that we want to transform & we burn them up in the fire. Then we write what we want to grow like the Sun in the New Year. We save that & put it in a special box where we keep the Yule Log. We can then read what we wrote the year before to see what came true before we write the new resolutions.
The Yule log is brought into the house with great ceremony, & decorated with holly & ivy & evergreens. Some prefer to use the Yule log as a decoration & place candles on it instead, transforming it into a candelabra. It is lit with a piece of last year’s log as described in Herrick’s poem, “Hesperides:” Come bring with a noise
In Italy, the Yule log is called the Ceppo, & families gathered around the hearth pouring libations of wine upon the glowing wood, linking the Yule log with the custom of wassailing, & pouring out libations to the trees in the orchard.
The Yule log is left to burn all night, &, if possible, throughout the 12 Holy Nights. The ashes are kept for good luck. They have magical properties & can be scattered in the field to fertilize the soil (sounds like biodynamics!) or sprinkled around the house for protection.
Another ancient Midwinter custom is decorating with greens. The Romans decorated with rosemary, bay, laurel, holly, ivy & mistletoe. The holly & ivy were both important midwinter plants in Great Britain & Ireland, as seen in the mysterious medieval carol which mentions the rivalry between them, with the Ivy representing the cold gloominess of winter, & the Holly King, the jolly spirit of the season. The Christmas tree has more modern origin. The earliest record of an evergreen being decorated comes from Riga in Latvia in 1519, when a group of local merchants carried an evergreen bedecked with flowers to the marketplace, where they danced around it & then burned it.
Another possible source is the custom in 15th century Germany of hanging apples on a fir tree as a prop for the Oberufer plays performed on Christmas Eve, depicting Adam & Eve being driven out of Paradise.
In some parts of the Scottish highlands, the head of the household finds a withered stump and carves it into the likeness of an old woman, the Cailleach Nollaich or Christmas Old Wife, the goddess of winter, the hag of night, the old one who brings death. Burning her image drives away the hardships of winter & protects the occupants of the household from death.
Many traditions focused on this human battle between the dark & the light within. May we be willing to look into the dark before calling in the light.
At a time when the fate of our planet & all her creatures hangs in the balance, let each of us journey down into the cave of the soul to drink from the secret well of Wisdom & find the hidden flame within — then Return - bearing our own unique gift of Light for the world. This is a natural time for letting go & saying farewell. Since this is the season when animals hibernate & nature sleeps & we can turn inward too, as our thinking wakes up. Then when we light the Christmas tree, we can create the intention of bringing the light of thinking into the world. What are the ways in which you can help make the world lighter?
Solstice Blessings Dear Ones. See you in the ethers for our Winter Solstice w/ Mysteria Mystica Americana MA Saturday 21 December - 1 pm – 2:30 pm CST Join Zoom Meeting https://us06web.zoom.us/j/7050174041?pwd=IHmFS9yuzUXffIXg5b4OojEMtLzbFA.1&omn=84580651527 Meeting ID: 705 017 4041 - Passcode: MA A Special gift from the Grand Lodge of Mysteria Mystica Americana: Richard Cloud, Hazel Archer, Lisa Dalton w/ guests: Michael Draskovic, Russell Blackstone Until Soon – Peace ~hag .:.
20 December 2024 - “Speaking with the Stars”: The Ursid meteor shower radiates from the constellation Ursa Minor, the Lesser Bear, aka the Little Dipper, which also contains the North Star, Polaris.
The Fellowship of Preparation Makers' annual gathering, to be held this year in Viroqua, WI. Registration and further info will be posted on their page as it becomes available: https://www.biodynamics.com/content/fellowship-preparation-makers .
If you want to support the Spiritualization of the Earth thru the Biodynamic Farming done on Zinniker Farm, you are invited to become a paid subscriber, with all donations going directly to the farm
Greetings Friend, you currently a free subscriber to Cognitive Ritual. Thank you for receiving my workings freely offered. For the full experience, upgrade your subscription. ALL donations go to support Zinniker Farm - The oldest Biodynamic Farm in America! Together we can spiritualize the Universe. XOX ~hag
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Friday, 20 December 2024
Sol Invictus: The Feast of the Unconquerable Sun.
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