PaganFM! 012612
Musical selections:
Loki, Shining Wheel Pagan Chorus, Chants of Balance
Hecate Is Rising, Shining Wheel Pagan Chorus, Elemental Children of Earth
Never Alone, Shining Wheel Pagan Chorus, Elemental Children of Earth
Circle Song, Shining Wheel Pagan Chorus, Elemental Children of Earth
Running Wild, Shining Wheel Pagan Chorus, Elemental Children of Earth
Herbs for life, Amanda Komisarek
Green and Grey, Damh the Bard, The Cauldron Born
The Horned God – An Unofficial Biography, Damh the Bard, As Nature Intended
Practical Pagan
Male and Female
Many Pagans today focus on the female principle – on the Goddess. Coming out of an age where only the God was worshiped, it sort of makes sense that we focus on the feminine principle. Maybe it’s setting things aright – returning toward a course that our ancestors once held. But there is a problem in moving toward a feminine principle alone: If we do that – if we replace the God of Judeo-Christian-Islamic belief with a purely feminine principle – what have we gained?
Now if the ultimate deity – assuming that there is one deity only – were to be female, rather than male, perhaps this would make sense. Then worshiping a female deity only would be worshiping in truth. But this requires of us one thing – to prove that there is only one ultimate deity, and that she is female. That’s something that can’t be done. Most every book that tries to demonstrate who our earliest ancestors worshiped, and how, has come to be met with a good deal of criticism. The truth is that we don’t know. And even if we did know which deity was first worshiped here on Earth – that proves nothing of the nature of Deity – it only shows how HUMANS worshiped.
Many Pagans, and especially Wiccans, tend to emphasize on the balance of masculine and feminine principles. But, strangely enough, the majority of books, the majority of our words, tend to focus on the feminine. So my question tonight is this: How do we get to a place of balance in our own lives? How do we come to honor the God as well as the Goddess, and not think of the God as merely an afterthought?
I think that one thing that we need to do, when looking to the God, is to wash away our preconceptions, which, for most of us, have been tainted by the Biblical description of the God who has been passed down through the Abrahamic religions. In these religions the emphasis was on defining ONE God who took the place of all Gods and Goddesses. And thus, all the elements of all deities had to be condensed into a single being. But in doing so, the traits which were most important to the Jews, became the dominant traits of the God. Thus, we see God as a vengeful, militaristic and judging being. What was important to the Jews was that they remain safe, that they be returned to their homeland, that their enemies be crushed, that those who wronged them be judged.
In Paganism, that isn’t what we’re looking for in a God. In Paganism, we’re looking for a God and a Goddess who complete, who complement each other. Neither is greater nor lesser than the other. Neither is stronger or weaker, more harsh or more compassionate. These are not the qualities that define masculine or feminine. The thing is that the strengths of both genders are expressed differently.
I get really upset when many people talk of the masculine and feminine principles as the “active” and “Passive” principles. There is nothing passive about the feminine principle. What IS different is how these principles are expressed in each gender. It might seem that, for example, in the sex act – and the subsequent act of procreation, that the male takes the active role, and the female takes the passive role. The reality of the situation is that both are active and both are (somewhat) passive roles. In the sex act, it can seem that the female is in the passive position, but this isn’t always the case. And it can seem that the female is little more than a vessel for a developing fetus – but that is certainly not the case.
A fetus, growing in the womb is entirely dependent on the mother. What she eats, drinks or breathe directly impacts the growing Fetus. At some point, brain development begins, and when ears have developed, the brain will be influenced by the sounds that fetus hears. Many researchers have suggested that the newborn can recognize the voices of those who were close to it while the baby was still in the womb. Any woman who has been pregnant or been through labor will tell you that it is nothing of a passive endeavor. In fact, when it comes to procreation, it might with much more reality seem that the male is the passive participant in the endeavor!
The point of all of this is that to properly understand the God, we really need to look to our selves. A recent study from the University of Michigan suggests that many of the differences between men and women are partially due to our evolution – and due to the fact that men needed to be warriors, and women needed to protect the young. The theory goes that men would eliminate other bands of men, and that this might explain why men are more likely to display prejudice. Women, on the other hand, would try to create bonds in an effort to help keep children safe, but would experience fear of strangers.
From these roots, it’s not difficult to surmise how the God could become a warrior God, and the Goddess a nurturing deity. We have Herne, the hunter, Lugh and Mars, the warriors and so many other male deities from various parts of the world who exhibited their qualities as hunters and gods of war. And we have many female deities who are Goddesses of motherhood and compassion.
But some in Paganism recognize that the male principle isn’t all about warfare and hunting and killing. Some see the God in a different fashion. And like the Charge of the Goddess, which I expect most all of us are very familiar with, there are various charges of the God. I found this unattributed one on the web. If it’s yours, or if anyone knows who wrote it, please get back to me so that I can properly attribute it. But I really appreciate the way this piece speaks of who the God is.
THE CHARGE OF THE GOD
Listen to the words of the Horned God, the Guardian of all things wild and free,
and Keeper of the Gates of Death, whose Call all must answer:
I am the fire within your heart…
The yearning of your Soul.
I am the Hunter of Knowledge
and the Seeker of the Holy Quest
I – who stand in the darkness of light
am He whom you have called Death.
I – the Consort and Mate of Her we adore,
call forth to thee.
Heed my call beloved ones,
come unto me and learn the secrets of death and peace.
I am the corn at harvest
and the fruit on the trees.
I am He who leads you home.
Scourge and Flame,
Blade and Blood -
these are mine and gifts to thee.
Call unto me in the forest wild
and on hilltop bare
and seek me in the Darkness Bright.
I – who have been called;
Pan,
Herne,
Osiris ,
and Hades,
speak to thee in thy search.
Come dance and sing;
come live and smile,
for behold:
this is my worship.
You are my children and I am thy Father.
On swift night wings
it is I who lay you at the Mother’s feet
to be reborn and to return again.
Thou who thinks to seek me,
know that I am the untamed wind,
the fury of storm and passion in your Soul.
Seek me with pride and humility,
but seek me best with love and strength.
For this is my path,
and I love not the weak and fearful.
Hear my call on long Winter nights
and we shall stand together guarding Her Earth
as She sleeps.
Certainly there are differences between male and female principles. There is none that is born of any but woman. And it is the sperm that fertilizes the egg. (To this, there have been demonstrated exceptions, but, at least not yet, in human life.) We all have a father, and we all have a mother, and they played different roles in how we have come to be.
But beyond that, in the world today, the roles of nurturer and protector and provider – we have no reason to hang on to the way things have been. The father can nurture, and the mother protect. Ours is not the world that our ancestors existed in aeons ago. We can create a new paradigm, and our Gods and goddesses can show the us the way. What we need do is look to what we see of ourselves today, and then discover the underlying archetypes. These are who our Gods and Goddesses are today.
If the God isn’t there primarily as a warrior or a hunter, who is he today?
We can look back at the Charge of the God that we just read, and the qualities there are certainly qualities I appreciate in a man! Yet there is not one word about war and killing, but strength still remains. He teaches us that we don’t need to prove our selves in battle to prove our strength or courage. It’s not in warfare or defeat of others that we prove our strength. Where blade and blood are gifts of the God, this doesn’t need to imply that one engages in battle. It might suggest that we can be ready for battle should the need exist, but again – this doesn’t mean that males only will ever be so engaged.
Being transgendered, and having had the opportunity to see both sides of the issue, I learned something a while ago that opened up my eyes just a bit. I’m going to recommend that you take a look at a film called Two Spirits. In some Native American traditions, there were many genders. There were girls who were born girls, boys who were born boys, girls who were born boys and boys who were born girls. There were those who had completely integrated both male and female in one body. The views of sex and gender were much more open than they are among Western civilization today.
I think that we could get to that point again. If we open our eyes and realize that our view of deity is very much a projection of who we are and what we aspire to, we will begin to see a God who is not merely vengeful or judgmental, but a God who is compassionate and loving. And we will see a Goddess who exhibits strength and courage and the physical skills that we might normally attribute to men. And when we do so, we will be the better for it because we will be all aspiring to the greatest we can achieve.
