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The elements are primal to probably every magical
tradition in the world. Not all traditions see them the same way, this is the Western and
Celtic perception.
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- Earth - North
- Darkness. Life and death. A womb-like place where all
potential knowing and knowledge is held. It is also the place of the Winter King, he who
guards us through the longest night and into the rebirth of the sun-year. From June 21st
until December 20th each year the nights get longer and longer and the days shorter and
shorter, gradually the year dies. The Old King dies at the time of the rising of the
Pleiades, the Seven Sisters and the setting or death of Orion the Hunter. It is a
changeover moment in the year. One story which symbolises this is that of Alcyone and the
birth of her son during the "Halcyon Days", the seven days before and after the
Winter Solstice.
- The Earth is a place of rebirth. One of its names is the
"Mound of Wonders" and one of its physical
representations is the hill of Gorsedd Arberth above Narberth in Wales which was the
palace of Pwyll but there are many more. Silbury Hill, near Avebury in England, is
another, a man-made mound of wonders. Legend has it that the Treasures of Britain are, or
were, buried within it, including the sword and the grail, and this would symbolise the
"potential" which is hidden within the Earth for us to find. there are many
"tumps" all over Britain, and the rest of the world, which are venerated as
entry places into the Earth, like swollen wombs full of the child of knowing and the
ageless wisdom of the ancestors.
- Earth also holds the energy of the personal self and the
physical and etheric bodies - the things which are the "home" of our souls.
Earth is "ground" which holds us up, anchors us down, feeds us with everything
we need and through which we can help everything grow more aware - including ourselves.
Earth is our foundation.
- The gods and beings associated with Earth are Rhiannon,
Arawn, Elen and the Green Man.
- Air - East
- First light, awakening, new day, first breath. Coming out
of the womb and into the world. It is the time of the Spring Equinox, the balancing of
light and dark after the sun has been reborn at mid-winter. Now, for the first time in the
year there begins to be more light than dark and this continues up until the Summer
Solstice. It is the balance point in the "evolutionary cycle" where the things
are growing up and coming out of the earth to flower and fruit, a time of planting and
growing things.
- One of the stories of this time is Culhwch and Olwen, the
story of the battle between the Old King and the New King for the Maid of Spring. If the
Old King gives her up he will die and so he fights, often through riddles and tricks, to
keep her. If he succeeds then the new King will die before he ever gets to reign. It is a
story about balance, about one power relinquishing its hold so that the other power can
reign in its turn. as you watch you'll see how that balance changes again at the Autumn
Equinox. Don't' get stuck in personal stuff when you read these stories and don't reduce
them to personal psychology or political correctness - you'll miss the whole boat if you
do!
- In Celtic lore it is often symbolised as a whirling disc of
colours and called the Colours of the Winds. In the
Irish poem Saltair Na Ran it says there are twelve winds, "four chief winds",
four winds below them and four more winds subordinate winds. The four chief winds are
black which blows from the north, white blowing from the west, purple blowing from the
south and grey blowing from the east. In the north-west the subordinate winds are dark
brown and grey; in the north-east "speckled" and "dark"; in the
south-east red and yellow; and in the south-west grey-green and green.
- Air and light go together often and air is also the realm
of the Mind, of thought, the place where ideas are brought through from the potential,
where we begin to put form on the inspiration which comes to us through giving it words.
Words are sometimes maligned in New Age philosophy when only their glamour-side is noticed
but think how you would communicate if you had no words ...!!! Also think of the beautiful
poetry you love and the stories you have read or heard and enjoyed and the plays, all of
those are inspirations using words.
- You could also try "tasting" words as you speak
them. Try it alone so you can do it aloud without feeling a pratt. Take any word and say
it aloud in lots of different ways, roll it round your tongue, make your mouth different
shapes as you say it, listen to the different sounds as you shape your mouth differently
around the same word and hear how the word fills up with more and more meanings. You are
getting to know words, not just use them thoughtlessly and out of habit.
You are getting an intimate relationship with words, making friends. just think how
enriching this will be for you.
- Air is about all this, and much more. without air we could
make no sound, use no words to communicate and beautify our world. Air is the
"carrier wave" and the "fuel" for beautiful communication and helps us
relate to our world and each other so that we are not alone.
- Fire - South
- Inspiration, the height of powers, zenith, culmination,
fruition. This is the time of the Summer Solstice, the Summer King, sometimes called
Gromer Somer Jour which means Lord of the Summer Day. One of his stories is told in the
tale of Gawain and Ragnall where the Summer King, represented by both Gawain and Arthur,
learns how to transform the world from ugliness to beauty - again by giving up any idea of
controlling nature! So the King comes to the height of his powers and then is able to
marry the goddess Sovereignty, represented here by Ragnall, but not until he has passed
all the tests. a Germanic version of this tale is Rauch Else, but there are many versions
all around the world.
- June 20th and 21st is the longest day, the last day of the
year when there is more light than dark, after this the days get shorter and shorter and
the dark grows until after the Autumn Equinox there is more dark than light for the next
six months. It is the height of the powers of the New King, his wedding time and the
beginning of the end of his reign. A lot of seeming paradox there but this is how life is,
a balancing of light and dark of all the pairs of opposites and the gods and goddesses
enact this in their stories and show us how to do it.
- The Summer Solstice is a time of death of harvest, of
endings, and of celebration of the fruits and growth of the previous six months. Soon
after this time hay harvesting begins and the Mare's Neck is cut, and the Hare runs and
her celebrations done. Then comes the corn harvest and the cutting down of John
Barleycorn, another representation of the Summer King, where he is transformed from grain
into ale.
- Fire is a transformer. In consuming matter it makes it into
invisible things - we say it was all burnt up so there was nothing left of it. Nothing we
could see with our normal physical vision but even in ordinary chemistry we would find
invisible elements in the air. So fire has a strong connection to air. And without air
there can be no fire, one of the ways firemen use to put out fires is to smother them,
stop them being able to get any air. Fire needs matter, earth-stuff, and air in order to
burn. It combines two elements and makes something else of them, it is creative.
- In Celtic lore it is also known as the Green and Burning Tree. This is another representation
of the paradox of fire, how it is two things at once and so shows us the way to walk
between the worlds. Brighid is one of the major fire-guardians, also known as Brigantia in
Britain. She is patroness of inspiration, poets, and of making, smiths, so she combines
the elements of air and earth through her fire.
- The Green and Burning Tree also often warns you to be on
your guard in the sense of balancing, like a tightrope. A misplaced step and you could
find yourself getting burned. It is about taking care of all the little details, another
very important part of magical work which you have probably already realised. You cannot
be slipshod in magical work, you must take care. It is one of the reasons why many people
do not wish to be bothered with it!
- Water - West
- Blood, Life-force, flowing, feelings, empathy, compassion.
One of the old stories about water is that of the Well Maidens who guarded the springs and
offered visitors to drink from the golden cup. They were raped and the springs befouled by
a king and the springs dried up and the land became wasteland until someone found the Well
Maidens again. The story has a twist in the tail in that when the hero does find them he
offers to kill all the descendants of the king in vengeance. the Well Maiden points out
that these are her children too, the result of the rape, and no longer can one distinguish
king-seed from Well Maid seed, for the both are now one new race.
- Another story which contains the golden cup is that of
Nechtan and Boand. Again the story has what can seem a tragic ending, however one must
rise out of personal considerations and start to think like the gods to get the real
meanings from the stories.
- The Well of Wisdom, also know as the Well of Segais, is the primary source of wisdom and ancestral
knowledge in Celtic lore and in this Well lives the Salmon of Wisdom the eldest beast, who
is eaten and reborn again daily. This wisdom and knowledge runs through the
waterways of the land, so rivers are sacred and should not be polluted as they carry more
than the physical water which sustains life. Wisdom and knowledge are the life-blood as
much as water or physical blood. The rivers are fed from the Well of Segais and flow
through the land enriching it but they also collect the leavings of humans and animals and
plants and carry those back again to the source. These "leavings" feed the Well
with more experience and knowledge which matures in the "vat of the well" into
wisdom. So not only are we fed by the Well but we feed it in return. If we wish ourselves
and our children to be fed good nourishing stuff then we should think about the quality of
the leavings we put out for the rivers to take back - in every sense!
- The West also signifies the "Way of Death". It
comes at the time of the Autumn Equinox when the leaves begin to turn colour ready to
drop. They do so because their food source is turned off, the leaves begin to die. The
Great Winds come soon after and pull them from the trees over the time of Samhain and the
five fallow days around it where the gates between the worlds are opened and free travel
between them is possible. So many may begin to die at the Autumn Equinox as it is the time
when the Summer King prepares for his death in order to allow the Winter King to be born.
- It is the time of Modron and Mabon. Modron means Mother and
she is one of the universal mother-goddess faces of the Celtic tradition. She births and
loses her son, the Mabon or heavenly child, who is later refound having been
"imprisoned" in the depths of the Well of Segais. The inference being that he
has been taken to the Source of Wisdom and has learned it. Heroes "rescue" him
and bring him back to Earth (Modron), they go to find the Wisdom and bring it back for
others to share for the Mabon is the wisdom of the soul. The Earth- Mother's children are
our souls and we must go to find them in the depths where the ancestors and the dragons
guard and care for them until we are capable of looking after and using them successfully
ourselves.
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