September 17, 2012October 2, 2019 Mago WorkLeave a comment

(Photo Essay 2) ‘Gaeyang Halmi, the Sea Goddess of Korea’ by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

Part II: The Lost Iconography of Gaeyang Halmi We visited the Suseong Shrine a second time on July 11, 2012. I looked inside the Shrine wherein a shaman ritual was Read More …

(Prose) Our Loss of Od by Deanne Quarrie

Freyja is an Old Icelandic goddess of the Earth, fertility, and beauty. Her name means “Lady.” Freyja is known to be very beautiful and sexual. It is thought that Freyja was first in union with Od. This union represented what is known in Old Icelandic as sam-vit, a state of united consciousness. In other words, consciousness that reflects a state of being united, integrated, or whole. Od had vanished from Her life causing her to weep for his loss. Where her tears fell on the land, they turned to amber and where they fell in the Sea they became gold. Amber and gold are both sacred to Freyja. From the time he left, she continued to travel and search for him. We come into this world as infants, and in that state only experience the present moment. We know our mothers from the heart beat felt in the womb and perhaps through other senses as yet undefined. We know at any given moment that we are hungry or content, wet or dry, sleepy or wakeful. Our ability to see is not fully developed and at first we see only hazy images around us. We are born knowing how to cry. It is our only way to communicate as infants. Our interests focus only on “self” and our own needs. We are, except for this ability to cry, basically helpless, unable to do anything except be where we are placed and are totally dependent on those who care for us. As we mature, however, we begin to hear and identify sounds, see colors and shapes and taste foods we like or dislike. We learn to smile when something pleases us and we learn to laugh when feeling happiness. We learn to recognize other people, sounds and gestures and eventually the many words spoken to us. We learn to scoot, crawl and finally walk. With that we learn to mimic and then, with understanding, communicate with speech. We still however, live very much in the “now.” As children, if not damaged by the care given us, we are fully sensing beings. We may not always understand our sensory perceptions because our experience is limited but we use our senses easily. We are creatures of exploration and discovery. Using an Old Icelandic term once more, you might say finna is fully active at this time. Finna is a critical and innate element of being that is critical to our spiritual and physical health and well-being. It means to discover, find, perceive, notice, feel, learn, to come across, and to meet. Something happens to us when we are old enough to enter school. We are placed in an environment where sensory exploration is no longer the focus but rather we begin to develop left brain perception, through reading and writing. We are taught to be more analytical, oriented toward mental processes rather than sensory awareness. Because of the rigid conformity required of us, we lose the ability to be open and much of the inherent wonder and deep curiosity of our own body’s desire to be open to our environment is lost. For those of us on a spiritual path, awareness of this loss comes to us as we seek answers to our own spiritual questions. Our yearning is much like that of Freyja for her Od. We have body memories of our connections to the sacred in those simple ways of childhood. We may not consciously remember what it is like to be open to all that is around us, but there is an inner yearning to seek and find, no matter how elusive it might be. Once we recognize that we are sacred beings and one with our Source, as well as everything else around us, the connections begin to grow. We take ourselves out into nature. We learn to really “see” what is around us. We learn that everything can speak to us, tell us what we need to know, if we listen. We study our past, digging deeply into our ancestors spiritual past wanting to know who their gods and goddesses were and we actively engage with them in our own lives. We learn that our bodies truly are our temple because they house our sacred spirit. From this we begin to see the advisability of caring for our bodies and begin eating in healthy ways. We learn to take care of this “temple” we have been given or have chosen for ourselves. If we allow it, music can enter our souls and speak to us, recalling far distant longings, awakening emotions hidden deeply within. Our food can give us new pleasure, with taste sensations unnoticed before. We learn about our deep inner nature, our lightness and our shadow. We acknowledge and love both. We see who we are though our learning about ourselves, perhaps through the many self-development avenues available to us. We learn to love who we are no matter if flawed or not, because we know that all are flawed in one way or another and we see that even “flawed” is a faulty perception. As we explore the five senses given to us at birth, opening in our perceptions, somehow another sense is developed and it is a returning of our own intuitive awareness. We have the ability to know of things seen by the inner eye and heard by inner ears. We delight in the sense of touch, both in the touching and in the being touched. And so this ongoing search for Od that we have leads us into a return to a natural state of openness and from there to an inner consciousness that reflects the state of being united, integrated, and whole. When we are in that state we are able to access all that we need to manifest all possibilities in life. Our Freyja will have found her Od. Meet Mago Contributor, Deanne Quarrie
(Poem) What if by Mary Saracino

Garden nearby where I live, New Mexico. Photo by Mary Saracino What if it’s not about who you know or don’t know what you know, or don’t know how much money you have or don’t have if you believe in god or not what if it’s about singing with the birds listening to the trees blessing the plants and all creatures great and small daydreaming with the clouds gazing at the stars dancing under the moon what if it’s about kindness, compassion, mercy what, if in the end, it’s all just about love https://www.magoism.net/2013/05/meet-mago-contributor-mary-saracino/
(Poem) Winged Women Deeply Rooted by Carolyn Lee Boyd

Photography by Carolyn Lee Boyd Like deeply planted oaks, the women once dwelled together in peace, Their feet covered with nourishing soil and arms outstretched, Branches of flesh to connect with the living air. Like laughing leaves swooping in the sky, The women once jubilantly soared as one Above the skin of the Earth. As a young child, I dreamt that if I stood very straight, Tensed all my muscles and closed my eyes, I would slowly rise into the air a few inches, Propel myself with my arms wherever I wished to go, Then land again as gently as a rose petal on the wind. But the only time I tried to ascend even a breath’s measure, I failed, landbound, unsure and giftless. Imagine my delight when I discovered that witches once Rode on brooms to song and dance-filled forest jamborees, Inanna soared like a condor over Sumer spotting evildoers and restoring justice, Holy Cailleachs metamorphosed into fierce and noisy owls Peering through the night’s blackness to see truth below. Goddesses and spirit beings from all over the globe Crowded the clouds with no thought of gravity’s imprisonment. These sacred beings were not escaping our planet’s surface, Seeking purity and glory in a heavenly realm Beyond sinful chaos on the ground. They knew that life on Earth is honeysweet magic and that Stone cold cellular walls dividing us From winged beings are gossamer illusion. I have heard that many women as children Believed the sky was their birthright. Maybe we all kept our conviction silent For fear of remembering when nothing held us down. But I think our ancestors willingly sacrificed their wings Aware that the times ahead would be hard and For now we must lay down on Earth’s breast To be infused with Her strength and love So that we can do all that we must do. Still, we forgot that we can fly without our feet leaving Earth’s rich, fertile, fragrant soil. We have power in our minds and souls to take wing above Our small patch of space and time, To see the world and eternity As a wholeness of fragility, beauty, and faith. To exuberantly dance into being lives worth living Standing together on this ambrosial, tender Earth. https://www.magoism.net/2016/08/meet-mago-contributor-carolyn-lee-boyd/
(Essay 2 Part 2) Why Do I Love Korean Historical Dramas? by Anna Tzanova, M.A.

Part 2 ENGAGING THE MIND It makes me cringe every time someone calls Korean drama, especially the historical genre, a soap opera. The fact that they are TV series doesn’t necessarily make them foamy. Quite the contrary, they are full of substance. They don’t go on and on for years, season after season. On average, most of them are 24 to 60, one-hour-long episodes. Some have fewer episodes, some have more episodes, but after they are done—we move on. It’s a good way to learn non-attachment. Korean historical drama is thought provoking. It is multidimensional in the way it presents characters and stories. Plots are well developed, intelligent, intriguing, and entertaining. Yes, there are some predictable outcomes, but there is also a lot of substance and artistic craftiness, as well as clever twists and fascinating surprises. Sageuk (Korean Historical Drama) can teach about history and culture, and also about mythology, philosophy, and spirituality. It reminds us of the values that are fading or have vanished in Western culture in the 21st century. The importance of subtleties in life is shown through plot development, rhythm, and acting. Reoccurring themes convey lessons like patience, acceptance, forgiveness, trust, integrity, perseverance, and courage… That is, the true meaning and practice of those. There is depth in the understanding of the writers, as well as in the corresponding depiction by actors. There is profundity, which evokes a reciprocal reaction in the viewers’ mind. The characters are likable—and their outlook on life and their behavior are admirable. They evolve and influence each other and their environment. There is this definitive sophistication in expression of emotion. Something akin to meditation. In Sageuk, “silence speaks”. Thus, the experience is not only pleasant, relaxing and/or exciting, but many times healing and enlightening. Confucian ideas mixed with Buddhist and Daoist ideals motivate the protagonists’ kind and considerate actions. A particularly valued quality in Korea is “착하다/착한 [chakhada/chakhan]”. I first heard it mentioned in an interview[i]/book[ii] presentation of Euny Hong. The translation in the dictionary reads, “good, nice, good-natured, kind-hearted, meek, obedient, docile, gentle, quiet.” Actually, it is all this and much more. It is a trait that when faced with, being cynical—as we often are in the 21st century—we can easily dismiss as being naive, gullible, submissive, and even foolish. However, in the words of Rumi, “Before you speak, let your words pass through three gates: at the first, you ask yourself, ‘Is it true?’ At the second gate ask, ‘Is it necessary?’ At the third gate ask, ‘Is it kind?’”. The heroines and heroes in Korean historical drama follow this teaching in words and action. Most epitomize pure heartedness. There is a child-like sweetness about many of them—come to think of it, by losing innocence, has humanity really gained wisdom? In the online edition of Entertainment Weekly, I encountered a quote by Jacqueline Sia, Director of Video Operations of New York based DramaFever—one of the largest databases of subtitled Asian films and TV programs. In speaking about Korean drama she states: “Portrayal of love is a little more PG,”[iii] an observation that strikes any novice in the genre. We have become used to quick climaxes, crash-and-burn liaisons, as well as media glorified dysfunctional relationships. The predominant understanding of sex (and certainly the one staring at us from the TV and cinema screens) is hurried, flat, and linear. There is a disconnect between sex and love. Profanity and violence pour daily from everywhere. Exhibiting symptoms of an empath can easily be diagnosed as a psychiatric condition, and yet we are conditioned to be less and less sensitive. In this background, complex and refined emotional states, longing, embodied sacredness, and the act of leaving much to the viewers’ imagination, seem to be suitable only for children. Are we awake and mature enough to realize that all the psychological and social implications of the well-manipulated programming we are subjugated to is already bearing fruit in ‘real life’? (Read Essay 2 Part 1. To be continued in Essay 2 Part 3.) Notes: [i] The Korean Society, “Euny Hong discusses with WSJ columnist Jeffrey Yang her first nonfictional book,” YouTube (November 6, 2014). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SxHv2gT539o [ii] Euny Hong, “The Birth of Korean Cool: How One Nation Is Conquering the World Through Pop Culture,” Simon and Shuster (2014). [iii] Hillary Busis, “Korean Dramas: A Beginner’s Guide,” Entertainment Weekly (April 11, 2014). Description of Korean Historical Dramas: This course offers a series of Korean Historical TV-dramas or Sageug (사극) and discusses the traits of female characters as well as general features of Korean history, culture, art, aesthetics, thought, customs, and people. What makes Korean drama so unique? What is the “secret recipe” that makes it so popular internationally? Why is it that, after a few episodes, one can‘t wait to see the next one or the next new drama? Those questions have made many wonder, from audiences to journalists and critics. Participants are invited to explore answers to these questions and more. Our emphasis is on woman’s place in history, as well as her role as creator, healer and leader; her strife to discover and reinvent herself, her inherent wisdom, her abilities to surrender, without giving up, and her potential to adapt, thrive, and ultimately transform the world she is in. Our selection of dramas qualifies high criteria in story content, character development, actor portrayal, multiplicity of ideas and values, and abilities to educate, while engaging and entertaining the viewer. Facilitators (Dr. Helen Hye-Sook Hwang and Ms. Anna Tzanova) will provide articles and audio-video materials concerning salient themes. (For more, see here) Info on online class, Korean Historical Dramas. See Meet Mago Contributor Anna Tzanova.
(Tribute) In Memoriam, Carol Patrice Christ (1945-2021) by Mara Lynn Keller

“In Goddess religion death is not feared, but is understood to be a part of life, followed by birth and renewal.” — Carol P. Christ Carol Patrice Christ died peacefully on July 14 from cancer. Carol was and will remain one of the foremothers and most brilliant voices of the Women’s Spirituality movement. At the conference on “The Great Goddess Re-Emerging” at the University of California at Santa Cruz in the spring of 1978, Carol delivered the keynote address, “Why Women Need the Goddess: Phenomenological, Psychological, and Political Reflections.” Christ proposed four compelling reasons why women might turn to the Goddess: the affirmation and legitimation of female power as beneficent; affirmation of the female body and its life cycles; affirmation of women’s will; and affirmation of women’s bonds with one another and their positive female heritage (Christ 1979). Carol graduated from Yale University with a PhD in Religious Studies and went on to teach as a feminist scholar of women and religion, women’s spirituality, and Goddess studies, at institutions including Columbia University, Harvard Divinity School, Pomona College, San Jose State University, and the California Institute of Integral Studies, where she was an adjunct professor since the inception of the Women’s Spirituality, Philosophy and Religion graduate studies program in 1993. Christ published eight profoundly thoughtful and inspiring books, several in collaboration with her friend and colleague Judith Plaskow, whom she met at Yale: Diving Deep and Surfacing: Women Writers on Spiritual Quest (1986)Woman Spirit Rising: A Feminist Reader in Religion, anthology co-edited with Judith Plaskow (1992)Odyssey with the Goddess: A Spiritual Quest in Crete (1995) Weaving the Visions: New Patterns in Feminist Spirituality. Anthology co-edited with Judith Plaskow (1989) Laughter of Aphrodite: Reflections on a Journey to the Goddess (1987)Rebirth of the Goddess: Finding Meaning in Feminist Spirituality (1998)She Who Changes: Re-imaging the Divine in the World (2004)Goddess and God in the World: Conversations in Embodied Theology. Co-authored with Judith Plaskow (2016) Christ’s first book, about women writers on spiritual quest, is a book of spiritual feminist literary criticism that focused on feminist authors Kate Chopin, Margaret Atwood, Doris Lessing, Adriene Rich, and Ntozake Shange. She discovers four key aspects to women’s spiritual quest: the experience of nothingness; awakening (to the powers that are greater than oneself, often found in nature); insight (into the meaning of one’s life); and a new naming (in one’s own terms). She emphasizes the importance of telling women’s stories in order to move beyond the stories told about women by the male-centered patriarchy. Her concluding chapter speaks of a “Culture of Wholeness,” that encompasses women’s quest for wholeness, and she adds that, for this wholeness to be realized, the personal spiritual quest needs to be combined with the quest for social justice. After first travelling to Greece in 1981 with the Aegean Women’s Studies Institute led by her friend Ellen Boneparth, Carol fell in love with the country. She chose to live in Greece, first in Molivos on the beautiful island of Lesbos, and then moving recently to Heraklion, Crete. She had a passion for saving the environment and was active in the Green movement in Greece. she also had a love for swimming in the Aegean and sharing Greek food and wine with friends in Greece and from overseas. Carol’s fascination with Crete, ancient and modern, led her to found the Ariadne Institute for the Study of Myth and Ritual, through which she offered an educational tour, “Pilgrimage to the Goddess” twice annually. These tours introduced many to a direct experience of the ancient Earth Mother Goddess in Crete (goddessariadne.org). In her most recent article, for the Encyclopedia of Women in World Religion: Faith and Culture, Christ wrote about the Goddess religion and culture of her beloved island of Crete, and the roles women played in that “egalitarian matriarchal” civilization. Her eloquent words speak not only to the Goddess religion of ancient Crete, but also to the spirituality and ethical values she also cherished, which are much needed in our own culture today. As discerners and guardians of the mysteries, women created rituals to celebrate the Source of Life and to pass the secrets of agriculture, pottery, and weaving down through the generations. The major rituals of the agricultural cycle involved blessing the seeds before planting, offering the first fruits of the harvest to the Goddess, and sharing the bounty of the harvest in communal feasts. These rituals establish that life is a gift of the Goddess and institute gift-giving as a cultural practice. As women controlled the secrets of agriculture, it makes sense that land was held by maternal clans, that kinship and inheritance passed through the maternal line, and that governance and decision-making for the group were in the hands of the elders of the maternal clan. In this context, the intelligence, love, and generosity of mothers and clan mothers would have been understood to reflect the intelligence, love, and generosity of the Goddess.* *Carol P. Christ, “Crete, Religion and Culture” Encyclopedia of Women in World Religions: Faith and Culture across History [2 volumes] edited by Susan de-Gaia | Nov 16, 2018 ABC-Clio Santa Barbara 2019. https://www.magoism.net/2021/07/meet-mago-contributor-mara-lynn-keller-ph-d/
(Essay 2) In the Footsteps of Mary Magdalene: Alexandria by Dr Joanna Kujawa

In this blog I would like to take you, along with me, along with myth, imagination and historical possibilities, on a great spiritual investigation. All I ask of you is your patience, as we need to follow the not always visible and often hidden threads of the life of one of the most fascinating figures in Western history – Mary Magdalene. I will discuss here the possibility of Mary Magdalene escaping to Alexandria, Egypt, after the Crucifixion, as suggested by Margaret Starbird in her now-famous book The Woman with the Alabaster Jar. I am not going to get involved in any discussions on the different ideas about the Crucifixion but rather will focus on the figure of a remarkable being who rises again in our collective psyche with great power – Mary Magdalene. Starbird believes that Mary Magdalene was Jesus’ wife and had a child with him: a girl called either Sarah or Tomar, depending on the tradition. I am not particularly interested in her marital status and whether she was a mother. However, I am deeply interested in Mary Magdalene as a remarkable woman (and perhaps more than a human woman) who was, as the Gnostic Gospel of Philip says, a companion or consort of Jesus and who, as the Gnostic Gospel of Mary Magdalene suggests (as well as another Gnostic work, Pistis Sophia), was either the lead disciple or a favoured disciple of Jesus. This honour was later transferred to Peter by the Orthodox traditions. And since I am interested more in her profile as a wise woman and the possible representation of the Divine Feminine and Divine Wisdom in the tradition of Sophia in Jesus’ life, her arrival in Alexandria is an interesting possibility. Starbird argues that after the Crucifixion, a pregnant Mary Magdalene and Joseph of Arimathea (the wealthy man who agreed that Jesus’ body be placed in his family tomb) escaped to Alexandria in Egypt. Interestingly, alternative and mythical traditions often place Mary Magdalene in Egypt in some period of her life. I find this interesting of itself. Joseph Campbell teaches that myths should be treated seriously, as they carry a larger truth within which is often repressed or dismissed by our rational minds. Myth is a collective, if allegorical, memory stored in our subconscious. Myth can preserve for us the essence of the Truth, even if it is vague on details and can be difficult to trace within the hard facts of history. Myth preserves for us what was quite possibly edited out of history for the convenience of the powers at hand. Even if a myth cannot be trusted with specific details, it does point us in the right direction of the truths hidden beneath the surface of our subconscious minds. So although I do not necessarily believe every wild story about Mary Magdalene in Egypt, I do believe there must be some connection between the woman I have come to admire and Egypt, specifically Alexandria. Why Alexandria, you may ask? There are many possible reasons for this. Alexandria was a port city and the centre of learning in the first century. It was a place where the greatest minds of the West and East met, and its famous library stored thousands of manuscripts, scrolls and papyri from around the world. Without any exaggeration, Alexandria was Paris, Rome, New York and London all in one. Also – and this is important – Alexandria was a place where many rebel philosophers argued about their own understanding of the scriptures of all traditions; it was the centre of what the institutionalised and dogmatic traditions later called ‘heretical thought’. Interestingly, Carl Jung in his Gnostic work, Seven Sermons to the Dead, chose Alexandria and not Jerusalem as the city where the spiritual truth resides. It is easy to imagine great and rebellious thinkers, explorers and heretics discussing matters of the soul in the corners of Alexandria’s famous library. If I could pick one time and place in history to visit, you know my choice. (On a more personal level, I fell in love with my first husband once I saw his plans for an architectural competition to rebuild the library of Alexandria! It was like discovering an ancient memory in my psyche.) But back to the essence of our search for Mary Magdalene in Alexandria. I hope you see my point now that, as a learned woman, as a favoured disciple and possibly a consort of Jesus, she would find Alexandria, with its great library and reputation as an intellectual enclave for the free thinkers, a natural place to be. Let’s go through some sources which can give us more direct reasons for her escape to this city, apart from her natural predisposition for learning. And evidence can sometimes be found in surprising and unorthodox places. For example, the Urantia Book, which is a modern, vaguely Gnostic source of revelation to some, has a chapter on young Jesus travelling to Alexandria. According to the Urantia Book, the young scholarly Jesus met an Indian businessman (Gonod) who hired him as a tutor for his son (Ganid) on his tour of the Mediterranean. At this stage, the young Jesus was already an accomplished scholar and known as the ‘scribe of Damascus’, where he had spent some time. In Alexandria, Jesus and Ganid visited the great Library where learned professors gave daily lectures. They anticipated hearing there the most famous of the first century philosophers of Alexandria, Philo of Alexandria, but were disappointed that Philo had fallen ill and could not meet them. If we trust the Urantia Book’s story, there was already a connection between Jesus and Alexandria. By extension, why would it also not be possible for Mary Magdalene, Jesus’ lead disciple and partner, to look for safe refuge in the same city of great and liberal minds, a place Jesus had once also enjoyed? It is also probably no coincidence that later ‘heretics’, who claimed Mary Magdalene was the main disciple and the consort …
(Prose) Transformative / holistic / experiential education by Nane Jordan

This title is key to some of my basic impulses in educational practices and research. It may lie at the heart of my interests and passion for learning/teaching and research. It’s why I am drawn to and inspired by the work being done by Indigenous education scholars in Canada, alongside studies in women’s spirituality education that nourish my path. This work integrates social justice with attention to social-cultural-spiritual development and healing of the human being, who we are, where we come from, and what do we really need to know and learn. It’s about finding and walking one’s way. “Wayfinding” à la curriculum scholar Cynthia Chambers. Narcisse Blood was one such Indigenous teacher (https://vimeo.com/119367676). Sadly, he was killed in a car accident last week. I give my heartfelt condolences and payers to the family, friends, and colleagues of this wise, funny, serious Blackfoot elder, filmmaker, and educator at Red Crow College, Alberta. In the university, there can be that most excellent of lectures, the kind that lifts you in thinking and knowing from the professor’s passion, intelligence and delivery of her subject. Oration from the teacher, like Socrates, and elders such as Narcisse (yes, Narcisse and Socrates!) is an ancient path of learning. I love this kind of study. I also love the study that comes from good books and reading. My independent reading, in finding the right books (yes, the ones that drop off the shelf for you), has taught me as much as anything I’ve learned in coursework at school. Reading ‘schools’ me, over and over, all the stories and ideas of others, transforming me in their words. It’s reading itself that leads my study of Cixous. And what reading generates for further writing/research in one’s self-development and education. This can ultimately affect the collective human good. Perhaps this encapsulates a history of my own sense of “study” (in the Bill Pinar sense). Reading, taking contemplative time with texts, re-generating through generations of the human being, “humanitas.” We pass our-selves backwards and forwards in time and space. Though reading is done in a solitary way, it’s a multi-vocal, multi-textual and bodied space. Giving our focused attention in reading, a cacophony of others and ancestors joins us in the collapse of space and time. Cixous, a reader extraordinaire, writes of this over and over. She reminds us how many voices are joined in every single text. Questioning “authorship” in writing, as a ‘stable’ or singular identity. Who is writing? Who joins us in our writing? A nod to the corpus of many. Going back to my blog title. I didn’t know this writing would take me to the notion of “reading.” Who is guiding this pen/keyboard? My original idea was to write about how important programs and curricula that integrate the “whole” person are, to my own path of study. An integration in learning of mind/body/emotions/spirit. Where I’ve been able to bring my-self, my own fragmented stories and history, sensing into life as education. It’s also why reading Cixous is so alluring for me. She moves across daily life, dreams, memory, place, the enigma of objects (things), people, dialogue, thought-in-itself, literature, in a multi-sensory, reading experience (sens/sang – sense/blood). I think of her as “dakini” Cixous – instant enlightenment! (dakini à la Vicki Noble) What I set out to say, is that I think it’s so important that education be centred upon, not only factors of good oration, reading and critical analysis – but inclusive of body, emotions, vital life, and spirit of students and teachers. At least it has been for me. How to be vitally engaged with one’s experience and history, and not just the delivery of information – the ‘curse’ of “instrumentalism” identified in curriculum theory. This delivery needs to be a physiologically attuned birth-giving, genuinely midwifed, if we want to feel a connective, relational sense of study. Scholarship is not much without a self-body that lives, breaths and is enhanced by it, an inspirited self-body. It’s hard for the singular teacher to work holistically or transformatively without a programmatic and philosophical structure to midwife and ‘hold’ their work, without colleagues taking on co-leadership together in new ways. Ways that can respond to the political, ecological, economic, and justice challenges of our times. I think arts-based and life-writing research go in this direction, in a Canadian education context. These are communities of scholars working with and through “wholeness” of life-forms, in practices of social engagement, justice, daily life, culture revival, in artful ways. It’s why I’m drawn to these forms of research. But in itself, research is not enough. There is so much more to a “whole” curriculum of human-making and being. This is best accomplished in collective communities of scholars /educators /learners, who are able to work together analytically, organically, emotionally – responding and creating as needed in our universities and schools. My doctoral topic on Women’s Spirituality education was ahead of me in these concerns. It wasn’t specifically the question I set out to ask, but it’s part of what I discovered in my inquiry – the necessity of collective creative effort. Over and over I see how this graduate program was such a unique example. A collective of educators /mentors, devoted to feminist scholarship and social justice, in concert with attending to the birth of students’ emergent inquiries, blending transformative and holistic education of self /body /emotions /spirit. Interestingly, it was my independent reading that brought me to this program of study. These women were not anyone taught to me in my undergraduate university coursework. How to focus on the human being in her/his becoming, an ongoing birth. Who is she? What does she bring? Where did she come from? Where is she now? What does she fear and hope for? What does she yearn for, or want and need to know more about? (Meet Mago Contributor, Nane Jordan)
(Essay) Such as it is… by Jillian Parker

It is now October, and the arc of the sun’s light has slowly begun shifting, the days are growing shorter in the North, where I live above the 61st parallel. The mornings present a biting chill and the bitter-cloying scent of decay. Birch and poplar leaves sift onto the forest floor, the roads and even the hoods of the vehicles. At this juncture, it is tempting to want to linger in the amber splendor, or to send a yearning glance back at summer’s infusion of chlorophyll. And yet again, perhaps it is time take stock of the stores at hand: to sort over the harvest, to perform an accounting of where I am along the path. I seize a calendar to assist in this task. Among the commemorations of October 9 include World Post Day, Leif Erikson Day, the Takayama Autumn Festival and Independence Day in Uganda. South Korea marks the day with a celebration of the 566th anniversary of the creation of the creation of the Korean alphabet, by King Sejong the Great. This holiday is known as Hangul Day (한글날). It is also the feast-day of the mysterious Dionysius the Areopagite. In my house, on this day, I am drawn to ponder and remember the words of a writer I became acquainted with while still practically a child: Iulia de Beausobre. Iulia was the wife of a Russian aristocrat who survived years of imprisonment and ordeals in Stalin’s concentration camps before immigrating to England. When my worries overcome me, when obstacles appear insurmountable, I remember Iulia. My invisible mentor’s writing left such an imprint on me, there have actually been times I have looked for her, imagined her silhouette standing in the shadows, watching over me during my darkest days. In turn, it is as if I sense her thoughts and yearnings, during the time of her greatest anguish, while she was incarcerated, when she had a vision she later described thusly: “Then came a Voice: Out of the confines of eternity I flew to humanity as light. From person to person I flow as warmth. When the great sun rises in the heart of humanity, I flow back to the limits of eternity as love. I am the pivot of the human world. I am eternity. My breath is Peace. Seek in the miracle of warmth flowing from harrowed person to harrowed person. Seek and you will find me.” –Iulia de Beausobre, from The Woman Who Could Not Die
(Essay 1) Magoist Cetaceanism: Why do we listen to the call of whales and dragons? by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang, Ph.D.

Moderns have lost the matricentric bond with whales. As a whole, whales are forgotten in the mind of moderns. Listening to the calling of whales has fallen into the hands of specialists. However, the call of whales needs not to be the topic confined to scientists or spiritualists. Magoist Korea invites the world to the calling of whales. The call of whales comes to us encoded in the traditional matricentric culture of Korea, Magoism. Magoist Koreans have favored, celebrated, and venerated whales. They longed for whales throughout generations from time immemorial. Whales constitute the heart of matricentric Korea. Korean Magoist Cetaceanism conveys the message to everyone across borders that our modern lives are NOT severed from the call of whales. On the contrary, it informs us that we humans dwell in “the body” of whales. Such cetacean metaphor carries the vessel of Magoist cetacean thealogy. Modern civilizations are built to hear the calling of whales everywhere and all the time! Our consciousness is apt to realize that we are breathing in the divine reality of cetaceans. The metaphoric perception that we humans live inside the body of a whale runs through the major cultural inventions of traditional Korea. That houses, temples, and palaces as well as tombs, mounds, sweat lodges, and temple bells are built in the shape of a whale’s belly remains esoteric even among modern Koreans. One may think that these insights are my wishful interpretations. Come see and listen to the Whale Bell! Its whale-shaped mallet and its numerous whale names can’t be mistaken! Behold the roof architecture in the image of a whale’s back! This is not just referring to a roof silhouette looking like a whale’s back. The roof ridge, the decorative end tiles, the male and female titles, and the structure profusely indicate cetacean designs and names. Behold the dragon head and tail carvings in the temple and palace buildings. They go with the whale back-like roof! Behold the ornate dragon spout of water spring channels. Behold the traditional floor heating system called the whale of a heated rock (온돌 고래 Ondol Gorae). And Korea’s Eastern Sea is formerly called the Sea of Whales (鯨海 Gyeonghae). There are more: Come see the postpartum nutrition of the sea mustard soup (미역국 miyeok-guk) or the birthday soup, served for Korean women, her baby, and the whole family, which is adopted from the custom of whale mothers. And like a mother whale carries her cub on her back (to help it breathing in the air), Korean mothers and grandmothers carry the baby on her back by using the blanket called “podaegi (포대기)” to wrap the baby around on one’s back with attached straps. A comprehensive discussion of the calling of whales in Magoist Cetaceanism requires field trips and audio-visual materials to see and feel. To introduce the Magoist Cetacean cultural inventions and more, I have prepared for 2021 Virtual Mago Pilgrimage to Cetacean Korea: The Calling of Whales and Dragons to WE/HERE/NOW. What is the call of whales and dragons? And what does it mean that we listen to the calling of whales? These questions will navigate our whale-seeking journeys. Listening to the call of whales is a journey. Cetaceanist seekers enter a collective pilgrimage with whales on Earth. Magoist Cetaceanism shows us that our lives are inseparable from the work of whales. Not just human lives but also all terrestrial lives. 2021 Mago Pilgrimage to Cetacean Korea aims to achieve the following four-fold goals. Firstly, participants will be introduced to the legacy of Magoist Cetaceanism thickly infused in traditional Korean culture. Secondly, we will invoke the Magoist Cosmogony to understand the cosmogonic feature of whale songs. Thirdly, we are given the cetacean identity of dragons in the myth of the pacifying flute. Lastly, we will explore and join the whale-back riding homecoming journey (From Words of Invitation in 2021 Mago Pilgrimage to Cetacean Korea: The Calling of Whales and Dragons to WE/HERE/NOW). Another irreplaceable contribution of Korean Magoist Cetaceanism to the world lies in the fact that a dragon is presented as an imaginary animal for the cetacean divine or the messenger of the whale divine. Put differently, we are told the origin of dragons in Magoist Cetaceanism. I posit that dragons are the ancient invention of Cetacean Magoists, an ingenuous matricentric symbol that conveys the dynamic presence of the whale divine. According to the source, a dragon is made up with nine animal parts: Her antlers are those of a stag, her head that of a camel, her eyes those of a rabbit, her neck that of a snake, her eyes those of a cow, her belly that of a clam, her scales those of a carp, her paws those of a tiger, and her claws those of an eagle. It is unequivocal that a dragon represents the non-human animal world. And they come in the form of nine animals, a topic to be discussed elsewhere. Suffices it to say that nine dragons are a Magoist expression of Sonic Numerology, the cosmogonic force of the universe, together with the Nine Mago Creatrix and the Nine Goma Queens. Also note that dragons are often associated with the royal, rulers, shamans, and heroes. Dragons are often addressed as the Dragon King (龍王 Yongwang), which I rephrase as the king/ruler of dragons. The cetacean divine forms one of the divine triads or the one leg of the tripod. Reinterpreted in Magoism, the traditional Korean thought of the Heaven-Earth-Humans divine triad holds truth to the cetacean divine, representing the terrestrial divine. In short, the Magoist interpretation of the Heaven-Earth-Humans divine triad stands for the matricentric cosmology, which honors the universe, the earth, and humans in a non-hierarchical and interdependent way. Magoist cosmology is predicated on the triadic or nona numerological scheme, a nature’s built-in organic mechanism, which is self-correcting and self-proliferating. This is starkly contrasted with the dualistic and hierarchical divine model (king and father) of patriarchal religions, a reductionist degenerative scheme. The matricentric worldview affirms the …
(Essay 2) Re-mything the Sacred Feminine by Mary Petiet

A symphony of voices is arising now at the time of our mother planet’s greatest peril. We remember and we awaken. We are powerful now because we are remembering. One story we can re-myth is the story of the summer solstice. In the modern west, that solstice is traditionally the time of the sun deity, when the days are at their longest and the sun is at its zenith. While the sun deity has been imagined differently by different cultures, as female in nature by the early Egyptians, the Germans and the Norse, the story we tell in the modern English speaking world is that the sun is male in aspect, and embodies the energy of the male. At the time of the solstice, the sun sits still for three days, high in the sky as it appears not to change position around the 21st of June in the northern hemisphere. Sol is the sun, and solstice means stand-still. The Earth stands still in the circle of the sun, pausing before its shift to shorter days.
(Essay 2) Magos, Muses, and Matrikas: The Magoist Cosmogony and Gynocentric Unity by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang, Ph.D.

[Author’s note: This paper is published in the journal, the Gukhak yeonguronchong 국학연구론총 (Issue 14, December 2014). Here it will appear in five sequels including the response by Dr. Glenys Livingstone. Numbers of end notes differ from the original paper.] (Part 2) The Magoist Cosmogony and the Mago Lineage According to the Budoji, ultimate creativity is attributed to Cosmic Music (read sonic movement or frequency), Pal-ryeo (八呂, Eight Pitches) or Yul-ryeo (律呂, Rhythm and Pitch).[1] Primordial matter came to existence through the self-equilibrating movement of Cosmic Music. In the beginning of comic time, there was only a warm cosmic ray from which Cosmic Music rose. Stars were born from Cosmic Music during the previous cosmic period. The interim cosmic period is marked by the emergence of earthly entities. Mago, the Primordial Goddess, Mago Stronghold (麻姑城, Mago-seong, earth itself),[2] and two other landmasses (moons) were born from the dance of Pal-ryeo.[3] Mago was born with and to the Earth (Mago Stronghold). She, representing the Earth to the celestial community, supervises earthly systems in accordance with Cosmic Music. In that sense, Mago is the Earth Mother. However, Her divine realm is not limited to the Earth in a dualistic sense. In perceiving Mago’s divine nature, dualistic thinking Heaven vs. Earth is irrelevant. Referred to as Heavenly Deity, She also represents the Cosmos to humans. In short, Mago is the Source of earthlings through whom earthlings are connected to the universe.[4]
(Meet Mago Contributor) Louisa Calio

Louisa Calio won first prize for her poem “Bhari” from the City of Messina, Sicily, an International Poetry Competition 2013, was 2013 Finalist for Poet Laureate of Nassau County, NY and in Oct. 2014, Legas Press published her epic, Journey to the Heart Waters. Director of the Poets and Writer’s Piazza for Hofstra’s Italian Experience for 12 years, she is on the Advisory Board of Arba Sicula, was honored at Columbia/Barnard with Alice Walker, Ruth Beta Ginsberg & others, as a Feminist who Changed America 2nd wave. won the 1978 Connecticut Commission of the Arts Award to individual Writers, the 1987 Women in Leadership Award for her contribution to Arts development in Connecticut, the Barbara Jones and Taliesin prizes for Poetry (Trinidad and Tobago), an Educational Center for the Arts Grant for the Production of In the Eye of Balance her collection of poetry published in 1978 by Paradiso Press. Her writings have been translated into Korean, Italian and Sicilian. Her work appears in numerous anthologies & journals ie: Birthed From Scorched Hearts: Women on War, Sister’s Singing, I Name Myself Daughter, She is Everywhere, darkmother, Italian Heart/ American Soul, Remembrances, Sweet Lemons 2, Arts and Culture, Humorous Stories. Journals: Long Island Sounds, GRADIVA, Journal of Italian Translation, Korean Expatriate Literature, Voices in Italian Americana, STUDIA MYSTICA, SALOME, POET’S ON, Feile-Festa, New Verse News, Descant, a Canadian Literary Journal and others. See Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louisa_Calio
(Essay 1) The Blending of Bön, Buddhism and the Goddess Gemu in Mosuo Culture by Krista Rodin

[Editor’s Note: This series is included as a chapter in Goddesses in Culture, History and Myth (Mago Books, 2018), a textbook on Goddess Studies related courses at the university level.] Goddess Gemu and Tara in Buddhist Temple, Lugu Lake, photo K . Rodin In a small formerly isolated region in SW China lies one of the most interesting still functional matriarchal societies, the Mosuo. There are about 8,000 Mosuo living in the Lugu Lake region. The Mosuo have survived various invasions into their lands, including the great Mongol chieftains and a few foreign powers whose representatives stayed to integrate their traditions with those of the indigenous people. Among the foreigners were Black Hat Böns, along with Yellow and Red Hat Buddhists, from the neighboring Tibetan Plateau. These distinct forms of Tibetan sacred traditions merged with indigenous worship to form a sacred tradition based on the Goddess Gemu that is unique to the Mosuo of Lugu Lake, which straddles the border of Yunnan and Sichuan provinces. While there remain clear differences among the Buddhist and Bön monasteries, the Goddess Gemu is infused in all of them. Currently, this very beautiful area is undergoing yet another transformation, a more commercial one, as it has become a major domestic tourist destination for Han Chinese. The influx of tourists has brought needed income to the villages, their monasteries, and sacred sites, but it has also led to popularizing and secularizing the region’s peoples’ sacred legacy. This chapter unravels some of the various historical and religious strains within this region in order to demonstrate how what appears at first blush to be the binary opposites of patriarchal Tibetan ideologies and an indigenous matriarchal goddess worshipping community can merge into a rich story-telling tradition with corresponding sacred rituals, and how the survival of these traditions is now threatened by popularization and commercialization. The opposing forces to be discussed include: patriarchal Tibetan ideologies with an indigenous matriarchal goddess worshipping tradition, local vs. external pressures, and ancient sacred vs. modern secular economies. The Mosuo No one knows for sure from where the Mosuo originated. There are records of Mosuo families in the region starting around the 9th-10th century, and it is assumed that they migrated south from what is now Sichuan Province. As the name was originally written in a non-Latin script, the English spelling takes on various forms, which can at times be confusing. A few of the most common spellings for this ethnic group include: Mo-so, Muso, and Museo, although, the preferred English version today is Mosuo. According to Christine Mathieu who has extensively studied the Mosuo, “They may have gotten their name from the six Mo – so chief or chiefs who were Mou through their matrilines, because the Mu’s notions of kingship were derived from the Tibetan royal tradition and the ancient Bon ritual.” [1] Most scholars speculate that they came as traders then settled in the fertile valleys around the spectacular lake. From the earliest records, the Mosuo were considered to have had strange practices, and even Marco Polo, who visited nearby Lijiang, commented on what to him were the strange sexual mores of the people. Much later in the early 20th century, Joseph Rock wrote extensively on the Na-khi (Naxi) people of the region and included the Mosuo among them. This may be the source of Chinese government’s classification of the Mosuo as Naxi, one of the 54 officially recognized ethnic groups in China, although the two groups have distinctly different cultural traits as both Rock in his “The Life and Culture of the Na-khi Tribe of the China-Tibet Borderland,” as well as his articles for the National Geographic in 1931,[2] and Susanne Knödel in her 1998 “Naxi and Moso Ethnography” describe. [3] Among the differences are the sacred traditions, including the ‘priests’, the dongba in the case of the Naxi and the dabas and lamas for the Musuo, the social organization, language and script. The Naxi have a large collection of sacred texts based on a pictographic script, whereas knowledge of a Mosuo written language was lost until 1986 when a daba explained 32 characters, including pictograms and symbols for abstract ideas, to Han scholar Yuan Xuenheng, who then published them in his 1995 “The Daba Religion of the Yongning Naxi,” which is referenced in Knodel’s book.[4] Yongning Naxi is another term for the Mosuo. The Mosuo characters appear to be primarily related to calendaring, which would probably have been used by the daba to divine the appropriate days for rituals. Naxi Dongba texts, on the other hand, consist of complete stories. [1] Christine Mathieu, A History and Anthropological Study of the Ancient Kingdoms of the Sino-Tibetan Borderland – Naxi and Mosuo, Mellen Studies in Anthropology 2 (Lewiston: Mellen Press, 2003), 111. [2] Joseph Rock, The Ancient Na-Khi Kingdom of Southwest China 1-2. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1947; “Konka Risumgongba, Holy Mountain of the Outlaws,” National Geographic, LX. July 1931. 1-65. [3] Susanne Knödel, Die Matrilinearen Mosuo von Yongning: Eine quellenkritische Auswertung Moderner Chinesischer Ethnographen. Kolner Ethnologische Studien, Band 22, edited by Ulla Johansen und Thomas Schweizer, (Cologne: Cologne University Press, 1995), 214-215. [4] Ibid, 212. (To be continued.)Meet Mago Contributor, Krista Rodin.

(Special Post 7) Why Goddess Feminism, Activism, and Spirituality?

[Editor’s Note: This was first proposed in The Mago Circle, Facebook Group, on March 6, 2014. […]
(Special Post 5) Nine-Headed Dragon Slain by Patriarchal Heroes: A Cross-cultural Discussion by Mago Circle Members

[Editor’s Note: This and the ensuing sequels are a revised version of the discussion that […]
(Special Post 2) Why Goddess Feminism, Activism, or Spirituality? A Collective Writing

[Editor’s Note: This was first proposed in The Mago Circle, Facebook Group, on March 6, […]
(Special Post) BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE FOR EL PASO ARTIST MARIO COLÍN by Donna Snyder

Born in Juárez in 1959, Mario Colín lived his entire life in the Five Points area […]
(Special Post Mother Teresa 4) A Role Model for Women? by Mago Circle Members

Part IV: Illumination and Consensus Reached [Editorial Note: The following is an edited version of […]
(Special Post 8) Why Goddess Feminism, Activism, and Spirituality?

[Editor’s Note: This was first proposed in The Mago Circle, Facebook Group, on March 6, 2014. […]

Imbolc: Through Goddess Eyes by Carolyn Lee Boyd

Photo by Carolyn Lee Boyd In times past, Creation’s Winter cupped me in her icy hand of sanctuary Gathered in, I sucked dormant life, and slumbered Till Earth’s rebirthing groans awakened my new body Now, older and full of life’s weeping and wondering awe At all that has happened in my decades on Earth I must shake myself into consciousness My seed’s opaque, blinding hull disintegrates and Bodyless, at last I can see through Goddess eyes I ache as my blood paints each flower petal I spin the whirlwind that cannot stop creating abundance I push the seasons through the year that mortals believe revolve of their own accord. Through Goddess eyes I can see me, I inhabit Winter’s hand as my own. I make the cold to slow creation of outside of me To gather the seed into fertile stillness within. That burgeons in my own time. https://www.magoism.net/2016/08/meet-mago-contributor-carolyn-lee-boyd/
Summer Solstice Poiesis by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

Seasonal Wheel of Stones Both Summer and Winter Solstices may be understood as particular celebrations of the Mother/Creator aspect of the Creative Triplicity of the Cosmos (often named as the Triple Goddess). The Solstices are Gateways between the dark and the light parts of the annual cycle of our orbit around Sun; they are both sacred interchanges, celebrating deep relationship, communion, with the peaking of fullness of either dark or light, and the turning into the other. The story is that the Young One/Virgin aspect of Spring has matured and now at Summer Solstice her face changes into the Mother of Summer. Summer Solstice may be understood as a birthing place, as Winter Solstice may also be, but at this time the transiton is from light back into dark, returning to larger self, from whence we come: it is the full opening, the “Great Om”, the Omega. I represent the Summer Solstice on my altar wheel of stones with the Omega-yonic shape of the horseshoe. I take this inspiration from Barbara Walker’s description of the horseshoe in her Woman’s Encyclopaedia of Myths and Secrets, as “Goddess’s symbol of ‘Great Gate’[i]”; and her later connection of it with the Sheil-na-gig yoni display[ii]. Sri Yantra. Ref: A.T. Mann & Jane Lyle, p.75 Summer Solstice is traditonally understood as a celebration of Union between Lover and Beloved, and the deep meaning of that is essentially a Re-Union: of sensed manifest form (the Lover) with All-That-Is (the Beloved). This may be understood as a fullness of expression of this manifest form, the small selves that we are, being all that we may be, and giving of this fullness of being in every moment: that would be a blissful thing, like a Summerland as it was understood to be. The boundaries of the self are broken, they merge: all is given away – all is poured forth, the deep rich dark stream of life flows out. It is a Radiance, the shining forth of the self which is at the same time a give-away, a consuming of the self.In traditional PaGaian Summer ceremony each participant is affirmed as “Gift”[iii]; and that is understood to mean that we are both given and received – all at the same time. The breath is given and life is received. We receive the Gift with each breath in, and we are the Gift with each breath out. As we fulfill our purpose, as we give ourselves over, we dissolve, as the Sun is actually doing in every moment. The “moment of grace”[iv]that is Summer Solstice, marks the stillpoint in the height of Summer, when light reaches its peak, and Earth’s tilt causes the Sun to begin its “decline”: that is, its movement back to the South in the Northern Hemisphere (in June), and back to the North in the Southern Hemisphere (in December). Whereas at Winter Solstice when out of the darkness it is light that is “born”, as it may be expressed: at the peak of Summer, in the warmth of expansion, it is the dark that is “born”. Insofar as Winter Solstice is about birth, then Summer Solstice is about death, the passing into the harvest. It is a celebration of profound mystical significance, which may be confronting in a culture where the dark is not valued for its creative telios; and it is noteworthy that Summer Solstice has not gained any popularity of the kind that Winter Solstice has globally (as ‘Christmas’). The re-union with All-That-Is is not generally considered a jolly affair, though when understood it may actually be blissful. Full Flowers to the Flames Summer is a time when many grains ripen, deciduous trees peak in their greenery, lots of bugs and creatures are bursting with business and creativity: yet in that ripening, is the turning, the fulfilment of creativity, and it is given away. Like the Sun and the wheat and the fruit, we find the purpose of our Creativity in the releasing of it; just as our breath must be released for its purpose of life. The symbolism used to express this in ceremony has been the giving of a full rose/flower to the flames. Summer is like the rose, as it says in this tradition[v]– blossom and thorn … beautiful, fragrant, full – yet it comes with thorns that open the skin. All is given over. All is given over: the feast is for enjoying With the daily giving of ourselves in our everyday acts, we each feed the world with our lives: we do participate in creating the cosmos, as many indigenous traditions still recognise. Just as our everyday lives are built on the fabric of the work/creativity of all who went before us, so the future, as well as the present, is built on ours, no matter how humble we may think our contribution is. We may celebrate the blossoming of our creativity then, which is Creativity, and the bliss of that blossoming, at a time when Earth and Sun are pouring forth their abundance, giving it away. In this Earth-based cosmology, what is given is the self fully realized and celebrated, not a self that is abnegated – just as the fruit gives its full self: as Starhawk says, “Oneness is attained not through losing the self, but through realizing it fully”[vi]. Everyday tasks can be joyful, if valued, and graciously received: I think of Eastern European women singing as they work in the fields – it is a common practice still for many. We are the Bread of Life Summer Solstice celebrates Mother Sun coming to fullness in Her creative engagement with Earth, and we are the Sun. Solstice Moment is a celebration of communion, the feast of life – which is for the enjoying, not for the holding onto. We do desire to be received, to be consumed – it is our joy and our grief. Brian Swimme says: “Every moment of our lives disappears into the ongoing story of the Universe. Our creativity is energising the whole[vii]”. As it may be ceremoniously affirmed: we are (each is) …
Lammas – the Sacred Consuming by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

Lammas, the first seasonal transition after Summer Solstice, may be summarised as the Season that marks and celebrates the Sacred Consuming, the Harvest of Life. Many indigenous cultures recognised the grain itself as Mother … Corn Mother being one of those images – She who feeds the community, the world, with Her own body: the Corn, the grain, the food, the bread, is Her body. She the Corn Mother, or any other grain Mother, was/is the original sacrifice … no need for extraordinary heroics: it is the nature of Her being. She is sacrificed, consumed, to make the people whole with Her body (as the word “sacrifice” means “to make whole”). She gives Herself in Her fullness to feed the people …. the original Communion. In cultures that preceded agriculture or were perhaps pastoral – hunted or bred animals for food – this cross-quarter day may not have been celebrated, or perhaps it may have been marked in some other way. Yet even in our times when many are not in relationship with the harvest of food directly, we may still be in relationship with our place: Sun and Earth and Moon still do their dance wherever you are, and are indeed the Ground of one’s being here … a good reason to pay attention and homage, and maybe as a result, and in the process, get the essence of one’s life in order. One does not need to go anywhere to make this pilgrimage … simply Place one’s self. The seasonal transition of Lammas may offer that in particular, being a “moment of grace” – as Thomas Berry has named the seasonal transitions, when the dark part of the day begins to grow longer, as the cloak of darkness slowly envelopes the days again: it is timely to reflect on the Dark Cosmos in Whom we are, from Whom we arise and to Whom we return – and upon that moment when like Corn Mother we give ourselves over. This reflection is good, will serve a person and all – to live fully, as well as simply to be who we are: this dark realm of manifesting is the core of who we are. And what difference might such reflection make to our world – personal and collective – to live in this relationship with where we are, and thus who we are. We all are the grain that is harvested and all are Her harvest … perhaps one may use a different metaphor: the truth that may be reflected upon at this seasonal moment after the peaking of Sun’s light at Summer Solstice and the wind down into Autumn, is that everything passes, all fades away … even our Sun shall pass. All is consumed. So What are we part of? (I write it with a capital because surely it is a sacred entity) And how might we participate creatively? We are Food – whether we like it or not … Lammas is a good time to get with the Creative plot, though many find it the most difficult, or focus on more exoteric celebration. May we be interesting food[i]. We are holy Communion, like Corn Mother. Meet Mago Contributor Glenys Livingstone NOTES: [i] This is an expression of cosmologist Brian Swimme in Canticle to the Cosmos DVD series.
A Southern Hemisphere Perspective on Place by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

This essay is an edited excerpt from the Introduction to the author’s book PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion, which was an outcome of her doctoral research/thesis entitled The Female Metaphor – Virgin, Mother, Crone – of the Dynamic Cosmological Unfolding: Her Embodiment in Seasonal Ritual as Catalyst for Personal and Cultural Change. This doctoral work was in turn a documentation and deeper research of the Seasonal ceremonial celebrations that the author was already engaged in for over a decade. The whole of the process is here named as her “Search”. photo credit: David Widdowson, Astrovisuals. The site of seasonal ceremonial celebrations will always be significant. In my case, the place in which I have created them has been notably in the Southern Hemisphere of out Planet Earth. The fact of my context being thus – the Southern Hemisphere – had contributed in the past to my deep internalized sense of being “other”, and dissociated from my senses, since almost all stories told were based in Northern Hemisphere perspective. Yet at the same time this context of inhabiting the Southern Hemisphere contributed to my deep awareness of Gaia’s Northern Hemisphere and Her reciprocal Seasonal Moment: thus, awareness of the whole Planet. My initial confusion about the sensed Cosmos – as a Place, became a clarity about the actual Cosmos – which remained inclusive of my sensed Cosmos. PaGaian reality – the reality of our Gaian “country” – is that the whole Creative Dynamic happens all the time, all at once. The “other”, the opposite, is always present – underneath and within the Moment. This has affected my comprehension of each Sabbat/Seasonal Moment, its particular beauty but also a fullness of its transitory nature. Many in the Northern Hemisphere – even today – have no idea that the Southern Hemisphere has a ‘different’ lunar, diurnal, seasonal perspective; and because of this there often is a rigidity of frame of reference for place, language, metaphor and hence cosmology[i]. Indeed over the years of industrialized culture it has appeared to matter less to many of both hemispheres, including the ‘author-ities’, the writers of culture and cosmos. And such ‘author-ity’ and northern-hemispheric rigidity is also assumed by many more Earth-oriented writers as well[ii]. There has been consistent failure to take into account a whole Earth perspective: for example, the North Star does not need to be the point of sacred reference – there is great Poetry to be made of the void of the South Celestial Pole. Nor need the North be rigidly associated with the Earth element and darkness, nor is there really an “up” and a “down” cosmologically speaking. A sense and accountof the Southern Hemisphere perspective with all that that implies metaphorically as well as sens-ibly, seems vitally important to comprehending and sensing a whole perspective and globe – a flexibility of mind, and coming to inhabit the real Cosmos, hence enabling what I have named as a ‘PaGaian’ cosmological perspective, a whole Earth perspective. It has also been of particular significance that my Search has been birthed in the ancient continent of Australia. It is the age of the exposed rock in this Land, present to her inhabitants in an untarnished, primal mode that is significant. This Land Herself has for millennia been largely untouched by human war, conquest and concentrated human agriculture and disturbance. The inhabitants of this Land dwelt here in a manner that was largely peaceful and harmonious, for tens of thousands of years. Therefore the Land Herself may speak more clearly I feel; one may be the recipient of direct transmission of Earth in one of her most primordial modes. Her knowledge may be felt more clearly – one may be taught by Her. I think that the purity of this transmission is a significant factor in the development of the formal research I undertook – in my chosen methodology and in what I perceived in the process, and documented; from my beginnings as a country girl, albeit below my conscious mind in the subtle realms of which I knew little, to the more conscious times of entering into the process of the Search. In this Land that birthed me, ‘spirit’ is not remote and abstract, it is felt in Her red earth[iii]. Aboriginal elder David Mowaljarlai described, “This is a spirit country”[iv], and all of Her inhabitants, including non-Indigenous, may be affected by the strength of Her organic communication. It took me until the later stages of my research to realize the need to state the importance of this particular place for the advent of the research: the significance of both the land of Australia, and the specific region of the Blue Mountains in which I was now dwelling, as well as the community of this particular region, which all lent itself to the whole process. The lateness of this perception on my part, has to do with the extent of my previous alienation; but the fact that it did occur, is perhaps at least in part attributable to the unfolding awakening to my habitat that was part of the project/process. The specific region of the “Blue Mountains” – as Europeans have named them – is significant in that I don’t think that this project/process could have happened as it did in just any region. David Abram says, “The singular magic of a place is evident from what happens there, from what befalls oneself or others when in its vicinity. To tell of such events is implicitly to tell of the particular power of that site, and indeed to participate in its expressive potency[v]”. Blue Mountains, Australia: Dharug and Gundungurra Country The Blue Mountains are impressive ancient rock formations, an uplifted ancient seabed, whose “range of rock types and topographical situations has given rise to distinct plant communities”[vi]; and the presence of this great variation of plant communities, “especially the swamps, offer an abundance and variety of food sources, as well as habitats for varied fauna”[vii]. I feel that this is the case for …
(Video) Autumn Equinox/Mabon Poetry by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

The Autumnal Equinox occurs each year in the range of March 20-23 in the Southern Hemisphere, and in the range of September 20 -23 in the Northern Hemisphere. Autumn Equinox is a point of sacred balance: it is the point of balance in the dark part of Earth’s annual cycle. Sun is equidistant between North and South as it was/is at Spring Equinox, but in this dark phase of the cycle, the trend is toward increasing dark. Henceforth the dark part of the day will exceed the light part: thus it is a Moment of certain descent … and a sacred Moment for feeling and contemplating the grief and power of loss, for ceremoniously joining personal and collective grief and loss with the larger Self in whom we are. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vcZflKLkvP8 Below is the text of the video. It is based on the traditional poetry for PaGaian Autumn Equinox/Mabon ceremony[i]. This is the Moment of the Autumnal Equinox in our Hemisphere – the moment of balance of light and dark in the dark part of the cycle. The light and dark parts of the day in the South and in the North of our planet, are of equal length at this time. We feel for the balance in this moment – Earth as She is poised in relationship with the Sun … breathing in the light, swelling with it, letting our breath go to the dark, staying with it. In our part of Earth, the balance is tipping into the dark. We remember the coolness of it. This is the time when we give thanks for our harvests – all that we have gained. And we remember too the sorrows, losses involved. The story of Old tells us that Persephone, Beloved Daughter, is given the wheat from Her Mother – the Mystery, knowledge of life and death. She receives it graciously. But she sets forth into the darkness – both Mother and Daughter grieve that it is so. Demeter, the Mother, says: “You are offered the wheat in every moment … I let you go as Child, most loved of Mine: you descend to Wisdom, to Sovereignty. You will return as Mother, co-Creator with me. You are the Seed in the Fruit, becoming the Fruit in the Seed. Inner Wisdom guides your path.” We give thanks for our harvests – our lives they are blessed. We are Daughters and Sons of the Mother. Yet we take our Wisdom and all that we have gained, and remember the sorrows – the losses involved. We remember the grief of the Mother, of mothers and lovers everywhere, our grief. Persephone descends. The Beloved One is lost. Persephone goes forth into the darkness to become Queen of that world. She tends the sorrows. The Seed represents our Persephones, who tends the sorrows – we are the Persephones, who may tend the sorrows. We go out into the night with Her and plant our seeds. Persephone blesses us with her fertile promise: “You have waxed into the fullness of life, And waned into darkness; May you be renewed in tranquility and wisdom[ii].” These represent our hope. The Seed of life never fades away. She is always present. Blessed be the Mother of all life. Blessed be the life that comes from Her and returns to Her. We tie red threads on each other: we participate in the Vision of the Seed – of the continuity of Life, that continues beneath the visible. The Mother knowledge grows within us. Our hope is in the Sacred Balance of the Cosmos – the Thread of Life, the Seed that never fades away: it is the Balance of Grief and Joy, the Care that we may feel in our Hearts. NOTES: [i] Glenys Livingstone, PaGaian Cosmology, p. 239-247. [ii] Charlene Spretrnak, Lost Goddesses of Early Greece, p. 116. REFERENCES: Livingstone, Glenys. PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion. NE: iUniverse, 2005. Spretnak, Charlene. Lost Goddesses of Early Greece: a Collection of Pre-Hellenic Myths. Boston: Beacon Press, 1992/1978.
(Essay) The Emergence celebrated at Spring Equinox by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

The Spring Equinox Moment occurs September 21-23 Southern Hemisphere, March 21-23 Northern Hemisphere. The full story of Spring Equinox is expressed in the full flower connected to the seed fresh from the earth; that is, it is a story of emergence from the dark, from a journey, perhaps long, perhaps short, through challenging places. The joy of the blossoming is rooted in the journey through the dark, and an acknowledgement of the dark’s fertile gift, as well as of great achievement in having made it, of having returned. Both Equinoxes, Spring and Autumn, celebrate this sacred balance of grief and joy, light and dark, and they are both celebrations of the mystery of the seed. The seed is essentially the deep Creativity within – that manifests in the Spring as flower, or green emerged One. the full story: the root and the flower As the new young light continues to grow at this time of Spring, it comes into balance with the dark at Spring Equinox, or ‘Eostar’ as it may be named; about to tip further into light when light will dominate the day. The trend at this Equinox is toward increasing hours of light: and thus it is about the power of being – life is stepping into it. Earth in this region is tilting further toward the Sun. Traditionally it may be storied as the joyful celebration of a Lost Beloved One, who may be represented by the Persephone story: She is a shamanic figure who is known for Her journey to the Underworld, and who at this time of Spring Equinox returns. Her Mother Demeter who has waited and longed for Her in deep grief, rejoices and so do all: warmth and growth return to the land. Persephone, the Beloved Daughter, the Seed, has navigated the darkness successfully, has enriched it with Her presence and also gained its riches. Eostar/Spring Equinox is the magic of the unexpected, yet long awaited, green emergence from under the ground, and then the flower: this emergence is especially profound as it is from a seed that has lain dormant for months or longer – much like the magic of desert blooms after long periods of drought. The name of “Eostar” comes from the Saxon Goddess Eostre/Ostara, the northern form of the Sumerian Astarte[i]. The Christian festival in the Spring, was named “Easter” as of the Middle Ages, appropriating Goddess/Earth tradition. The date of Easter, which is set for Northern Hemispheric seasons, is still based on the lunar/menstrual calendar; that is, the 1st Sunday after the first full Moon after Spring Equinox. In Australia where I am, “Easter” is celebrated in Autumn (!) by mainstream culture, so we have the spectacle of fluffy chickens, chocolate eggs and rabbits in the shops at that time. There are other names for “Eostar” in other places …the Welsh name for the Spring Equinox celebration is Eilir, meaning ‘regeneration’ or ‘spring’ – or ‘earth’[ii]. In my own PaGaian tradition, the Spring Equinox celebration is based on the Demeter and Persephone story, the version that is understand as pre-patriarchal, from Old Europe. In the oldest stories, Persephone has agency in Her descent: She descends to the underworld voluntarily as a courageous seeker of wisdom, and a compassionate receiver of the dead. She represents, and IS, the Seed of Life that never fades away. Spring Equinox is a celebration of Her return, Life’s continual return, and thus also our personal and collective emergences/returns.We may contemplate the collective emergence/returns especially in our times. I describe Persephone as a “hera”, which of old was a term for any courageous One. “Hera” was a pre-Hellenic name for the Goddess in general[iii]. “Hera” was the indigenous Queen Goddess of pre-Olympic Greece, before She was married off to Zeus. “Hero” was a term for the brave male Heracles who carried out tasks for his Goddess Hera: “The derivative form ‘heroine’ is therefore completely unnecessary”[iv]. “Hera” may be used as a term for any courageous individual: and participants in PaGaian Spring Equinox ceremony have named themselves this way. The pre-“Olympic” games of Greece were Hera’s games, held at Her Heraion/temple[v]. The winners were “heras” – gaining the status of being like Her[vi]. At the time of Spring Equinox, we may celebrate the Persephone, the Hera, the Courageous One, who steps with new wisdom, into power of being: the organic power that all beings must have, Gaian power, the power of the Cosmos. This Seasonal ceremony may be a rejoicing in how we have made it through great challenges and loss, faced our fears and our demise (in its various forms), had ‘close shaves’ – perhaps physically as well as psychicly and emotionally. It is a time to welcome back that which was lost, and step into the strength of being. Spring Equinox/Eostar is the time for enjoying the fruits of the descent, of the journey taken into the darkness: return is now certain, not tentative as it was in the Early Spring/Imbolc. Demeter, the Mother, receives the Persephones, Lost Beloved Ones, joyously. This may be understood as an individual experience, but also as a collective experience – as we emerge into a new Era as a species. Thomas Berry and Brian Swimme speak of the ending of the sixty-five million year geological Era – the Cenozoic Era – in our times, and our possible emergence into an Ecozoic Era. They describe the Ecozoic Era as a time when “the curvature of the universe, the curvature of the earth, and the curvature of the human are once more in their proper relation”[vii]. Joanna Macy speaks of the “Great Turning” of our times[viii]. Collectively we have been away from the Mother for some time and there is a lot of pain. At this time we may contemplate not only our own individual lost wanderings, but also that of the human species. We are part of a much bigger Return that is happening. The Beloved One may be understood as returning on a collective level: …
(Art & Poem) Candelmas/Imbolc by Sudie Rakusin & Annie Finch

IMBOLC DANCE From the east she has gathered like wishes. She has woven a night into dawn. We are quickening ivy. We grow where her warmth melts out over the ice. Now spiral south bends into flame to push the morning over doors. The light swings wide, green with the pulse of seasons, and we let her in We are quickening ivy. We grow The light swings wide, green with the pulse till the west is rocked by darkness pulled from where the fire rises. Shortened time’s reflecting water rakes her through the thickened cold. Hands cover north smooth with emptiness, stinging the mill of night’s hours. Wait with me. See, she comes circling over the listening snow to us. Shortened time’s reflecting water Wait with me. See, she comes circling From Calendars (Tupelo Press, 2003) Art is included in Celebrating Seasons of the Goddess (Mago Books, 2017). (Meet Mago Contributor) Sudie Rakusin (Meet Mago Contributor) Annie Finch
(Poem) Samhain by Annie Finch

In the season leaves should love, since it gives them leave to move through the wind, towards the ground they were watching while they hung, legend says there is a seam stitching darkness like a name. Now when dying grasses veil earth from the sky in one last pale wave, as autumn dies to bring winter back, and then the spring, we who die ourselves can peel back another kind of veil that hangs among us like thick smoke. Tonight at last I feel it shake. I feel the nights stretching away thousands long behind the days, till they reach the darkness where all of me is ancestor. I turn my hand and feel a touch move with me, and when I brush my young mind across another, I have met my mother’s mother. Sure as footsteps in my waiting self, I find her, and she brings arms that hold answers for me, intimate, waiting, bounty: “Carry me.” She leaves this trail through a shudder of the veil, and leaves, like amber where she stays, a gift for her perpetual gaze. From Eve (Carnegie Mellon University Press, 2010) (Meet Mago Contributor) Annie Finch
(Art & Poem) Spring Equinox by Sudie Rakusin & Annie Finch

A SEED FOR SPRING EQUINOX . . . till I feel the earth around the place my head has lain under winter’s touch, and it crumbles. Slanted weight of clouds. Reaching with my head and shoulders past the open crust dried by spring wind. Sun. Tucking through the ground that has planted cold inside me, made its waiting be my food. Now I watch the watching dark my light’s long-grown dark makes known. Art and poem are included in Celebrating Seasons of the Goddess (Mago Books, 2017). (Meet Mago Contributor) Sudie Rakusin (Meet Mago Contributor) Annie Finch
Lammas/Late Summer in PaGaian tradition By Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

This essay is an edited excerpt from Chapter 5 of the author’s book PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion. Traditionally the dates for this Seasonal Moment are: Southern Hemisphere – Feb. 1st/2nd Northern Hemisphere – August 1st/2nd however the actual astronomical date varies. See archaeoastronomy.com for the actual moment. Lammas table/altar Lammas, as it is often called[1], is the meridian point of the first dark quarter of the year, between Summer Solstice and Autumn Equinox; it is after the light phase has peaked and is complete, and as such, I choose it as a special celebration of the Crone/Old One. Within the Celtic tradition, it is the wake of Lugh, the Sun King, and it is the Crone that reaps him. But within earlier Goddess traditions, all the transformations were Hers[2]; and the community reflected on the reality that the Mother aspect of the Goddess, having come to fruition, from Lammas on would enter the Earth and slowly become transformed into the Old Woman-Hecate-Cailleach aspect …[3] I dedicate Lammas to the face of the Old One, just as Imbolc, its polar opposite on the Wheel in Old European tradition, is dedicated to the Virgin/Maiden face. The Old One, the Dark and Shining One, has been much maligned, so to celebrate Her can be more of a challenge in our present cultural context. Lammas may be an opportunity to re-aquaint ourselves with the Crone in her purity, to fall in love with Her again. I state the purpose of the seasonal gathering thus: This is the season of the waxing dark. The seed of darkness born at the Summer Solstice now grows … the dark part of the days grows visibly longer. Earth’s tilt is taking us back away from the Sun. This is the time when we celebrate dissolution; each unique self lets go, to the Darkness. It is the time of ending, when the grain, the fruit, is harvested. We meet to remember the Dark Sentience, the All-Nourishing Abyss, She from whom we arise, in whom we are immersed, and to whom we return. This is the time of the Crone, the Wise Dark One, who accepts and receives our harvest, who grinds the grain, who dismantles what has gone before. She is Hecate, Lillith, Medusa, Kali, Erishkagel,Chamunda, Coatlique – Divine Compassionate One, She Who Creates the Space to Be. We meet to accept Her transformative embrace, trusting Her knowing, which is beyond all knowledge. Lammas is the seasonal moment for recognizing that we dissolve into the “night” of the Larger Organism of whom we are part – Gaia. It is She who is immortal, from whom we arise, and into whom we dissolve. This celebration is a development of what was born in the transition of Summer Solstice; the dark sentient Source of Creativity is honoured. The autopoietic space in us recognizes Her, is comforted by Her, desires Her self-transcendence and self-dissolution; Lammas is an opportunity to be with our organism’s love of Larger Self – this Native Place. We have been taught to fear Her, but at this Seasonal Moment we may remember that She is the compassionate One, deeply committed to transformation, which is actually innate to us. Whereas at Imbolc/Early Spring, we shone forth as individual, multiforms of Her; at Lammas, we small individual selves remember that we are She and dissolve back into Her. We are the Promise of Lifeas was affirmed at Imbolc, but we are the Promise of Her- it is not ours to hold. We identify as the sacred Harvest at Lammas; our individual harvest isHer Harvest. We are the process itself – we are Gaia’s Process. Wedo not breathe (though of course we do), we borrow the breath, for a while. It is like a relay: we pick the breath up, create what we do during our time with it, and pass it on. The harvest we reap in our individual lives is important, andit is for us only short term; it belongs to the Cosmos in the long term. Lammas is a time for “making sacred” – as “sacrifice” may be understood; we may “make sacred” ourselves. As Imbolc was a time for dedication, so is Lammas. This is the wisdom of the phase of the Old One. She is the aspect that finds the “yes” to letting go, to loving the Larger Self, beyond all knowledge, and steps into the power of the Abyss; encouraged and nourished by the harvest, She will gradually move into the balance of Autumn Equinox/Mabon, the next Sesaonal Moment on the year’s cycle. References: Durdin-Robertson, Lawrence. The Year of the Goddess.Wellingborough: Aquarian Press, 1990. Gray, Susan. The Woman’s Book of Runes.New York: Barnes and Noble, 1999. Livingstone, Glenys. PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion. NE: iUniverse, 2005. McLean, Adam. The Four Fire Festivals. Edinburgh: Megalithic Research Publications, 1979. Notes: [1]See note 3. [2]Susan Gray, The Woman’s Book of Runes,p. 18. This is also to say that the transformations are within each being, not elsewhere, that is the “sacrifice” is not carried out by another external to the self, as could be and have been interpreted from stories of Lugh or Jesus. [3]Lawrence Durdin-Robertson, The Year of the Goddess, p.143, quoting Adam McLean, Fire Festivals,p.20-22. Another indication of the earlier tradition beneath “Lughnasad” is the other name for it in Ireland of “Tailltean Games”. Taillte was said to be Lugh’s foster-mother, and it was her death that was being commemmorated (Mike Nichols, “The First Harvest”, Pagan Alliance Newsletter NSW Australia). The name “Tailtunasad” has been suggested for this Seasonal Moment, by Cheryl Straffon editor of Goddess Alive! I prefer the name of Lammas, although some think it is a Christian term: however some sources say that Lammas means “feast of the bread” which is how I have understood it, and surely such a feast pre-dates Christianity. It is my opinion that the incoming Christians preferred “Lammas” to “Lughnasad”: the term itself is not Christian in origin. The evolution of all these things is complex, and we may evolve them further with our careful thoughts and experience.
(Photography & Poetry) Thoughts of Spring by Deanne Quarrie

Spring At the highest point on the tree, you stretch, reaching for the sun. Your pink petals elegant in their grace, you stand alone. Bravest of all, for leaves have yet to come to offer shade Branches bare except for furry buds that will soon follow in imitation of your daring first move. Intrepid flower of Spring, I feel like you in my yearning for the Sun!

(Mago Essay 3) Toward the Primordial Knowing of Mago, the Great Goddess by Helen Hwang

[The following sequels including this one are a modified version of my paper presented to Daoist Studies, the American Academy of Religion (AAR) in 2010.] Part 3 Daoist Rendition of Mago, the Great Goddess Being the creatrix, progenitor, and ultimate sovereign, Mago has been addressed by many names. Her derivative names include Samsin Halmeoni (Triad Grandmother/Goddess), Cheonsin (Heavenly Deity), Daejosin (Great Ancestor Deity), Nogo (Crone/Grandmother), Gomo (Goddess Mother), Magui (Devil), Seogo (Auspicious Goddess), Seonnyeo (Female Immortal), Seonja (Immortal Person), and simply Halmi (Grandmother/Crone/Goddess) especially in Korea. To say the least, these names, respectively embedded in a particular cultural and historical background, reflect a complex and enduring feature of Magoism. One may wonder: How is it possible to assess that these goddesses with different names refer to the same goddess, Mago? While such a query is legitimate, its answer entails a prolix explication of inferences based on the comprehensive analysis of a large volume of data, a technique that requires all human faculties, not just rationality. Foremost, the name “Mago” is the primary defining factor to identify Her transnational manifestations in East Asia. This name crisscrosses otherwise seemingly unrelated data including folklore, arts, literature, poetry, and religious and historical records. Such toponyms as Mt. Mago, Rock of Mago, and Cave of Mago presently extant in Korea, China, and/or Japan further substantiate the coherence of Magoism in East Asia. Having established the patterns and styles of Mago stories, the researcher is able to identify a common motif that is shared by the stories and place-names of the goddesses with derivative names. In short, these stories are organically interconnected, reflecting the universality and particularities of Magoist theism. As with Her many names, the researcher or art historian requires the same technique to assess a broad range of Her visual representations. One can begin with a good number of paintings whose colophons designate Mago. Two of the most conspicuous colophons are “Magu gathering medicinal herbs” and “Mago presents longevity.” However, many icons including sculptures and embroideries do not have such an indication. In that case, one can tell the Mago icon by its pictorial themes recurring in the images that are identified as Mago. That said, there is no doubt that the Mago icon stands as the prototype of its numerous variations, which are beyond my documentation at this point. A large portion of Mago visual representations I have documented is casually referred to as “The Immortal Magu (麻姑仙, Magu Xian or Mago Seon)” by moderns. As such, it is assumed that She is a Daoist goddess. Would the Daoist appropriation of Mago’s visual images be accurate? I hold that the Daoist rendition of Mago is a specious stopgap, leaving many issues unattended. When B is derived from A, B alone can explain neither A nor B. Not only Her pre-Daoist origin but also Her supreme divinity as the Great Goddess remains unexplained. Furthermore, Daoism has offered no framework to explain the transnational dissemination of Magoist material culture in Korea, China, and Japan.
(Goma Article Excerpt 2) Goma, the Shaman Ruler of Old Magoist East Asia/Korea and Her Mythology by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

[Author’s Note: This essay was first included in Goddesses in Myth, History and Culture, published in 2018 by Mago Books]. Background Discussions Hanung (Her Title) and Sindansu (Divine Goma Tree) We will peel off the layers of patriarchal and Sinocentric devices that conceal her unparalleled supreme manifestations. In a conventional interpretation, we are told that Goma and Hanung are two different persons as the mother and the father of Dangun. This proves to be an androcentric invention to divest Goma of supremacy. Goma is not the consort of Hanung. Nor Hanung the male counterpart of Goma. Goma and Hanung refer to the same figure, not a heterosexual couple. It is her title (Hanung 桓雄) that is split from her (Goma) and made into a male ruler. Androcentric interpreters have noted the two homonyms “Ung (熊 bear)” and “Ung (雄 hero)” but made them two different figures. Thus, they deem that the former “Ung” refers to Ungnyeo, the bear-woman, whereas the latter “Ung” to Hanung, the male ruler. However, the latter “Ung” does not mean a male. It is true that logographic characters are characteristically polysemic. And Ung is no exception as it means “a hero,” “a great person,” or “a male bird.” When it is used to mean a male, it refers to a male bird or animal. The literal meaning of Hanung should be the heroic ruler (Sovereign) of Han (the People of the Creatrix). In short, the character “Ung (Hero),” as is in Cheonung (天雄 Heavenly Hero) and Sinung (神雄 Divine Hero), refers to Goma, the heroic founding ruler (Sovereign) of Danguk. The idea that Hanung is the male ruler remains unsupported. First of all, the present myth is rife with female symbols and images including the cave initiation, the divine tree, conception, and procreation. Indeed, the Goma myth is a completely pacific or rather pacifying story, void of conquering, killing or raping. Secondly, the idea of Hanung as a male founder is left without a direct connection with the bear clan (Ungjok) and the Goma words, a topic to be explicated in detail at a later section. Most critically, if Hanung were the male ruler, his association with Sindansu would be too superficial to give due meaning to the Korean foundation myth. The present myth ascertains that the protagonist of the Sindansu (Divine Goma Tree) motif is a female. Sindansu, the tree of life or the world tree, to be explicated at a later section, is credited with one of the most pivotal mythemes, if not the most, of the Korean foundation myth. It is the cosmic tree, which Goma envisioned for the common origin of all beings from the Triad Creatrix and prayed for conception without a male partner. The syllable, “dan (檀)” in “Sindansu,” refers to the divine tree in Mount Taebaek. It is the eponymous root of the terms that indicate the Goma people. It is used in such words as Danguk (Goma State), Dangun (Head of the Goma State), and Danmok (Goma Tree), to name a few. Note that “Danguk was the strongest among the states of the bear clan,” headed by queens,[1] indicating that Danguk was the the confederal mother state that led the nine daughter states. Put differently, Danguk represents the matriarchal (magocratic, referring to a society ruled by a Magoist shaman queen) confederacy of the bear clan states.[2] Goma’s alternative epithets including “Ungssi-ja (Decendant of the Goma Clan), “Ungssi-wang” (Ruler of the Goma Clan), and “Ungssi-gun” (Head of the Goma Clan) substantiate that she is the ruler and head of the bear clan.[3] Also note that Dangun, Goma’s dynastic successor, “was enthroned as the Descendant of Heavenly Sovereign, as she established the capital in Danmok, Asadal, succeeding Danguk.”[4] Danmok is another word for Sindansu. Its alternative meaning “the birch” comes from the sound of “bakdal (박달).” Prominent Koreanists tend to agree that the character “dan” is related to “barkdal (밝달),” “baekdal (백달),” and “baedal (배달),” all of which indicate the Korean people.[5] However, they do not seem to see the multi-connection among Sindansu, Danmok, Baedal and Goma (Ungnyeo). Thus, they fail to see the Magoist context of the Goma myth. The Goma myth is about Danmok and Sindansu, Goma’s tree in Mount Taeback (Great Resplendence). The Divine Tree of Mount Taebaek is wherein Hanung Goma descended to rule the world. Goma has been commemorated as Ungsang (熊常Eternal Tree) and Dangmok (堂木 Shrine Tree) throughout history. The Goma tree sheds light on the origin of the tree worship in Korea and beyond. According to the Handan Gogi, the veneration of Ungsang originated from the time of Danguk and revived throughout the period of Dangun Joseon.[6] In traditional Korea, it is enshrined as Dangmok (Shrine Tree) in village shrines, Seonhwang-dang. It is not haphazard that Korean women are noted for their prayers of conception under the shrine tree. Splitting Goma into Ungnyeo and Hanung has resulted in awkward phraseology especially concerning her procreation in the story. Ultimately, it proves to be an androcentric device to dismiss the mytheme of her parthenogenetic birth to a child, the virgin birth, a contradictory concept to the patriarchal mindset. She, the shaman queen of the bear clan, was enthroned as Hanung, the dynastic founder Hanung of Danguk. Also, her offspring, Dangun, is the new queen-founder of Joseon who succeeded Danguk, rather than her biological son. The Goma myth is the story of a polity not a family. I maintain that the shaman rulers in Old Magoism (Hanguk, Danguk, and Joseon) are predominantly women.[7] In addition to “Hanung,” other titles of Goma include “Cheongwang (天王 Heavenly Ruler),” “Cheonung (天雄Heavenly Sovereign),” “Sinung (神雄 Divine Sovereign),” “Cheonhwang (天皇 Heavenly Empress),” “Seonhwang (仙皇Immortal Empress), and “Daeung (大雄Great Hero).” The Goma worship in Korean culture remains too pervasive to be recognized. As suggested in these alternative epithets, it has shaped the landscape of Korean popular religions, in particular Shamanism and Buddhism. Most prominently, the Goma worship manifests in the form of revering the Shrine Tree (Dangmok) in Seonhwang-dang (Seonghwang-dang or …
(Mago Essay 2) Toward the Primordial Knowing of Mago, the Great Goddess by Helen Hwang

Part 2 Gynocentric Study of Mago’s Visual Representations [The following sequels including this one are a modified version of my paper presented to Daoist Studies, the American Academy of Religion (AAR) in 2010.] Mago [麻姑, also known as Magu or Mako] remains underrepresented if treated in modern scholarship. Little attention has been given to the topic of Magu in its own right. In the West a handful of scholars have mentioned Mago within the context of Daoism. Her transnational and trans-temporal manifestations in Korea, China, and Japan are largely unrecognized. That Magu is known as multiple identities throughout history in East Asia has gone unnoticed. In my study of Mago, that Mago’s supreme divinity as the Great Goddess has been rendered unintelligible over time under the rule of patriarchy offers a crucial insight leading to a befitting method. First of all, the perception of Her as the Great Goddess enables one to recognize a large volume of primary sources, otherwise left unattended, from across national, regional, temporal, and typological boundaries. Secondly, the primary materials in turn allow one to assess the supreme nature of the Great Goddess, Mago, apart from the theological framework of the monotheistic male god. By being a non-Western and non-patriarchal tradition, Magoism warrants a distinctive thealogy characterized by self-equilibrium and interdependence of components, part of which was discussed in Part I. Thirdly, a trans-disciplinary method is corollary in processing a variety of multi-genre materials that would not be neatly categorized in a mono-disciplinary data-pool. To say the least, it liberates itself from the tyranny of monolithic methodology, which dissects to take only a portion of data from the whole and treat it as if it is a single independent entity. In short, methodology and thealogy, being mutually supportive, lead the researcher to a rather unexplored conceptual territory, which I call gynocentrism. Gynocentrism takes the female principle as an operating system. Its system has been thwarted within the discourse of androcentric perspectives. Gynocentrism is a submerged mode of thinking in the patriarchically indoctrinated psyche. Made to be subliminal, the gynocentric mode of thinking elicits the Mago (Great Goddess) consciousness. Consequently, Mago consciousness upholds the infrastructures of gynocentric thinking. What distinguishes gynocentrism from feminism is that it redefines the male as a derivative of the Female. Gynocentrism reflects the principle of all mothers of living beings. In that sense, my study of Mago is a gynocentric endeavor to chart an alternative paradigm of doing thealogy within the context of East Asian history, mythology, and culture. It is a misunderstanding that Magoist thealogy or Magology (the study of the Great Goddess) concerns the divine only. Gynocentric thealogy is not locked into a separate domain apart from humanity, nature, and the universe. Put differently, Magology is not a mere conceptual tool that explains the divine. It summons gynocentric histories, myths, and cultures that are to be restored and rewritten. It calls for rethinking everything in a fresh light. In the sequels to follow, I bring to light a series of Mago’s visual representations expressed in paintings, ceramics, embroideries, woodprints, sculptures, and topographies, and examine Her multivalent identities in light of the large corpus of Magoist written and oral texts. Mago’s visual icons are beyond one’s documentation. They, especially those from China, are still a favored item in modern day’s auction markets. Several hundred images that I have documented are simply incomplete. Some sample images are chosen to show an array of historical/cultural/social productions, once honored and valued highly by many. Through the economy of commodification, these images have carried the cultural memory of the Great Goddess. While a number of her visual icons are undated, many are from the Yuan (1271 to 1368), Ming (1368 to 1644), and Qing (1644 to 1912) dynasties of China, the Joseon dynasty (1392-1910) of Korea, and certain historical periods of Japan. Also, many are from modern times. In them, Mago/Magu/Mako is depicted as: (1) An immortal/transcendant (仙 xian or seon, immortal or transcendant). (2) A mendicant. (3) A sea goddess. (4) A mountain goddess. (5) A crone. (6) The ancestor of shamans. And (7) A non-anthropomorphic identity or giantess as the nature-shaper or cosmogonist of local topographies such as mountains, rocks, caves, and seas. The notion of a giantess is employed to describe Her transcendental nature. In this case, Mago-named topographies alongside folk stories describe Her feature/identity of immeasurability. Needless to say, these identities overlap and merge, making up an overall picture of Mago as the Great Goddess. That is, She is each and all. These visual icons, stylized with symbolic objects, respectively demonstrate specific Magoist cultural memes once prevailing and favored among East Asians. A throng of objects such as medicinal herbs, especially lingzhi mushrooms, flowers, hoes, baskets, vessels, and animals, forms the coded syntaxes of the arcane language. In particular, a troupe of animals including deer, crane, dog, and monkey highlights the drama. Also, colophons carry not only the cultural meme but also prestige and authority for its producers and possessors. (To be continued.) [i] I have discussed this in detail in Helen Hye-Sook Hwang, Seeking Mago, the Great Goddess: A Mytho-Historic-Thealogical Reconstruction of Magoism, an Archaically Originated Gynocentric Tradition of East Asia, Ph.D. dissertation (Claremont: Claremont Graduate University, 2005), 335-342; 353-361.
How do you say what The Mago Work is? by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang & Mago Circle Members

It took many years for me to pronounce the communal nature of the Mago Work. Defining the Mago Work necessarily endows us with the bird’s eye view of the Great Goddess, the primordial consciousness of WE in S/HE. Early this year, I asked people to define the Mago Work and their definitions are illuminating about what this book ultimately seeks to achieve.[1]
(Art) Mago by Lydia Ruyle

Mago of old Korea and East Asia, also known as Magu, Mako, Samsin Halmeoni (Triad Grandmother Goddess) and Cheonsin (Heavenly Deity), is the Great Goddess. Mago is the progenitor, creatrix, and ultimate sovereign. Early gynocentric cultures venerated Her in many forms. Her multivalent identities include an immortal, mendicant, crone, shaman, and/or nature-shaper of mountains, rocks, caves and seas. In art, Mago often carries a basket of lingzi mushrooms, medicinal herbs and flowers–all symbols of immortality. Source: Painting c. 1400 CE by Seokgyeong. Joseon Dynasty. Korea (Meet Mago Contributor) Lydia Ruyle.
(Photo Essay 4) ‘Gaeyang Halmi, the Sea Goddess of Korea’ by Helen Hwang

Part IV: Revival of the Gurang (Nine Maidens) Gaeyang Halmi There is more to reveal. As I write this part of the photo essay, I have encountered new information, previously made available online by individuals and organizations. It is reported that the “Suseong-dang” (水聖堂, Sea Saint Shrine) was once called the “Gurang-sa” (九娘祠, Nine Maidens Shine), of which I never heard before.[i] That Suseong-dang is a fake name blew my mind! Note the difference of gender between “the Nine Maidens Shrine” and “the Sea Saint Shrine”! The female-connoted term was stolen just like that! “Gurang-sa,” a female-referenced term as the character “rang” means a maiden, had to go due to its overt female representation. It is not without grounds that I was taken aback to see its present logography, “the Sea Saint Shrine,” on the information board.[ii] I almost heard a voice warning me, “This is not the place that you think it is!” That voice attempted to force me to leave the place without further investigation. However, I intuitively took a mental note, “Something is not correct here.” And I was right! Its name change sheds a consistent light on the meddling of patriarchal distortion/deception done to the tradition of Gaeyang Halmi. Readers are reminded of the lost painting of Gaeyang Halmi, which was replaced by that of the Sea God explicated in Part 2 of this photo essay (also Part 3). Like “the Sea God,” “the Suseong-dang” constitutes no reality. It is not only a conceptual deception but also a theft of the intangible cultural heritage, righteously committed by faceless patriarchal men disappeared into the lapse of time. It is clear that systematic erasure of the Female/Goddess has been in operation. Female power embodied whether in the name of the shrine or in the iconography was stripped away. However, it is proven once again that the Female is immortal because it constitutes the root of patriarchy. People smuggled the forbidden knowledge of the Female to later generations through oral stories. Thus, we find the folklore of the Female subversive.