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  1. Sakti bodies – I

    “By you is everything supported, by you is the world created: by you is it protected, O Goddess, and you always consume (it) at the end (of time).
    At (its) emanation you have the form of creation; in (its) protection (you have) the form of steadiness; likewise at the end of the world (you have) the form of destruction. O you who consist of this world!
    You are the great knowledge (mahavidya), the great illusion (mahamaya), the great insight (mahamedha) the great memory and the great delusion, the great Goddess (Mahadevi), the great demoness (mahasuri).”
    Devimahatmya 1, 56-58

    Sakti is one of the most fundamental aspects of Tantra – and potentially, one of the most bewildering. Continue reading »

    June 6th 2011

    Posted by in tantra

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  2. Pan: Adolescent Panics in Forster and Saki

    “God went out (oddly enough with cricket and beer) and Pan came in.In a hundred novels his cloven hoof left its imprint on the sward; poets saw him lurking in the twilight on London commons, and literary ladies in Surrey, nymphs of an industrial age, mysteriously surrendered their virginity to his rough embrace.”
    Somerset Maugham, quoted in Hutton, Triumph of the Moon, p48

    For this post, I’m taking a cue from Patricia Merivale’s Pan the Goat-God: His Myth in Modern Times (Harvard Univ. Press, 1969). Merivale’s book is particularly useful as she focuses on the great upswell of appearences of Pan in English prose between 1890 and 1918. Literary representations of Pan in the fin de siècle change dramatically, from Pan as an essentially benevolent and transcendental figure, to a much darker character. Continue reading »

    June 1st 2011

    Posted by in Pagan, Queer

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  3. On the notion of Pagan “Elders”

    The term “Pagan Elders” has never rested well with me as a cultural convention.  Believe me, I am grateful for those who have gone before, those who have courageously blazed the trails, taught, led and agitated.  I am so delighted to honor these people, but I do so at my own judgment, not because I am compelled to by convention.  I find this term, elders, problematic in that it apes our perceptions of “respected tribal elders”, and thus smacks to me of appropriation.  Continue reading »

    May 31st 2011

    Posted by in History, Occult, Pagan

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    38 comments »

  4. Intensities: a quiet epiphany

    dip in
    to the sea
    of possibilities…
    Patti Smith

    I feel as though I am on the edge of vertigo – thoughts, ideas, bits of conversation whirling around me, yet at the same time, it’s quiet. Continue reading »

    May 14th 2011

    Posted by in tantra

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  5. Metaphor, Metonymy & tantric interpretations – II

    It seems likely, for example, that advanced practitioners of yoga and other psychophysical practices would develop rather distinctive image schemata appropriate to their experiences and sadhana, transmitted by specific gurus and teaching lineages.
    Quoted from Glen A. Hayes in Whicher, Carpenter, p164 (2003)

    Continue reading »

    May 13th 2011

    Posted by in tantra

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  6. Pan: an odd sort of god

    “Down the long lanes and overgrown ridings of history we catch odd glimpses of a lurking rustic god with a goat’s white lightning in his eyes. A sort of fugitive, hidden among leaves. and laughing with the uncanny derision of one who feels himself defeated by something lesser than himself.”
    D. H Lawrence, Remembering Pan

    Continue reading »

    May 6th 2011

    Posted by in Pagan, Queer

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    2 comments »

  7. Shamanism and gender-variance: uncovering a history

    As I read through the various commentaries and observations in the wake of this year’s PantheaCon I came across people asserting that what happened was particularly reprehensible because Paganism has always been welcoming to LGBTQI people. This might well be the case in the USA, but its certainly not true for the UK. Continue reading »

    May 2nd 2011

    Posted by in Gender, History, Occult, Pagan, Queer

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  8. Sexual Outlaw, Erotic Mystic: The Essential Ida Craddock – A Review

    Sexual Outlaw, Erotic Mystic: The Essential Ida Craddock (San Francisco: Red Wheel/Weiser, 2010) by Vere Chappell is a welcome contribution to a growing body of literature related to Craddock (1857-1902). After a long period of neglect, the life and writings of this amazing woman are finally emerging from obscurity. Continue reading »

    April 19th 2011

    Posted by in Book reviews

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  9. Issues with the Gender Binary in Public Paganism

    Our community benefits from questioning what gender and/or sexuality are doing in a given context.  Asking is simple, but the answers often reveal themselves to be complicated, and loaded with values and assumptions in ways that are not initially apparent, particularly when the subject in question is related to religion.  For modern religions, like modern Paganism, there are no common, sacred documents that enshrine assignment and treatment of gender and sexuality, or the values encoded by the handling of these issues, which means that we must find our own way of expressing these values in meaningful ways for our community.  As different groups under the wide umbrella of modern Paganism find themselves presenting ritual and religion in public, this can cause those chosen ways to be exposed and discussed publicly, which opens them to public criticism, because these manifestations can affect members of our community in ways not anticipated by organisers. Continue reading »

    April 19th 2011

    Posted by in Gender, Pagan, Queer

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    4 comments »

  10. Kula Bodies – III

    For this next installment of what’s turning out to be a fairly slow-moving series I’m going to briefly review some of the features of dividuality which have emerged out of ethnographic accounts of personhood in Melansia, with particular reference to the work of Marilyn Strathern and Edward LiPuma. Continue reading »

    April 16th 2011

    Posted by in tantra

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    1 comment »