January 28, 2010
Posted in Festivals, Thoughts and Reflections
at 12:59 pm
by Shefyt
Earlier this week, in the wake of the torrential downpours, a beautiful, burnished evening — the trees like bronze in the westering light, the woods warm and wet, filled with numinous pools reflecting the gold-tinged sky. And I thought, can this really be January? But then I realized with a shock that January is already almost over. The snowdrops under the apple tree have been poking their stubborn heads up for a couple of weeks now; the light is noticeably stronger. Sunset is just beginning to enflame the sky at 5:00 as I walk across the parking lot to the gym to work out. The weather has turned cold once again — there was brief, startling shower of snow this morning — but spring is undeniably closer.
This has always been a special time of year for me. And conveniently, there’s a Feast of Heryshef right about where I once would have celebrated the waxing light and the first glimmers of spring with Imbolc during my semi-Wiccan days. So I’m planning to do something next week to honor Him, although I haven’t yet decided exactly what. It seems remarkably appropriate, considering that Heryshef was known as the ba of Ra and also of Wesir — a manifestation of the sun god and also of the god who brings forth the greenness of the world. I’ve been wanting to get to know Him better anyway, so this seems like an ideal opportunity.
Dua Heryshef! Nekhtet!
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January 20, 2010
Posted in Stalking Beauty, Thoughts and Reflections
at 12:50 pm
by Shefyt
I finally went to see James Cameron’s Avatar last weekend. It was splendidly done, no question, a visual spectacular, showing a satisfying triumph of beauty and spirituality over corporate greed and blindness. I enjoyed it greatly, and yet I came away from it not feeling profoundly moved. My reaction may have been colored by the issues of romanticized racism that have been raised elsewhere — the idealized and pure native peoples needing to be saved by the Great White Soldier-Hero — but it wasn’t only that. It may have been that the characters didn’t hit any of my particular triggers (aside from being felinoid, which is always an attraction, blue or not), but it seemed that there was something more. And as I thought of the luminous, otherworldly forest that the movie depicted, the vivid and brilliant wings of the irkan and the toruk flashing against the sky, the perfect union of the bond, the realization came, sudden, startling, and sure:
Beautiful, yes. But not as beautiful as my Mother’s eyes.
The green-tinged gold of the winter hillsides; the moss of my lawn, lush in the brief, damp thaw; the flawless, living clarity of the brook — the caress of the sun; the wind’s sweet, subtle stirring; the leap of my heart, the sense of presence like an embrace; Her warm and endless regard holding me, always. The kinship of those who care for me and whom I care for, of those who hear echoes of the same callings, a silver, flickering music.
I feel a little sad for the people who come out of the movie theater pining for a place that they’ll never get to. The connection to something larger, to the universal web of beauty of which the self is one part, isn’t out there, on Pandora. It’s right here, right now, in the eyes that see, in the heart that opens itself in exhilarated joy and welcome like the outstretched wings of a bird.
The day after Avatar, I went for a walk to the local nature preserve and sang an offering to the stream’s spirit; at home, I raked leaves, cut back perennials, and hauled firewood, alive to the contours of the land beneath my feet, to the fall of the light. Whatever its flaws or its virtues, I’m grateful to Avatar for this: for reminding me of what beauty truly is and where it lives.
I see you, the Na’vi greet each other.
What do you see?
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January 15, 2010
Posted in Books, Reviews: Nonfiction
at 8:08 am
by Shefyt
God’s Wife, God’s Servant: The God’s Wife of Amun
By Mariam F. Ayad. London and New York: Routledge, 2009. Hardcover, 216 pages, 51 b/w and color photos.
I pulled this from the library shelves because I was interested in the subject of women in priestly or priestlike roles in ancient Egypt. After a general historical overview of the title “God’s Wife of Amun,” the book focuses on five women from the Third Intermediate and Late Periods who held that position: Shepenwepet I, Amenirdis I, Shepenwepet II, Nitocris, and Ankhnesneferibre. For the most part, it concentrates on analyzing the iconography of depictions of the God’s Wives, and how they were shown in activities and contexts that had previously been the exclusive domain of the King — for instance, taking part in the sed festival, offering ma’at to the Gods, or being suckled by a Goddess. In exploring the evolution of the position and its associations with divine and royal authority, the book also refutes the view that the God’s Wife’s primary role was to sexually please the Gods.
For me, the most interesting part of the book was the section describing the various rites and rituals celebrated by the God’s Wife. For example, a scene from the Edifice of Taharqo by the Sacred Lake shows the God’s Wife aiming a bow and the King hitting balls with his mace. The two of them, here depicted as equals, are performing a rite of protecting the tomb of Wesir from the enemies of the four directions. (The hieroglyphic caption by the God’s Wife reads: “The God’s Wife has grasped the bow against the South and the North, the West and the East in return for what he has given her.”) I think this could be translated into a extremely fun group ritual, by the way; it’s on my list of projects. Other rites include burning fans bearing images of Kemet’s enemies, elevating the Gods, and driving four calves.
The text can get a little repetitive at times as the author describes the elements of the various represenations, many of which repeat from image to image: the costuming, the gestures, the relative positionings. Also, the proofreading is rather sketchy. (You know it’s bad when “Nitocris” is spelled three different ways — on the same page.) There’s a lot of intriguing info here, though, as well as photographs and line drawings of many obscure scenes, mostly from funerary and cultic chapels at Medinet Habu and Karnak. I don’t think it’s quite worth paying the book’s hardcover price (about $100US on Amazon at the time of this review) unless you have an extremely intense interest in the subject, but it’s definitely worth checking out of the library (or possibly getting on Kindle, where it’s only $28.76US).
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January 1, 2010
Posted in Thoughts and Reflections
at 2:23 pm
by Shefyt
Ten years ago, I was at the peak of my fandom phase, heavily engaged in writing fanfiction and moderating a mailing list, and without much at all happening in the way of spirituality. Five years ago, I was halfway through the House of Netjer’s beginners’ course, still not sure of where it was going to lead me, but finally starting to click with the sense of community and being very profoundly moved by some postings by the Imakhiu on the subject of service.
In the last decade, my father died, leaving me the only member of my family on this continent; I was divined a daughter of Bast, became a Shemsu, a Shemsu-Ankh, and then a w’ab priest; I left my job of thirteen years and found a new one, plus I started freelancing; I finished my epic fanfic and began work on an original novel; I started writing songs; I drove all across the United States by myself; I overcame two of the three addictions that had been plaguing me; I traveled to Japan and to Egypt. For much of the time I felt lost, anxious, blocked, and tremendously frustrated with my life, but I look back now and realize how much happened and how much I accomplished. And that realization gives me a sense of hope and a surge of positive energy for going forward into the next decade.
That said, my resolutions for 2010 are:
- to refine my service as a priest of my Mother
- to tend what’s mine to tend
- to make decisive progress in my writing
- to balance the opposites: strength and beauty, focus and freedom, discipline and joy
Dua Netjer! Nekhtet!
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