January 31, 2012
Posted in Festivals, Netjeru, Pagan Blog Project 2012
at 1:09 pm
by Shefyt
For the Pagan Blog Project‘s Imbolc prompt:
Imbolc was one of my favorite Sabbats, back when I was kinda-sorta Wiccan. Although the beginning of February was generally still cold and wintery, it was the point at which I could always see the lengthening of the days, the hint of a shift in the wind, the very first stirrings of the coming spring. It lifted my heart with the promise of sun and warming earth and flowers.
Happily, there’s a Kemetic festival at just about the same time that ties into that theme well enough that I’ve been able to shift my affections over. This is the Feast of Heryshef, the ram-headed God of Hnes. You could think of Him as something like a syncretism of Atum, Ra, and Wesir, as well as, or alternately, Heru. He’s rather large. He’s also sometimes a son of Bast, and in my own reconstruction He’s included as one of the Seven Arrows of Bast. My personal mythology is that with the sun’s return, Bast awakens/arouses/causes to come into being Heryshef, who is embodied by the freshening spring wind and the kindling energy of the first new growth.
For the His festival, which was yesterday, I got up early to sing and pray and to offer Him incense and cool water, apples and bread. Not at all coincidentally, I’d been hit with the beginning of a new song for Him the day before, so I finished writing that during my commute to work. At lunch I went for a long walk to enjoy the day, and at dinner I offered Him our spinach and artichoke pie. And yesterday morning the sun rose before the end of my commute for the first time this year, the first pale purple snow crocuses were in bloom (unusually early due to the mild winter), and the wind breathed promises through the still-leafless trees, all reminders of His presence. Simple connections — not a day of pomp and ceremony and high ritual, but nonetheless one that was intimately entwined with the God and His mystery.
Dua Heryshef! Nekhtet!
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March 7, 2011
Posted in Festivals, Netjeru, Uncategorized
at 7:25 pm
by Shefyt
The weekend before last, our local group had a get-together in honor of Nut and Geb. It was shortly after Nut’s birthday and in the general vicinity of Valentine’s Day, so it seemed appropriate to celebrate this divine couple, whose love and desire for each other were so overwhelming that they had to be separated by the god Shu in order for life to come into existence between them. Following in that spirit, the get-together was called “Making Hearts for Nut and Geb”: we created heart amulets in the form of cards (printed with semiprecious stone backgrounds such as lapis or agate and then cut in the shape of the Kemetic heart symbol) and wrote prayers for the well-being of our loved ones inside them before offering them to Geb and Nut. It was a lovely, very peaceful gathering. (Here are a couple more pictures, showing the shrine with our heart amulets and close-ups [1] [2] of some of the hearts.)
This past Saturday was the much-beloved festival of Chewing Onions for Bast (or Onion Day, as we like to call it). Sadly, the scheduling didn’t work out for a group get-together, but I celebrated the festival by going out with my housemate to New Hope, where we fed all of our senses on beautiful crafts and music, and then to Outback Steakhouse for the requisite Bloomin’ Onion. Such a perfect day, filled with freedom and delight — dua Bast!
Since we’re now in a new month (IV Peret, the last month of the season of Growing), I’ve given thanks to Heryshef for His gifts and welcomed in the next set of monthly gods: Wenut, the hare-headed Eye of Ra goddess, and Renenutet, the snake goddess who oversees the fertile fields and the prosperity that comes with the harvest. (To a certain extent, I’m honoring the Eye of Ra goddesses in general this month, but these two are my primary focus.) I’ve had some interaction previously with Wenut, as one of the Seven Arrows of Bast, but Renenutet is entirely new to me, so this should be quite interesting. So far She seems extremely pragmatic, which makes rather a lot of sense. Renenutet is one of the few Names I’ve carried over from the “official” Kemetic gods of the months, as She clicked perfectly for me. (Wadjet is the other exact carry-over, although I also have Hethert-Nut in lieu of Hethert and Ra-Atum in lieu of Ra-Heruakhety. All of my other god/month associations are quite different from the traditional ones.) I’m hoping at some point to write up what all of these various gods mean to me and why I’ve chosen them for these monthly devotions, but it may need to wait until I’ve made it through one full year-cycle.
At any rate, now I seem to be caught up again. Whew!
Hail and praise to You, Nut and Geb, who encircle and encompass us all with Your love.
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February 21, 2011
Posted in Thoughts and Reflections
at 10:05 pm
by Shefyt
I’ve been going through one of those stretches where I feel as though I have so desperately much to get done that I can’t figure out how to direct my energy, so I run in mental circles until I fall over in a heap. Add to that a week of intensely focused, deadline-pressured work at my job, and my brain has been very low on resources indeed.
Yesterday, after a bout of compulsively reading productivity blogs in lieu of actually being productive, I finally was able to pry myself off the machine and get outside for a walk. And oh, how much I needed that. Walking, breathing deeply and rhythmically, looking into the far distance (what a relief after staring for hours at the computer screen!), chanting affirmations to myself with every stride, I was able at last to clear out the tension, the scatteredness, and to begin to bring myself back into balance.
Just after passing the spot where I found my purification glass (some years ago now), I came across a perfect small branch of Eastern red cedar that must have been blown down in the recent strong winds. It felt like a gift, so I carried it with me, breathing in its sharp, cleansing fragrance. Once I got home, I looked cedar up in Cunningham’s Magical Aromatherapy and was amused to see that it relates to spirituality, self-control…and balance. A gift indeed — a very appropriate one! And that single branch, set in a glass vase before the naos of my shrine, now perfumes the entire room, a holy tree in miniature, a penetrating reminder of the center to which I need to return.
For this last week or so of III Peret, I’ve refreshed Heryshef’s flowers. (His yellow lilies lasted nearly the entire month!) Daffodils for the burgeoning spring — I love their fragrance too, a different kind of pungency, the purifying vibrancy of green shoots and first flowers. It’s still too early for daffodils outside, but the snowdrops beneath the apple tree have come up, and the very first snow crocuses have poked their noses above ground on the south slope — and subsequently been covered by this morning’s snowfall. But they’ll survive, and soon enough the land will be in bloom with all the fearsome, ecstatic, inevitable and wondrous beauty of the season.
Hail and praise to You, all You Gods and Goddesses of renewal! Thank You for Your gifts!
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February 14, 2011
Posted in Netjeru, The Wild Sky
at 10:20 pm
by Shefyt
Another extraordinary sky this morning, a fleece-soft blanket of orange-rose drawn across half the heavens, patterned in cloud bands and wisps of vapor, shifting later to become the crisp blue clarity of a sunny near-spring day. The snow has already drawn back in places to reveal damp earth and flattened grass, a hint of yielding underfoot as the ground begins to thaw, and one can feel life force starting to move, the grip of winter’s stasis gradually weakening. This evening the wind has picked up sharply, blowing with fierce exuberance, and in the moving air, in the excitement and gathering energy of spring’s promise, the Great Ram tosses His head and ramps, exulting in the vigor of His own surging energy.
In my efforts to deepen my connections with my various deities, I’ve been experimenting with setting a monthly focus. The traditional Kemetic calendar dedicates each month to one or two Gods, but the relationship between God(s) and month and among the Gods themselves has been obscure to me. (My guess is that it reflects some balance of regional or political influence specific to the ancient Two Lands.) For my own personal practice, then, I’ve selected a God or group of Gods that mesh with either my experience of the month in question or my special relationships within the Kemetic pantheon.
The God of this month is Heryshef; I made offerings on His festival (which is definitely becoming a regular and favorite event), and I plan to honor Him again at the full moon this Friday. This list of monthly Gods is very much a work in progress — Heryshef is the first one I’ve celebrated, but He certainly has been making His presence (and His appropriateness) felt!
Tonight, guided by Bast, I made spontaneous offerings of flame, incense, and cool water to Her Seven Arrows, and Heryshef was there as well, his image anchoring the back of the shrine while Nefertem’s bouquet of flowers held the front.
O beautiful Ram Who lives in beauty, Whose breath is the wind that stirs the trees, Whose face gazes down from amidst the clouds, Whose hooves tread the icy snowmelt into fertile mud, may You bring life for us all! Dua Heryshef! Nekhtet!
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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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June 29, 2009
Posted in Books, Reviews: Nonfiction
at 12:24 pm
by Shefyt
Horus: Royal God of Egypt
By Samuel A. B. Mercer. London: Luzac & Co., 1942. Hardcover, 252 pages, line illustrations. [out of print]
I hunted this down because I was looking for information about the relatively obscure gods Heryshef and Heru-hekenu. It does indeed include snippets of information about Them, along with other lesser-known aspects and syncretizations such as Heru-Khenty-Khety and Heru-Amun, in addition to the more prominent Herus, such as Heru-wer and Heru-sa-Aset. There are over a hundred little line drawings of Heru and other gods, and an exhaustive list of epithets of Heru, so there are plenty of interesting bits of knowledge in this book.
On the down side, it’s rather dated — the author relies heavily on Budge, so be warned, and there’s a great deal of speculative history about the “people of Horus” coming to Egypt from somewhere in the Middle East, probably Arabia, which has been rejected by more contemporary studies. I honestly found it rather tedious whenever he began trying to trace a historical trajectory for anything, and there are three chapters of background before he really delves into Heru Himself. I was most interested in the chapters on Heru and the Names identified with or associated with Him; on the Eye of Heru; on representations of Heru; and the worship half of the chapter on theology and worship of Heru. (The theology part attempted to trace the development of Heru’s character through various stages, but given the author’s questionable history and the fact that he keeps conflating Heru-wer and Heru-sa-Aset in ways that I’m just not sure are accurate, I couldn’t bring myself to trust that portion of the chapter.) The chapter on places where Heru was worshipped got a bit listy, so I mostly skimmed it, but it’s certainly comprehensive.
The book is out of print and as of now [June 2009] doesn’t seem to be available online. Used copies are very expensive, so your best bet is probably to check it out of your local university library, unless you’re a Heru devotee who’s trying to acquire all possible resources for your personal library. It’s a really good compilation of data from many older sources (including a lot that aren’t in English); just be sure to double check things, especially when the author starts straying into interpretation.
[If you have access to JSTOR, there's a review from 1943 here, which basically sums up to "facts good, historical interpretation interesting but unsupported, beware of taking literary/Hellenistic sources over actual papyri/inscriptions." I'm amused that the reviewer calls the index "adequate" — damning with faint praise? — as I personally found it kind of sketchy. (It failed to include Bast at all, and She was definitely in there.)]
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