When I was fifteen, during my Hebrew High School summer in Israel, we were coming back from a trip one night and stopped by the sea. The moon was full, the ocean was beautiful and the air balmy and intoxicating. I ran into the waves, still in my dress, with the skirt swirling around me. I remember feeling such a deep sense of oneness and connectedness with the night, the moon, the sea, and all of life.
I was an L.A. kid, and rarely got to experience wild nature. But when I was old enough to travel on my own, to hitchhike up and down the California coast, and spend weeks camping out in the wild, I again and again experienced that sense of oneness in direct contact with the natural world.
I felt as if everything were alive and speaking, offering deep compassion, beauty and love. I wanted to learn to hear and understand, to speak the ancient language of birds, stones and stars, and the whole world was infused with a sensual, spritual ecstasy.
Those were the experiences that sent me seeking for something beyond the Jewish faith I was born into, and that eventually led me to the Goddess and the practice of Witchcraft. When I discovered there was an actual spiritual tradition and practice that was rooted in the sacredness of nature, I knew I had found my spiritual home.
By
Starhawk
|
January 9, 2007; 4:50 PM ET
Save & Share:
Previous: A 19th Century Decision Resonates Still |
Next:
Posted by: Jack Lawrence | May 18, 2007 4:45 AM
Report Offensive Comment
chase florida bank
Posted by: finance bank chase | April 10, 2007 2:34 PM
Report Offensive Comment
Care Soror Starhawk,
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.
Thank you for sharing a personal note about your history and studies in ancient Judea. You most likely know this and is worth mentioning here, that the ancient Hebrews, Israelites, Judeans were culturally Pagan and not monotheistic followers of the Jerusalemite priest caste. In archaeological excavations statues and pottery inscriptions of Asherah and Shekinah have been found in Israelite dwellings dated up to last Roman rebellions. Paganism and Goddess worship are just as important to Hebrew religious history as is it to the Europeans who lost their native beliefs and practices to patriarchal religious domination.
Blessed Be and Goddess Bless!
Love is the law, love under will.
Fr.LVX
Posted by: hebrew descendant | January 23, 2007 11:17 PM
Report Offensive Comment
I had been an initiated Witch for many years when I had, with a friend traveled two miles into the woods to find a place to call our own. A place that we could have our celebrations. We found it and settled down. Made our sacred space, planted some herbs, had a tent and built a fireplace. The place had been an old pioneer site... we found the mounds of what was left, covered in brush and trees. In the mounds were burned scraps of logs and a hearth stone,turned to almost black glass, and many square nails. We found all kinds of broken pottery and artifacts of interest.
There was Wisteria growing through the trees in the summer...a miracle in itself...and an old hand dug well, it's stone walls fallen down. We named it Mother's Well, and the water was cold and fresh.
This is a very long story with many happenings, but I will cut to the chase.
One MidSummer afternoon we were in the Circle and it was after all the ritual was over, before closing down things..and we were circling in dance...all those not Pagan will not understand this..
We were circling and circling, the music was playing softly and the sun was high over head..and the trees were bending in the breeze, and there above us high, were birds whirling in circles..and the trees were bending, and we were circling..and the birds were dancing and the trees were dancing and we were dancing and we were one.
And we were One...the sun, the trees, the birds, the wind and earth, all those in the circle...and even those who down through the ages met in palces like that grove in the Kentucky woods...we are one.
That is not why I am a follower of Witchcraft, but just one more reason.
Blessed be..
Posted by: Terra Gazelle | January 19, 2007 11:24 PM
Report Offensive Comment
Me too.
Posted by: Solea | January 12, 2007 1:33 PM
Report Offensive Comment
I want to share this quote from Henry David Thoreau. Thank you.
In our most trivial walks, we are constantly, though unconsciously, steering like pilots by certain well-known beacons and headlands, and if we go beyond our usual course we still carry in our minds the bearing of some neighboring
cape; and not till we are completely lost, or turned round, -for a man needs only to be turned round once with his eyes shut in this world to be lost, -do we appreciate the vastness and strangeness of nature. Every man has to
learn the points of compass again as often as he awakes, whether from sleep or any abstraction. Not till we are lost, in other words, not till we have lost the world, do we begin to find ourselves, and realize where we are and
the infinite extent of our relations.
Posted by: FRIEND | January 11, 2007 10:50 AM
Report Offensive Comment
I'm really enjoying your entries on this site. You offer some much needed balance. When I first started learning about Paganism I felt as if I'd come home. It was such an obvious fit for me after having explored a number of different spiritual paths.
Thanks for the work you do.
Posted by: Laurel Yves | January 10, 2007 3:33 PM
Report Offensive Comment
Its nice to see some balance from other spiritual leaders, over the predominately Christian panelist responses.
peace
Posted by: Casey Kochmer | January 10, 2007 2:48 AM
Report Offensive Comment
I too am glad to see a Wiccan on the panel. If there is a “God” or “Goddess” to be found it's proof will be found to exist in nature, and not in ancient literature, of that much I am convinced.
Posted by: Mad Love | January 10, 2007 2:27 AM
Report Offensive Comment
I didn't know that they had a Wiccan on the panel. It's nice to see that the WaPo folks are serious about this being a discussion between all faiths.
Posted by: Robert B. | January 9, 2007 7:41 PM
Report Offensive Comment
A wonderful statement, Starhawk.
Posted by: Norrie Hoyt | January 9, 2007 7:00 PM
Report Offensive Comment
So happy to see you on this panel. And, thanks for being!
Posted by: mommadona | January 9, 2007 6:57 PM
Report Offensive Comment
The comments to this entry are closed.

Twitter










Google is the best search engine Google