BETHANY MAGDALENE'S REALM

This is going on the list of one of my all-time favorite television episodes

2012-01-23T03:46:00.000-08:00

It is so awesome when you see the spirit come through so strongly in such an unexpected place as television. Loves it!

M.A. in Women's Spirituality Seeks Teaching Position

2012-01-09T21:07:00.000-08:00

I have just completed a master's degree program in women's spirituality at the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology in Palo Alto. If anyone has any leads re: teaching positions in humanities, religious studies, Mormon studies, mythology, cultural anthropology or women's studies I would love to hear about it. Please contact me @ bethanymagdalene@yahoo.com

Thanks!

Scholar Uncovers Legend of Jesus' Great-Grandmother

2011-10-17T12:52:00.000-07:00

Medieval legends suggest that Ismeria, a descendent of the tribe of King David, was the grandmother of the Virgin Mary

http://news.discovery.com/history/jesus-great-grandmother.html

http://www.aolnews.com/2010/12/18/scholar-uncovers-legend-of-jesus-great-grandmother

More on Matriarchy from my hero, Russell

2011-01-06T22:17:00.000-08:00

Mary Magdalene's Feast Day Today

2010-07-22T18:11:00.000-07:00

In honor of Mary Magdalene's Feast Day today, here is today's episode of the ongoing, monthly Magdalene Circle (Margaret Starbird and Joan Norton are featured):

Click here for the Magdalene Circle homepage

Listen to internet radio with spirituallyspeaking on Blog Talk Radio

This a fascinating website: A Chapel of Our Mother God

2010-06-19T23:15:00.000-07:00

I've only read a couple of pages (Quan Yin) and watched a video, but I can't believe I haven't noticed this website before...

http://www.mother-god.com

Contemporary Priestesses - Seven7Sisters

2010-06-01T17:22:00.000-07:00

Whole Earth Festival, May 8, 2010

Karen Tate - Voices of the Sacred Feminine

2010-04-30T17:16:00.000-07:00

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/voicesofthesacredfeminine

Every Wednesday night Karen Tate, host of Voices of the Sacred Feminine... Extended Edition interviews women and men who discuss Goddess as deity, archetype and ideal, the rising interest in the Feminine Consciousness and Right Brain Thinking. At the bottom of the hour, hear WHAT'S THE BUZZ, the insightful and sometimes controversial socio-political commentary and news segment relevant to our shifting values and ideas embracing the Sacred Feminine. Fear not - taste the forbidden fruit! Rethink, reclaim and embrace the age-old knowledge that's been denied us for too long. Unlock your female tool kit and empower yourself as you learn long hidden truths. Discover what having denied a feminine face of god has cost humanity - particularly women! From your home altar to the voting booth, relearn and reclaim the ideals of the Divine Feminine with scholar, speaker, sacred tour leader, and workshop presenter, Karen Tate, author of Sacred Places of Goddess: 108 Destinations and Walking An Ancient Path: Rebirthing Goddess on Planet Earth.

Mary Daly, a Leader in Feminist Theology, Dies at 81

2010-01-11T11:24:00.001-08:00

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/07/education/07daly.html

Daughters of the Goddess in the News

2009-12-29T19:55:00.000-08:00

One of my grad school teachers, and a friend from way back in our La Leche League days, Leilani Birely, started the women's spirituality circle that I used to attend, named Daughters of the Goddess. By inviting me to her early circles, Leilani is really the one responsible for me finding out about the Women's Spirituality Masters Degree program that I am now in.

Recently there were articles in both the county's newspaper and magazine about Leilani, and the group -

Contra Costa Times: Group Helps Women Find Empowerment Through Nature, Goddesses

Diablo Magazine:
Worshipping the Inner Goddess - How a Lafayette mom is leading East Bay “witches” to celebrate their “divine feminine.”

UPDATED 2-27-10: Matriarchy by Russell Means / Republic of Lakotah

2009-12-29T01:03:00.000-08:00

NEW - part 2

NEW - part 3

NEW - part 4

Faith and Feminism/Womanist/Mujerista Festival & Conference

2009-11-11T14:40:00.000-08:00

Marys, Madonnas, Maternal Eternals – GoddessWithUs @ HerChurch in San Francisco

Pastor Stacy Boorn

This conference was one of the most amazing experiences of my life, and I am so glad to know that I can go back any Sunday for services that include the Divine Feminine, or on Wednesdays for a Goddess Rosary...

Here is a video about HerChurch:

Here is a link to the conference program, which included the play, Mary Magdalene - The Musical, and presenters, Margaret Starbird, China Galland, Joan Norton, and others:
http://www.herchurch.org/id19.html

Joan Norton's blog about the conference:
http://blog.marymagdalenewithin.com/2009/11/15/godde-was-in-her-house.aspx

My pix:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=10088&id=100000166967384&l=aa78de66fc

Vicki Noble - The Biological Basis for Matriarchy

2009-10-24T14:09:00.000-07:00

Motherworld conference @ York University, Toronto, October 24, 2009

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRwzVHE2q6k&feature=PlayList&p=079F7CD831D967DA&index=0

If you watch 'til the end you will be rewarded by being able to see the lovely Polly Wood sing, The Blood Song, acapella, a portion of which goes like this:

How come they show the blood of Christ, The blood of war, the blood from the sliced incision(surgery on t.v. every night)?

How come they show the blood of sport? It’s all the same as blood from violent video games (movies, they love to see Hollywood stars in a bloody fight).

How come they drink the blood of life As red wine, buy the bloody meat from the butcher’s vine? It’s all accepted, all okay

Except the blood they cannot say
Except the blood you cannot say
Except the blood you cannot speak
Except that blood may sometimes leak.

The only blood they cannot show
Is the blood that freely, freely flows
From ladies, sisters, women, girls, and me.
No cut, no scrape, no knife, no gun, no wound.

Here is an even nicer, accompanied, audio version:
http://www.metaformia.org/multimedia.cfm

LEAVE HEAVEN ALONE!

2009-10-09T00:43:00.000-07:00

From the album "Old Wives Tales," one of my favorites of all time, Exene Cervanka (also of the band X) prophetically sings:
"Now we want to rule the moon...leave heaven alone!"
I can't believe this album was recorded in 1989. So ahead of it's time.

Exene Cervenka from modi Frank on Vimeo.

Turkey Unearths 16,000-year-old Mother Goddess Figurine

2009-08-19T10:42:00.000-07:00

Excerpted from:
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-08/17/content_11899536.htm

ANKARA, Aug. 17 (Xinhua) -- Archeologists have unearthed a 16,000-year-old mother goddess figurine during a cave excavation in south Turkey, the semi-official Anatolia news agency reported on Monday.

The clay figurine was found during the excavation work of the Direkli Cave in the Kahramanmaras province, which started on July 15, Gazi University Archeology Department lecturer Cevdet Merih Erek told the agency Monday.

The finding showed that women had a high social status in the region 16,000 years ago and that the method of using fired clay in making figurines was older than previously thought, Erek was quoted as saying.

Before the discovery, the oldest fired clay god or goddess figurines unearthed in Mesopotamia, Anatolia and other Near East regions were found to be made in 5,000 BC, said Erek.

In a separate report, the Anatolia news agency said broader archeological excavations have started in the Sabuniye Tumulus, in the Sutasi hamlet of Samandag town in south Turkey's Hatay province.

Archeologists had discovered artifacts belonging to the Egyptian and Mycenaean civilizations in earlier excavations of the tumulus, which was found to be a major commercial and cultural port city in the Bronze Age, Hatice Pamir, chairperson of the Mustafa Kemal University (MKU) Archeology Department, told the agency on Monday.

Nearly 30 people including 16 scientists are participating in the excavation work, which was organized jointly by Turkey's Culture and Tourism Ministry and the MKU, Pamir was quoted as saying.

Editor: Mu Xuequan

From Salt Lake City Weekly

2009-08-14T15:03:00.000-07:00

Sunstone Symposium
THURSDAY 8.13
By Dallas Robbins

The Salt Lake Sunstone Symposium is an annual gathering of scholars, historians, novelists, feminists, activists, and anyone intellectually curious about Mormon culture and history. Now in its 30th year, the symposium is a forum for liberals and conservatives, heretics and orthodox, atheists and believers, a place where free and open discussion is explored and encouraged.

This year’s theme, “Zion’s Sisterhood,” focuses a number of presentations on feminist topics, ranging from “Sex and the Heavenly Mother,” women and the priesthood, and “The Achievements and Ironies of Women’s Religious Creativity” (the free opening lecture Aug. 12). With more than 300 sessions, there is something for everyone. Highlights include presentations on Utah County’s Dream Mine, Gnostic retellings of Adam and Eve, discussion of the temple ceremony depicted in Big Love, the controversy over Book of Mormon witnesses, polygamist wives talking about their experiences, and even a panel on the mythic and religious elements of vampires and Twilight.

Along with a wide variety of challenging history and thorny theological debates, the symposium isn’t afraid of tackling the increasingly important issues of homosexuality and religion. Stephen Williams will screen his short film Voicings, a story about a devout Mormon husband and his secret gay life. The Gay Mormon Literature Project is a panel exploring Mormon and gay themes in film, books and plays. And pioneer researcher Dr. Caitlin Ryan discusses the influence of families on their LGBT children.

The Sunstone Symposium offers a unique experience for the adventurous and those curious enough to challenge their mind—and maybe stretch their soul.

Sunstone Symposium @ Salt Lake City Sheraton, 150 W. 500 South, Aug. 12–15. Registration and ticket prices vary. SunStoneMagazine.com

Check out the NEW online Magdalene Circle! (updated)

2009-07-27T19:07:00.001-07:00

The inaugural episode, launched on Mary Magdalene's Feast Day, July 22nd, 2009. Every 22nd of the month is a new episode:

New Updates!

2009-07-21T16:53:00.000-07:00

Some of the "Suggested Reading" lists in the sidebar to the right have been updated so check for the NEW articles!

Female Icons - Ancestral Mothers by Max Dashu

2009-06-30T11:42:00.000-07:00

Part 1 - 6 min.

CLICK for FULL SCREEN

Part 2 - 4 min.

CLICK for FULL SCREEN

Ancestral Stones of the Elder Kindreds - FREE webinar

2009-06-20T17:46:00.000-07:00

1) Wed. July 8, 7:30 pm US Eastern time (=4:30 pm Pacific)
Reserve your place for July 8 at this URL:
https://www2.gotomeeting.com/register/315312058

and

2) Thurs. July 9, 7:30 pm GMT (London time) (= 8:30 western Europe, or 11:30 am US Pacific) Reserve your place for July 9 at this URL:
https://www2.gotomeeting.com/register/411364515

The megalithic sanctuaries, stone circles, and statue-menhirs are the foundational culture of ancient (PRE-INDO-EUROPEAN) Europe. In this webinar Max Dashu will provide a visual overview of these womb-tombs and especially the female menhir-statues of France, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Sardinia, and more. We'll also look at similarities to Algerian and Ethiopia menhir-statues, and the ancestor-face motif.

This is a rare chance to look at these early monumental women, which nearly all histories omit, and which are minimized even in most archaeological surveys. Yet this neolithic cultural focus on ancestral grandmothers points toward matrilineage, and the communal burials in the megalithic "passage graves") reflect a collective clan-oriented society.

Join Max Dashu for this free webinar which kicks off an online course, Spiritual Heritages of Ancient Europe.

MORE INFO:

http://www.sourcememory.net/courses/2009.html

Suppressed Histories Archives: Real Women, Global Vision
http://www.suppressedhistories.net

Women's Power DVD
http://www.suppressedhistories.net/womenspowerdvd.html

World's Oldest Sculpture discovered - a Venus figurine

2009-05-14T09:48:00.000-07:00

(Fair use via Wikipedia)

Most of the interpretaions are pretty patriarchal and sexist but this would have been identified as a goddess by archaeologist Marija Gimbutas. See video on Gimbutas in the post below.

Click here for links:

UPDATE: Great New Article - God the Mother or Paleolithic Porn? by Dale Allen at the Huffington Post

AP: Ivory sculpture in Germany could be world's oldest

Video from Nature

Venus of Hohle Fels from Wikipedia

Signs Out of Time

2009-03-31T13:45:00.000-07:00

The Story of Archaeologist Marija Gimbutas

A documentary on archeologist Marija Gimbutas, who found that Europe’s origins lay in a cooperative, peaceful, neolitihic Goddess culture. Her theories challenge conventional archaeology, spirituality, theology, and religious studies, while inspiring artists, feminists, environmentalists and activists

-- From Belili Productions (where you can order a copy on DVD).

To view full-screen, and parts 2-7 (listed under the "related videos" box to the right) CLICK HERE

2009-01-28T22:12:00.000-08:00

Taking China Galland's class on Black Madonnas and the Dark Mother at the Graduate Theological Union: Art, Darkness, and the Womb of God (!)

Mary Magdalene (song)

2009-01-10T11:42:00.000-08:00

Here is a cool song about Mary Magdalene by AndrewLargemanJones:

(And for all you Thelemites out there, this is my 93rd post)...

Today's breaking news: Earliest shaman grave is female from Israel

2008-11-04T15:00:00.000-08:00

Reuters, and others, ran a story today that the earliest known grave of a shaman was discovered. The grave is 12,000 years old, located in present day Israel, and the remains are female. Ha'aretz called her "the petite priestess." The full story can be read here:

Haaretz - Israelis Unearth Skeleton of 'Petite' Priestess Who Died 12,000
Years Ago:
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1034241.html

Reuters - Earliest Known Shaman Grave Site Found:
http://www.reuters.com/article/scienceNews/idUSTRE4A251K20081104

National Geographic - Oldest Shaman Grave Found; Includes Foot, Animal Parts: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2008/11/081104-israel-shaman-missions.html

Maenad Prophecy (by Starhawk, 2008)

2008-09-29T20:21:00.000-07:00

Two dancing dakini skeletons from the Samye Monastery in Tibet (via Vicki Noble).

When kings wage unjust war,

When poison fills the skies,

When the rich prey on the poor,

When hope for justice dies

When a spell lies o¹er the land,

Of malice and of lies,

Then a wild and fearless band

Of women shall arise

Crazy saints, yoginis,

Peering through the gloom,

Maenads and dakinis

Witches grab your brooms!

Sweep away the stench

Sweep away the sneers!

Sweep away the clench

Of hunger and of fears

Dance to feel the passion

Dance to wake the wild,

To honor deep compassion,

For the forest and the child,

Dance to keep the Arctic cool,

To keep the jungle green,

Dance for every holy fool,

For every wound unseen.

Dance for justice, dance for peace

Dance for life to thrive,

May beauty, health and joy increase

For every being alive

Dance in love, dance in wrath,

For chains to fall apart,

Dance to choose a better path,

Dance for strength of heart,

All across the nation,

Bankers quail and glower,

Cracked is the foundation

Of the bastions of power

Strong walls crumble,

Kings face their final hour,

An angry earth shall rumble,

Down shall fall the Tower.

And through its stones shall weave the roots

Of a living tree

That offers us its shining fruits

Of truth and liberty

Fruit to fill each empty hand

With sweet gifts of the earth

Dance to heal this bleeding land--

A new world comes to birth.

Emma Smith as Shaman

2008-08-10T15:13:00.000-07:00

CLICK on the PICTURES to ENLARGE:

To download this Sunstone Symposium session (in MP3 format) so that you can hear the response from Margaret Toscano, Ph.D. (as well as Q & A from the audience) go to - https://www.sunstonemagazine.com/symposium.html

ABSTRACT: In recent years, much has been spoken and written about Joseph Smith and shamanism. But many people would be surprised to learn of the shamanic elements in the life of Emma Smith. While much has been published about male shamanic traditions, this session will explore the lesser-known forms and traditions of female shamanism and the evidence for their existence in the life and work of Emma Smith. It will also look at parallels between Mormonism and other shamanic religious and cultural traditions, ancient and contemporary.

TO PRINT or READ OFFLINE, highlight all of the text and "Paste Special - unformatted text" into a Word document and PRINT. OR, you can email me @ elizabethquick5 at yahoo dot com for a Word document with real footnotes and hyperlinks.

EMMA SMITH as SHAMAN:

In recent decades there has been an “extensive conceptual and analytical debate about [the definition and nature of] shamanism.”(1) Despite the fact that “there is no agreement among scholars as to the main features of shamanism among different peoples of the world,”(2) anthropologists have come to use the term ‘shaman’ to describe magico-religious practitioners in cultures world-wide.(3)

In its strictest sense, the word is “a religious phenomena of Siberia and Central Asia,”(4) the word coming to us from the Evenki, a Tungusic language spoken in Siberia and Northern China, and means, “the one who knows.”(5)

A shaman is someone who walks between worlds with one foot in each. Religious historian, Mircea Eliade, calls shamanism in its most basic definition a “technique of ecstasy,”(6) or in other words an altered state of consciousness. Despite cultural differences, essentially a shaman is a “spiritual person with the ability to enter deep states of awareness,”(7) which enables the practitioner to, act as an intermediary between the mundane world and other dimensions of consciousness in order to “access healing power.”(8)

Anthropologist, Barbara Tedlock, says “it is best to think of shamanic activities and perspectives rather than about ‘shamanism’ as an ideology or institution.”(9) Some of the shamanic characteristics and practices may include one or more of the following: exorcism;(10) mediumship; seership, and prophecy; divination; psychotherapy; poetry and music; healing;(11) communion with ancestors or deities;(12) psychic abilities such as extrasensory perception and psychokinesis;(13) out of body experiences, ascent to the heavens, descent to the underworld, mastery of fire, and influencing the weather;(14) “control over breathing and other bodily functions,” and seemingly magical powers such as invisibility and levitation.(15) Shamans may be called by inspiration, while others are hereditary.(16) According to Tedlock, “Shamanism consists of both a healing practice and a religious sensibility.”(17)

A shaman may conduct or participate in rituals, ceremonies, or prayers, by dancing, drumming, chanting, singing, or storytelling(18) but the shaman may or may not hold a clerical role as priest or priestess, although the further back in time you go the more the two overlap.(19) One scholar notes that “most cultures have elements corresponding to both the shamanic and the clerical; each of these modes predominates in association with certain forms of social organization. Where a society is decentralized, the “shamanic” mode typically prevails. Where the dominant social form is a centralized, bureaucratic state, with power concentrated in the hands of trained elites tending to reside in population centers, the clerical mode tends to prevail.”(20)

Shamanism is often equated with mental illness by some scholars, but not all scholars hold “negative views.”(21) It is important to note that, new “investigations and the reevaluation of earlier data,” indicate “that most shamans emerge from among the healthiest members of the community.”(22)

Shamanistic beliefs and practices are found on every continent on the globe, including ancient and contemporary Judeo-Christian cultures and traditions.(23) Shamanism is the oldest spiritual tradition in the world, going back to Paleolithic times, and scientific evidence suggests that it was invented by women.(24)

Contrary to popular belief, the word shaman is unrelated to the English word “man.”(25) Interestingly, U.C. Berkeley archeologist, Jeannine Davis-Kimball states, “The Russian ethnographers, who were among the first to study the Siberian peoples, maintain that the first shamans were women.”(26) In fact, “the earliest known skeletal remains of a shaman belong to a woman. She lived over 20,000 years ago in what is now the Czech Republic, and was the first ceramic artist of record.(27) British scholar Geoffrey Ashe writes that, “originally shamans were women, the most ancient form of the word itself meaning ‘female shaman’...he says that ancient shamanism was not an individual phenomena but something that was practiced by the female group.”(28)

Many traditional cultures maintain that shamanism originated within early women’s culture, and there are scholars who agree that menstruation gives women special abilities as shaman.(29) If this is true, then why have female shaman come to be “ignored, denigrated, and even erased from the [historical] record”(30) over time? One reason is that “common assumptions about the roles of women,” combined with “the linguistics of translation,” “have obscured the history of female shamans.” Often “ethnographers have rendered the word for shaman differently, depending on the gender of the person described,” so rather than listing a woman as a shaman, she might be labeled as an herbalist or a midwife instead.(31)

Barbara Tedlock illustrates how the latest scientific technology is beginning to set the record straight:

These discoveries of female skeletons buried together with shamanic artifacts continue to surprise many Western scholars as well as the general public because it has been assumed for so long that shamanism was primarily a masculine vocation. This misconception has been sustained, in part, by the practice of assigning sex to bones by the shape of the pelvis, the size of the skull, and the weight and dimensions of limb bones. The problem with this method is that there is great variation in size and weight within the population of each sex. Ambiguous bones, including those of strong or robust females, were often designated as male. At some sites as many as 80% of all skeletal remains were considered by Western archaeologists to be male, which is an improbable finding that hints at the bias. If we add to this distortion to the old assumption that a shamanic burial would be a masculine one, we can see that a woman shaman with a robust body had little chance of being correctly identified. In the past most of the scientists sexing skeletal materials were male, and as a result evolutionary theories about the origins of human culture had a tendency to emphasize males. But thanks to the emergence of new technologies such as chemical analysis of the mitochondrial DNA that comes through the female line (mtDNA), and an increase in the number of women scientists, especially paleoanthropologists, progress in the proper sexing of bones has begun to occur. Today many of our new fossil heroes are turning out to be female.

Western researchers and writers who popularized shamanism in the 20th century, often arbitrarily divided shamanic abilities by gender, popularizing the masculine traditions and sometimes denigrating the feminine ones, like when psychoanalyst / anthropologist Geza Roheim labeled two Hungarian female shaman, “ ‘witches,’ who ‘were just pretending to be healers.’” Influenced by Roheim, religious historian Mircea Eliade, “limited shamanism to ‘soul flight’ – which he regarded as not only transcendent but also phallic. And he separated it from ‘possession’ which he considered immanent and assigned to women, whom he felt were not really shamans.”(32)

In her book, The Woman in the Shaman’s Body: Reclaiming the Feminine in Religion and Medicine, initiated shaman and anthropologist, Barbara Tedlock points out the serious limitations to Eliade’s work, which she says was published in France in 1951 at the feminine-negating height of the psychoanalytic movement of the 1950’s and that his standard reference, Shamanism: Archaic Techniques of Ecstasy wasn’t even critiqued for 40 years.(33)

But the popular stereotype of Eliade’s masculine path of “dismemberment, evisceration, and symbolic death leading to rebirth - as necessary to shamanic initiation,” has endured for over half a century.(34) This dichotomy, however, is false. There are cultures where “out of body soul flight is considered a feminine action, while possession is considered masculine.”(35) The actual sex or gender of the person practicing feminine shamanic paths is not a prerequisite. Women and men practicing so-called feminine paths are said to be “born into” the calling.(36) Byambadorj Dondog is a highly respected man practicing “in the female line” of traditional Mongolian shamanism(37) which includes a midwifery practice. He says, “If it wasn’t for my midwifery, I wouldn’t have the power to do what I do,” acknowledging the feminine roots of shamanism. There are also females that practice traditionally male forms of shamanism,(38) but Tedlock emphasizes that shamanism honors as important “both masculine and feminine energies and traditions.

She explains:

The most powerful shamans, of either sex, work with both masculine and feminine forms of energy. So while women shamans are usually nurturing, they can also be brave and powerful – when they help with a difficult birth, for instance, or take on the warrior’s role in healing.(39) Shamans are taught not to negate or destroy either their masculine or their feminine side. Instead by shifting genders and embodying characteristics of each gender, they manipulate the male female polarity itself. Shamans are able to hold incompatible things together, because each of the apparent opposites is necessary and in some sense ‘true’(40)... As a general rule, women shamans, and men trained within a feminine tradition, have an interpersonal orientation; they coax their clients to become active participants in their own healing. Male shamans, and women trained in a masculine tradition, take on a heroic role; they encourage their clients to take the role of passive spectators at their dramatic performances. It is vital that we understand both paths, crucial that we focus on the entire life-death-rebirth continuum.(41)

So now that we have completed a crash course in “Shamanism 101 for the 21st Century,” I’d like to look at some intriguing parallels between Mormon traditions and shamanic cultures worldwide, and then explore some compelling parallels and connections between the Mormon traditions and the shamanic traditions of the Himalayas, particularly the Tibetan, and then finally we will look more closely at Emma as a shaman.

The first parallel that I would like to note is Tedlock’s description of one of the “fundamental features” of the shamanic worldview, which is “the conviction that all entities – animate or otherwise – are imbued with a holistic life force, vital energy, consciousness, soul, spirit, or some other ethereal or immaterial substance that transcends the laws of classical physics. Each member of this wondrous cosmos is a participant in the life energy that holds the world together. The Polynesian mana, Lakota wakanda, and Chinese Taoist ch’i are conceived of as powerful forces that permeate everything.” In short, this is what academics usually label as animism, something that always brings to my mind the following L.D.S. scriptures and ideas such as Doctrine & Covenants, section 88, where it says that the light of Christ is in all things, gives life to all things, and through all things and is the law by which all things are governed.(42) It also brings to mind Joseph Smith’s comment “There is no such thing as immaterial matter. All spirit is matter, but is more fine or pure, and can only be discerned by purer eyes. We cannot see it, but when our bodies are purified, we shall see that it is all matter.”(43) The last quote dovetails nicely with Tedlock, who says, “For a shaman, energy is an expression of spirit transforming into matter.”(44)

Tedlock describes “the heart of shamanic practice,” as “the active pursuit of knowledge” which she says takes many forms, among those: “the understanding of animal and human behavior; the identification of medicinal plants and their uses; the hands on healing knowledge of bone setting, massage and midwifery; and the empathic knowledge of the human psyche. Through calendrical study, divination, and prophecy shamans seek knowledge of the future, and through recitation of myths, epics, charms, spells, songs, and the genealogies of previous shamans they pass along knowledge of the past and of the spirit world. And since shamans everywhere wish to know more than they have experienced in their everyday waking lives, they may extend their wisdom through dream journeys or psychedelic trips that provide [in the words of one shaman] ‘a thousand years of human living rolled into one day.’ The latter sounds rather like the shaman Joseph Smith when he said, “Could you gaze into heaven five minutes, you would know more than you would by reading all that ever was written on the subject,”(45) and last year, Dr. Robert Beckstead made an extremely compelling case for the early Mormon use of entheogens,(46) the word entheogen being a neologism from the ancient Greek ‘entheos’ meaning “god within,” and describes the religious and cultural use of psychoactive plants in a sacramental manner.(47)

According to Tedlock, divination can take many forms including, the casting of lots, which is mentioned throughout the Bible; dream interpretation; the use of consciousness-enhancing plants; and crystal gazing,(48)the latter which brings to mind the early Mormon use of seer stones, brilliantly chronicled in D. Michael Quinn’s, Early Mormonism and the Magic World View.

I think that The Mormon quest for gnosis is epitomized by two things:
First, The idea, in 19th century Mormon parlance, that everything is composed of some degree of “intelligence,”(49)or what we might now call consciousness, which is said to be “eternally progressing,”(50) or in contemporary terms: evolving. Secondly, the principle of personal revelation and the Mormon sensibility of seeking and receiving truth “let it come from whence it may.”(51)

Another astonishing parallel that I came across with the L.D.S. culture and another shamanic culture is the concept of adoption and sealing family lineages together. In Barbara Tedlock’s book, she reports that upon shamanic initiation both herself and her shamanic partner and husband, Dennis Tedlock, and all of their family members (both living and dead) were adopted into the patrilineage of one of their teachers, Don Andrés, a Mayan shaman from Guatemala.(52)

Finally, a parallel in cosmology with certain shamanic cultures that piqued my interest is the belief amongst some Asian cultures in a Celestial goddess. Quoting Tedlock again:

“Studies of shamanism that focus on the sky have ignored have ignored the existence of...celestial goddesses and the practices associated with them. Mircea Eliade, in discussing the shamanic symbolism of ascent to the sky, asserted that ‘the supreme gods of archaic peoples are called ‘He on High,’ ‘He of the Sky,’ or simply ‘Sky.’ The truth is that North Asian celestial cults focused on bringing babies into the world and nurturing them. The fact that the Celestial goddesses were oriented around fertility was abhorrent to Buddhist missionaries, who set out in the twelfth century to destroy the feminine cults. Their efforts at suppression were only partly successful, although the celestial goddesses were expunged from many written historical records.”(53)

This certainly brings to mind the L.D.S. concept of Heavenly Mother and her L.D.S. daughters here on earth who, as a spiritual practice, emulate their Mother in Heaven, by giving birth to mortal bodies to house the spirit bodies birthed pre-existently by their Celestial Mother.

One of the shamanistic cultures that I have found has many remarkable parallels to the Mormon traditions are Himalayan cultures, especially Tibet. Most people are somewhat familiar with the existence of Buddhism as the primary religious tradition in Tibetan culture. It was brought to Tibet, from India, by request of the king about 1200 years ago by Guru Rinpoche, also known as Padmasambhava, in the 8th century, but Tibet’s more ancient shamanic roots are less well known.

Revealingly, further etymology on the word ‘shaman’ suggests the Tungus term shaman is related to the Chinese term ‘sha man’ meaning “Buddhist monk,” as well as a Sanskrit word meaning “Buddhist ascetic;”(54) and interestingly, Eliade noted that there is a resemblance “between yogic techniques such as those represented in Buddhist meditation ‘and the techniques of shamanism’.”(55) This is interesting because, British anthropologist and museologist, Richard Rudgley asserts that, “it is possible that the martial arts that we tend to associate with Taoist and Buddhist traditions have their prototypes in prehistoric shamanistic practices.”(56) Even more interestingly, shamanic scholar, teacher, and practitioner, Vicki Noble, believes that very ancient women’s practices were codified into what we now know as yoga.(57)

She says:

Just as women today in dorms or other communal living situations will synchronize their menstrual cycles and end up getting their periods at the same time, so the kundalini [or shamanistic] energy is also contagious in circles of women. Ancient communities apparently took advantage of this fact and sanctified it, making women's blood cycles the center of their social organization. The origins of Yoga lie in this ancient social organization that allowed and encouraged the free, spontaneous flow of kundalini energy through the female group, and by extension, throughout the entire community. Bleeding, birthing, healing and dying were supported by rituals of trance, dance, and an instinctual form of ecstasy facilitated by the women. In this way, disease was purged from the community through ritual, and fertility (in women, animals, and food crops) was enhanced and magically supported by the simple enjoyment of the biological ecstasy of life on earth. Truly, those were the days of ‘living yoga.’

Noble, who has spent time in Tibet, as well as archaeological sites along the Silk Road, also situates this yogic tradition in a larger geographical region beyond Asia, and going back to at least Neolithic times.(58) She calls it, “a coherent lineage of shamanistic practices and ecstatic rituals that cuts across the boundaries and nationalism that take up so much space in our history books.”(59) She explains:

Recent evidence strongly suggests that there is a direct line of connection (perhaps even descent) from the Mediterranean Bronze Age yoginis and those historical yoginis recorded two thousand years later in India and Tibet. Eurasian mummies unearthed from burials in the Altai Mountains of Mongolia and the Tien Shan Mountains of China have changed our ideas regarding Bronze and Iron Age peoples, showing that they traveled thousands of miles in their migrations and shared cultural contacts that connected them all the way from Turkey and Greece to Tibet, India, and the western edges of China. Buddhist monasteries and temples were financed by merchants engaged in active commerce along the Silk Road that linked China to Rome. Female priestesses wearing high conical black hats (like Russian “Babas” and European witches of the Middle Ages) have been found in the Tarim Basin from the late 2nd millennium B.C.E., bringing to life the many enigmatic textual references to “dakini witches” and “yogini queens” in the later histories of pre-Buddhist Tibet that have only recently become available in English.(60)

Last year at Sunstone there was a magazine article and a symposium presentation on The Yoga of Christ.(61) Similar yogic parallels can be found in the life and work of Joseph and Emma Smith. In many cultures shamanism is transmitted to a couple, and according to Tedlock, “erotic energy is an essential component of many shamanic traditions.”(62) She says that, “Abstinence is [also] used in many traditions as a way of manipulating sexual energy.”(63)

Tedlock explains that, “Sexually ecstatic states are celebrated literally as well as symbolically in tantric and kundalini yoga, both of which evolved out of North Asian shamanic practices. The Sanskrit word tantra comes from the root tan, meaning ‘to stretch’ or ‘to weave.’ Tantra is the art of weaving together the spiritual and the material worlds. It is a way of realizing the divine essence through bodily experience, especially the creative force of sexuality. The Sanskrit term Kundalini, meaning “serpent power,” designates divine sexual energy...(65) During orgasm lovers often appear as if possessed by spirits, shuddering and quivering, groaning and crying out, momentarily blind and deaf to all that surrounds them. Scientists point to a strong neurological connection between sexuality, particularly female sexuality, and going into a trance.”(65) Tedlock points out that “the blending of sacred eroticism with ecstatic visionary experience,” is not limited to Asia and she points to its once “important role in Christianity,” quoting St. Theresa and the “deeply ecstatic language of [other] Christian mystics.”(66)

Over the last few years scholars have begun to note parallels between Joseph Smith and the yogic tradition of terma and terton, or hidden treasure texts and the shamanic seers who find them. At a conference at the Library of Congress, on the 200th anniversary of the birth of Joseph Smith, historian, Grant Underwood, discussed historian, Richard Bushman’s, invitation:

“To situate Joseph in broader transnational histories, beyond the borders of the United States and even beyond a Judeo-Christian heritage, [which] enables us to discover some interesting parallels. In the Nyingma tradition of Tibetan Buddhism, for instance, a fundamental source of religious teaching is the termas (treasures). Termas include sacred texts composed anciently, primarily by the great Guru Rinpoche (Padmasambhava) and hidden by him in various secret locations to be discovered at a later date. Termas can only be discovered by a special class of spiritually enlightened adepts (bodhisattvas) known as tertons (treasure finders). Only tertons can reveal these texts because they are written in the cryptic language of the dakini (supernatural beings).

Placing these histories side by side, Smith looks like an American terton-seer translating ancient texts written in cryptic Reformed Egyptian by the great prophets of the past, Mormon and Moroni. The prophets’ purpose for writing, as it had been for Guru Rinpoche, included keeping the faith on track by making clear the fundamental “plain and precious” principles of the tradition. Further, it is interesting to note that some of the Tibetan termas are called “mind treasures” because they are not physically discovered but are revealed through the mind of the terton.” This phraseology recalls the prophecies of Enoch or the parchment of John revealed by Joseph Smith. What is interesting here is not to preposterously argue for any organic connection between Joseph Smith and Tibetan Buddhism but to notice the similar mechanisms for authorizing a religious text and to ponder the social and intellectual dynamics that make them effective.”(67)

Exploring the Eastern treasure text tradition, Noble says, “It is believed that students of Padmasambhava reborn in later centuries would remember their earlier incarnations through the vehicle of revealed treasures which they spontaneously express through unique ways in their lifetime. The terma treasures are sometimes physical (texts, amulets, relics), but frequently they are treasures of the mind. In a broad understanding of the concept, one might say that the excavation of European mummies in China and Mongolia counts as terma, along with more technical artifacts unearthed in Tibet over the centuries.”(68)

Tibetan teacher, Namkhai Norbu, describes the process, “as one of direct transmission from teacher to student through the use of symbols and [describes] the ‘language of the dakini’ as a form in which the ancient, secret teachings are encoded until the time a certain predestined people around the world will discover portions of them, which it is their task to translate into the cultural language of their time and place. To be a part of this lineage does not require that the person be participating in a particular spiritual form, such as Buddhism, although the teacher doing the transmitting may well be Buddhist.”(69)

Is it possible that there could be a universal spiritual lineage that connects the Tibetan and Mormon traditions? John Tvedtnes, over at B.Y.U.’s Maxwell Institute, wrote a book titled: The Book of Mormon and Other Hidden Books, detailing “numerous ancient traditions of angels as writers and guardians of written records,”(70) “hidden to come forth to later generations.”(71) The book demonstrates “that various elements of the Book of Mormon story have antecedents in the ancient world that were not known to Joseph Smith and his contemporaries(72) and that while various parts of the world share [similar] tradition[s], it is most prominent in the ancient Near East, the land from which the Book of Mormon people emigrated to the new world.”(73)

And this passage from the Book of Mormon - 2 Nephi, chapter 29 – contains a non-sectarian message stating that the Divine realm deals with ALL of the earth’s peoples and inspires cultures around the globe:

…Know ye not that there are more nations than one?... I bring forth my word unto…all the nations of the earth? (29:7)…

…Wherefore murmur ye, because that ye shall receive more of my word... that I remember one nation like unto another? (29:8)…

…Wherefore, because that ye have a Bible ye need not suppose that it contains all my words; neither need ye suppose that I have not caused more to be written (29:10)…

…For I command all… both in the east and in the west, and in the north, and in the south, and in the islands of the sea, that they shall write the words which I speak unto them (29:11)…

I shall also speak unto all nations of the earth and they shall write it (29:12).

Vicki Noble and Tibetan Tulku, Thondup Rinpoche state:

“Treasure-finders known as Tertons (sometimes female terma-finders are referred to as Kandroma, which basically means ‘dakini’) receive their termas in the language of the dakini, which is a secret script that has to be decoded. Terma-finders must have a consort with whom to practice their mystical yoga. ‘The support of the consort has two purposes…to produce and maintain the wisdom of the union of the great bliss and emptiness (freedom), by which the adept attains the ultimate state…(and) the consort causes him or her to awaken the realization as well as to discover the Termas.’ The ‘special consort who has made the appropriate aspirations in the past” is “the key to accomplishment,’ which is ‘one of the reasons why all Tertons happen to have consorts.’(74)

“Dakini is a Tibetan word meaning skydancer,(75) skygoer, or sky-walking female,” and describes a female shamanic practitioner equivalent to an Indian yogini, “the embodiment of cosmic feminine energy and wisdom,”(76) a “practitioner of supernatural yogic powers.”(77) Vicki Noble says that, “The narratives of the great Tibetan and Indian ‘masters’ generally contain a segment in which the yogi is awakened or initiated by a yogini or female guru, often disguised as an ‘ordinary’ woman. The dakini’s identity is ‘ambiguous’ and she is often not recognized for who she is, even by advanced yogis.”(78)

Noble says that Dakinis have to integrate the time and the place that they live in(79)and that “Tertons and Kandromas...express their discoveries through the particular vernacular of their time and for the direct benefit of their special constituency of their students.” Barbara Tedlock adds that shamanic practitioners, “ritually enact their local system of myths and symbols and interpret the patient’s condition within that system.”(80)

Was Emma Joseph’s tantric consort, the energizer and necessary ingredient for the coming forth of the Book of Mormon? A visitor to the home of Emma’s youth once described her as, “‘fine looking, smart...a good singer...and she often got the power.’” Emma’s biographers say, “What the ‘power’ was the visitor did not elaborate upon, but Emma did have a deep faith and knew the Bible well. When Joseph told her of his vision in the woods she believed him.”(81)

Joseph was prepared by supernatural visitations for years before he could go to the Hill Cumorah, in upstate New York, to retrieve the buried treasure known as the Golden Plates. Reading the earliest accounts of this romantic adventure-quest Emma looks a lot like a classical yogini.

Henry Harris had heard about the Golden Plates directly from Joseph Smith and recollected Smith's interaction with an angel and his use of a seer stone:

I had a conversation with him, and asked him where he found them and how he come [sic] to know where they were. He said he had a revelation from God that told him they were hid in a certain hill and he looked in his stone and saw them in the place of deposit; that an angel appeared, and told him he could not get the plates until he was married, and that when he saw the woman that was to be his wife, he should know her, and she would know him.(82)

Joseph Smith’s close friend, Joseph Knight, reported that, “when Joseph went that fall to the hill named Cumorah, the ‘personage’ told him he could have the record the following September ‘if he brot with him the right person’ and indicated that Joseph would know who that was.” Knight said that Joseph, “looked into his glass and found it was Emma Hale Daughter of old Mr. Hale of Pensulvany.”(83)

One of the Three Witnesses of the Book of Mormon, Martin Harris,(84) recollected being told by the Smith family how Joseph obtained the golden plates and added an interesting visual detail to Emma’s role that mystical equinox evening (85) “After this, on the 22nd of September, 1827, before day, Joseph took the horse and wagon of old Mr. Stowel, and taking his wife, he went to the place where the plates were concealed, and while he was obtaining them, she kneeled down and prayed.”(86) This particular account shows Emma playing an active spiritual role in the obtaining of the plates.

“Emma acted as scribe for Joseph for a short time before Martin Harris became scribe and also immediately after Harris was rejected by Smith for losing the pages.”(87) Like a veritable dakini, Emma, wrote in 1829: “In writing for your father I frequently wrote day after day, often sitting at the table close by him, he sitting with his face buried in his hat, with the stone in it, and dictating hour after hour with nothing between us.”

In the final section of this paper I’d like to present five specific shamanic elements in the life and work of Emma Smith.

Number one is “the laying on of hands:”

Thanks to much scholarly work in recent years we know that as a priestess(88) and the head of the Relief Society, Emma administered blessings of health, which is a healing rite customarily administered by the laying on of hands. In Women as Healers in the Modern Church, Betina Lindsey states, “In Nauvoo, Illinois, the women of the Relief Society frequently pronounced blessings upon each other. Sister Durfee and Abigail Leonard tell of receiving blessings of health from Emma Smith and her counselors.” Lindsey notes that, “The laying on of hands is the oldest form of ritual healing known to virtually every religion. Early rock carvings in Egypt and Chaldea and cave paintings in the Pyrenees that are 15,000 years old, portray [the] laying on of hands.”(89)

Number two is “speaking in tongues:”

Although Emma’s biographers, Newell and Avery, report that “There does not seem to be any indication that Emma Smith spoke in tongues,”(90) They do mention that, “the practice became a part of the saint’s worship – particularly among women – into the [20th] century.”(91) Dr. Mihaly Hoppal includes speaking in tongues, also known as glossolalia, in his definition of shamanic characteristics because, he says, “glossolalia can be seen as the audible (phonetic) expression of the neuron-psychological trance process.”(92)

The next category in the shaman’s repertoire where we find Emma is said, by Dr. Hoppal, to often be overlooked - the shaman as poet or singer:

Hoppal notes that “oral ecstatic performance and collective singing” is a feature in some shamanistic societies, as is “shamanic [musical] performance, and the ritualized narration of myth...by singers of traditional oral narratives.” He quotes R. Mastromattei who said that a text, “recited in an ecstatic context,” “becomes shamanic.”(93) The “Elect Lady revelation” that was given to Emma commissioned her to “make a selection of sacred hymns,” and another early Mormon revelation equates “the song of righteousness” with prayer,(94) which is sometimes linked to meditative or altered states of consciousness;(95) What’s more, Newell and Avery speculate that Emma could have been, “a contributor herself,” as several hymns are of unknown authorship.(96)

The remaining two categories where I have located Emma came from a book that contained information about her that I have never encountered anywhere else. Buddy Youngreen’s book, Reflections of Emma, reveals that after Joseph’s death, after Brigham Young had taken most of the Mormons West with him, leaving Emma in Nauvoo, Emma Smith became a prolific midwife and an herbalist.(97)

“Midwifery has rarely been acknowledged as a shamans art,” (98) yet spanning multiple cultures and continents, Barbara Tedlock has begun to locate “extensive archaeological and ethnographic evidence for midwifery as a branch of shamanism,”(99) She points out that, “in many cultures midwives may enlist spiritual aid before, during, and after birth. Thus they are shamanic healers in their own right.”(100) She elaborates, “Women on feminine [shamanic] paths focus their attention around birth. They receive their shamanic calling during menarche or pregnancy and are symbolically born into the profession,”(101) and adds that, “Women shamans are nearly always midwives. The act of helping souls to transform themselves in order to cross from the other world into this world turns out to be at the heart of feminine shamanic traditions worldwide. While the masculine traditions focus on a shaman’s symbolically dying into shamanhood, the feminine traditions focus on the shaman’s being born into it.”(102)

Historically, midwives are usually also herbalists,(103) and Emma was no exception. Tedlock says that part of “the active [shamanic] pursuit of knowledge,” is “the identification of medicinal plants and their uses”(104) and that herbalism is shamanic because in the “identification, collection, preparation, and use,” of plants, “herbalists go beyond the rational intelligence that is based on every day experience and teaching. They also rely on inspirational knowledge...for indigenous peoples it is wisdom rather than knowledge per se that is the goal. Knowledge consists of empirical information passed on from teacher to pupil. Wisdom adds to that an intuitive grasp of the complex connections and forms of consciousness in the natural world. Herbalists insist that in order to choose the proper medicine for any situation, a healer ‘must come to know plants’ as living beings. It is not the plant alone that cures; the healing comes from the greater power that exists within the spirits of the plant, the healer, the patient, and the culture...while there are herbalists in many societies who are not trained as shamans – they do not enter a trance or experience ecstasy – all shamans know the plant realm well. And in most cultures herbal healing, like midwifery, is a strongly feminine specialty.”(105)

For more information on the “botanical arts” of early Mormonism, medical anthropologist, John Heinerman, has done an excellent job extensively documenting the ethnobotany of early Mormonism, in Joseph Smith and Herbal Medicine.(106)

In closing, I want to thank Dr. C. Jess Groesbeck for paving the way for this paper with his 2005 Sunstone presentation, Joseph Smith and the Shaman's Vision: A Forgotten Paradigm for the Life of the Mormon Prophet. I would also like to thank Kenneth Shaw for pointing out to me, over 10 years ago, the remarkable parallels between Joseph Smith and Tibetan tertons.

Lastly, I would like to thank Barbara Tedlock, Vicki Noble, and Max Dashu for personally teaching me most of what I know about female shamanism.

ENDNOTES:

(1) Mihaly Hoppal, “Shamanism: An Archaic and/or Recent Belief System,” in Shamanism, ed. Shirley Nicholson (Wheaton, IL: Theosophical Publishing House, 1987), 76.
(2) Hoppal, Shamanism, 76.
(3)Michael James Winkelman, “Shamans and Other ‘Magico-Religious’ Healers: A Cross-Cultural Study of Their Origins, Nature, and Social Transformations,” Ethos, Vol. 18, No. 3. (Sep., 1990), 308-352.
http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0091-2131%28199009%2918%3A3%3C308%3ASAO%22HA%3E2.0.CO%3B2-7
(4)Mircea Eliade, Shamanism: Archaic Techniques of Ecstasy, (Princeton University Press, 1964), 4.
(5)Barbara Tedlock, The Woman in the Shaman’s Body: Reclaiming the Feminine in Religion and Medicine, (New York, NY: Bantam Dell, 2005), 24.
(6) Eliade, Shamanism, 4
(7)Max Dashu, “Suppressed Histories Archives: FAQ,” Suppressed Histories Archives, http://www.suppressedhistories.net/faq.html
(8) Dashu, “Suppressed Histories Archives: FAQ.”
(9) Tedlock, The Woman in the Shaman’s Body, 20.
(10) Encyclopedia of Alternative Medicine, s.v. “Shamanism,” Answers.com. The Gale Group, Inc, 2005. http://www.answers.com/topic/shamanism
(11) Hoppal, “Shamanism,” 90.
(12) Dashu, “Suppressed Histories Archives: FAQ.”
(13) Ibid.
(14) Eliade, Shamanism, 5-6, 290.
(15) Vicki Noble, The Double Goddess: Women Sharing Power, (Rochester, VT: Bear & Co., 2003), 94.
(16) Tedlock, The Woman in the Shaman’s Body, 22.
(17)Ibid., 27.
(18) Alternative Medical Encyclopedia.
(19) Tedlock, The Woman in the Shaman’s Body, 23; and Max Dashu, “Woman Shaman” lecture, New College of California, San Francisco CA, Dec. 9, 2006.
(20) Reginald A. Ray, “Tibetan Buddhism as Shamanism?” Reviewed Work: Civilized Shamans: Buddhism in Tibetan Societies by Geoffrey Samuel, The Journal of Religion, Vol. 75, No. 1. (Jan., 1995), 92.
http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0022-4189%28199501%2975%3A1%3C90%3ATBAS%3E2.0.CO%3B2-K
(21) Hoppal, “Shamanism.” 83.
(22) Ibid.
(23) Tedlock, The Woman in the Shaman’s Body, 27. See also: Benny Shanon, “Biblical Entheogens: A Speculative Hypothesis,” Time and Mind: The Journal of Archaeology Consciousness and Culture, Vol. 1, no. 1, (March 2008), 51–74. http://shamanism.files.wordpress.com/2008/03/shanon_article_moses.pdf and Rabbi Yonassan Gershom, “Shamanism in the Jewish Tradition,” Shamanism, ed. Shirley Nicholson, (Wheaton, IL: Theosophical Publishing House, 1987), 181; and James R. Davila, “The Hekhalot Literature and Shamanism, published in The Society of Biblical Literature 1994 Seminar Papers, (Atlanta, Ga.: Scholars Press, 1994) 767-89; http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/~www_sd/hekhalot_shamanism_art.html
and Dan Merkur, The Mystery of Manna: The Psychedelic Sacrament of the Bible, (Rochester, VT: Park Street Press), 2001.
(24) Tedlock, The Woman in the Shaman’s Body, 4, 14; Jean Clottes and David Lewis-Williams, The Shamans of Prehistory: Trance and Magic in the Painted Caves, translated by Sophie Hawkes, (Harry N. Abrams, 1998).
(25) Answers.com, Wikipedia, s.v. “shamanism,” http://www.answers.com/topic/shamanism
(26) Jeannine Davis-Kimball, Warrior Women: An Archaeologist’s Search for History’s Hidden Heroines, (New York, NY: Warner Books, 2002), 85.
(27) Tedlock, The Woman in the Shaman’s Body, 4.
(28) Vicki Noble, Shakti Woman: Feeling Our Fire, Healing Our World, The New Female Shamanism, (New York, NY: HarperSanFrancisco), 13.
(29) Tedlock, The Woman in the Shaman’s Body, 205; and Vicki Noble, Shakti Woman, 11.
(30) Tedlock, 61.
(31) Ibid., 70.
(32) Ibid., 72.
(33) Ibid., 64.
(34) Ibid., 202.
(35) Ibid., 73.
(36) Ibid., 202.
(37) Barbara Tedlock, lecture, “Ancient and Contemporary Female Shamanism,” college course, New College of California, Sunday, November 19, 2006.
(38) Tedlock, The Woman in the Shaman’s Body, 168.
(39) Ibid., 249.
(40) Ibid., 254.
(41) Ibid., 282.
(42) Doctrine & Covenants 88:7, 12-13.
(43) http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/j/josephsmit192875.html
(44) Tedlock, The Woman in the Shaman’s Body, 83.
(45) TPJS, p. 324; cf. HC 6:50. Quoted in, Larry C. Porter, “Visions of Joseph Smith,” http://www.lightplanet.com/mormons/people/joseph_smith/visions.html
(46) Robert T. Beckstead, "Restoration and the Sacred Mushroom: Did Joseph Smith use Psychedelic Substances to Facilitate Visionary Experiences?," paper presented at the Sunstone Symposium, August 2007. http://www.mormonelixirs.org
(47) Carl A. P. Ruck, Jeremy Bigwood, Danny Staples, Jonathan Ott, and Gordon Wasson, “Entheogens,” The Journal of Psychedelic Drugs, Vol. 11(1-2) Jan-Jun, 1979 http://www.entheomedia.org/entheogen.htm
(48) Tedlock, The Woman in the Shaman’s Body, 25.
(49) Joseph Smith, "The King Follett Discourse," http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/King_Follett_Discourse#The_Power_to_Advance_in_Knowledge
(50) Lisa Ramsey Adams, Encyclopedia of Mormonism, Vol. 1, s.v. “Eternal Progression,” (Macmillan Publishing Co., 1992) http://www.lightplanet.com/mormons/basic/afterlife/progression_eom.htm
(51) Joseph Smith, Jr. once stated: “One of the grand fundamental principles of Mormonism is to receive truth, let it come from whence it may.” See also: Don Bradley, “The Grand Fundamental Principles of Mormonism: Joseph Smith’s Unfinished Reformation,” Sunstone, April 2006, http://www.sunstoneonline.com/magazine/issues/141/141-32-41.pdf
(52) Tedlock, The Woman in the Shaman’s Body, 22.
(53) Ibid., 234.
(54) Eliade, Shamanism, 4, 495. Also, Online Etymology Dictionary, http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=shaman and, Berthold Laufer, “Origin of the Word Shaman,” American Anthropologist, New Series, Vol. 19, No. 3. (Jul. - Sep., 1917), 361-371.
http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0002-7294%28191707%2F09%292%3A19%3A3%3C361%3AOOTWS%3E2.0.CO%3B2-E
(55) Reginald A. Ray, “Tibetan Buddhism as Shamanism?,” 96.
(56) Richard Rudgley, The Lost Civilizations of the Stone Age, (New York, NY: Touchstone, 2000), 121.
(57) Vicki Noble, “The Life Cycle and Yogini Roots: Did Women Invent the Ancient Art of Yoga?,” http://www.lotusfertility.com/Yogini_Roots.html
(58) Vicki Noble, The Double Goddess, 91.
(59) Ibid., 10.
(60) Noble, “The Life Cycle and Yogini Roots;” See also, Jeannine Davis-Kimball, Warrior Women, 38, 103, 151; see also Vicki Noble, The Double Goddess, 128-134, 199.
(61) Philip G. McLemore, “The Yoga of Christ,” Sunstone, June 2007.
(62) Tedlock, The Woman in the Shaman’s Body, 87.
(63) Ibid., 88.
(64) Ibid., 88.
(65) Ibid., 89.
(66) Ibid., 89.
(67) John Welch, Ed. B.Y.U. Studies (Vol. 44, no. 44 2005) “Special Issue - The World’s of Joseph Smith: A Bicentennial Conference at the Library of Congress,” 46.
(68) Noble, The Double Goddess, 201.
(69) Noble, Shakti Woman, 77.
(70) H. Curtis Wright, from the Introduction, The Book of Mormon and Other Hidden Books, (Provo, UT: Foundation for Ancient Mormon Studies, 2000), xi.
(71) John A. Tvedtnes, The Book of Mormon and Other Hidden Books, Acknowledgements.
(72) Ibid., 5.
(73) Ibid., 25.
(74) Noble, The Double Goddess, 201-2.
(75) Touching SA, http://touchingsa.co.za/2007/11/13/tantric-terms/
(76) Ibid.
(77) Noble, The Double Goddess, 10.
(78) Ibid., 198.
(79) Vicki Noble, lecture, “Ancient and Contemporary Female Shamanism,” college course, New College of California, Sunday, November 19, 2006.
(80) Tedlock, The Woman in the Shaman’s Body, 15.
(81) Linda King Newell and Valeen Tippetts Avery, Mormon Enigma: Emma Hale Smith, 18.
(82) Michael Marquardt, The Rise of Mormonism: 1816-1844, (Xulon Press, 2005), 95.
(83) Newell, Mormon Enigma, 19.
(84) 1783-1875, http://www.lightplanet.com/mormons/people/martin_harris.html
(85) Gail L. Porritt and Robert S. Portlock, “Joseph Smith As Latter-day Halcyon:
Spiritual Mythology and Mormon Symbolism,” January 2000 Internet Edition, http://web.archive.org/web/20041217090630/http://www.aros.net/~johor/Halcyon/Latter-day_Halcyon.htm
(86) Marquardt, The Rise of Mormonism, 93.
(87) History of the RLDS Church, http://www.rmwhome.com/Mormons/Documents/translation.htm
(88) D. Michael Quinn, “Mormon Women Have Had the Priesthood Since 1843,” Women and Authority:
Re-emerging Mormon Feminism, Ed. Maxine Hanks, (Salt Lake City, UT: Signature Books, 1992), http://www.signaturebookslibrary.org/women/chapter17.htm#Woman See also, Margaret & Paul Toscano, Strangers in Paradox: Explorations in Mormon Theology, (Salt Lake City, UT: Signature Books, 1990).
(89) Betina Lindsey, “Women as Healers in the Modern Church,” Women and Authority: Re-emerging Mormon Feminism, ed. Maxine Hanks, (Salt Lake City, UT: Signature Books, 1992)
http://www.signaturebookslibrary.org/women/chapter19.htm#Healers
(90) Linda King Newell and Valeen Tippetts Avery, “Sweet Counsel and Seas of Tribulation: The Religious Life of the Women in Kirtland,” BYU Studies, 20.2, 1980.
http://byustudies.byu.edu/shop/pdfsrc/20.2NewellAvery.pdf
(91) Newell, Mormon Enigma, 46.
(92) Hoppal, “Shamanism,” 91.
(93) Ibid.
(94) Newell, Mormon Enigma, 34.
(95) Greg Braden, The Isaiah Effect, (NY: Three Rivers Press, 2001), 226; and Eugene G. D'Aquili and Andrew B. Newberg, The Mystical Mind: Probing the Biology of Religious Experience, (Minneapolis, MN: Augsburg Fortress, 1999), 152.
(96) Newell, Mormon Enigma, 57.
(97) Buddy Youngreen, Reflections of Emma, (Provo, UT: Maasai, Inc., 2001).
(98) Tedlock, The Woman in the Shaman’s Body, 208.
(99) Ibid., 212.
(100) Ibid., 208.
(101) Ibid., 202.
(102) Ibid., 206.
(103) Ibid., 207.
(104) Ibid., 23.
(105) Ibid., 137.
(106) John Heinerman, Joseph Smith and Herbal Medicine: A Brief Study of the Botanical Arts in Mormonism, (Springville, UT: Bonneville Books, 2001). See also, John Heinerman, Joseph Smith and Natural Foods, (Springville, UT: Bonneville Books, 2001).

Sunstone, Synchronicity, and SLC Radio

2008-08-07T17:16:00.000-07:00

RadioActive! Aug 6 Sunstone Symposium - Critiquing Mormon Theology.

"SALT LAKE CITY, UTAH (2008-08-08) The annual Sunstone Symposium is in session and Gena welcomes three of the participants. Jeff Needle is a Jewish Mormonphile who has spent decades fascinated by Mormon theology. Elizabeth Quick sees Emma Smith as a mystical shaman and Sharon Adams is comparing and constrasting Mormonism with Buddhism. All three guests offer new and interesting takes on the religion of the Latter-day Saints."

Download the MP3 while it's still available (click) HERE

Just prior to this year's Sunstone Symposium I was contacted by producer Troy Williams of Salt Lake City's community radio station, KRCL, for an interview regarding my Sunstone presentation.

Two other Sunstone presenters were scheduled to appear on the show with me: Salt Lake Tribune columnist Robert Kirby and the (interestingly, non-Mormon) Mormon History Association book editor Jeff Needleman.

My husband and I arrived at the station Wednesday evening at 5:45 where I met Jeff and his companion, Richard C. Russell (another Sunstone presenter) at the front door, which turned out to be closed after hours. Jeff was very charming as he described his Sunstone presentation to me on our way to the back door. (My husband) Tim and Russell went to listen to the show in the producer's room with Troy.

When I arrived in the studio I was surprised to see that the third guest was a woman, not Robert Kirby, who turned out to be Sharon Adams, but when I found out that she was giving a paper at Sunstone on "female empowerment in the Mormon and Tibetan Buddhist traditions," I was even more surprised, as I hadn't fully explored the symposium program yet, and a large section of my Emma Smith paper had to do with paralells and possible connections between the Mormon tradition and Tibetan Buddhism.

161. Paper RELIGIOUS AUTHORITY VERSUS PRACTICE:FEMALE EMPOWERMENT IN THE MORMON AND TIBETAN BUDDHIST TRADITIONS

Abstract: This presentation explores notions of religious 'authority' as it relates to religious experience for women in Mormonism and Tibetan Buddhism. Whereas religious authority appears to be the domain of men in both traditions, I argue that certain aspects of individual religious experience, aspects of worship involving personal meaning, and how a practitioner embodies the tradition, is not gender specific. I explore how some Tibetan Buddhist teachings regarding representations of the divine feminine may compliment LDS practice, giving Mormon women access to the divine feminine in ways that could bring a sense of empowerment.

During the breaks and after the show, Sharon was just as surprised to meet me. She kept asking me if I knew about this or that aspect of Tibetan religion, culture or history that had some auspicious synchronicity with with Mormonism, such as the "Terma tradition." Nearly every time I said, "Yes, I'm covering that in the paper that I am presenting." We also found out that we both practice Tibetan Buddhism at the Shambhala Centers, she in Colorado, and I in California. We were very excited to meet each other, and after the show I mentioned to Troy that I thought that it was a really meaningful coincidence that instead of Robert Kirby, there was another woman talking about Tibetan Buddhism there. Troy said that he felt I had written a really "maverick" paper for Sunstone and that when Mr. Kirby was unable to make it that he thought that Sharon's topic would compliment mine on the show very nicely. Indeed!

While I was being interviewed, Tim found out that Troy needed a ride back to the Sheraton (where the conference was being held and we were staying) and offered him one. I was excited to meet such a fascinating person with so many common interests and was eager to read his blog (which I thought has such a great title), http://www.queergnosis.com

When we pulled into the parking lot Troy was telling us that he knew the Indigo Girls and mentioned the new song on Amy Ray's latest solo Album that he'd used as bumper music for the show that day. I hadn't noticed until he mentioned it - but the song was titled: SLC Radio, and was inspired, in part, by KRCL! (You can listen to the song HERE.)

It was such a coincidence because the Indigo Girls often remind me of Utah and I had made it a point to bring a couple of Indigo Girls CDs with me on this trip for old time's sake. I was first introduced to the Indigo Girls self-titled first album when I was 18 years old, by my friend Graye Morehouse, in the Spring of 1988. In June of that year, I moved out of my parents house for the first time to Provo, Utah and brought the first Indigo Girls album with me. Already on this trip I'd been driving around Salt Lake singing my heart out to the Indigo Girls. It was also a coincidence because being in the KRCL studio reminded me of my own radio producing days at Salt Lake's K-Talk (KTKK), another independent, grass-roots, radio station, where I interned for several months and occasionally hosted, co-hosted, did news, commercials and PSAs.

Indigo Girl loves Salt Lake's 'vibrant scene'
By Scott Iwasaki
Deseret News
http://deseretnews.com/article/1,5143,700247705,00.html

KRCL's Troy Williams interviews Amy Ray (short MP3 interview):
http://cdn3.libsyn.com/queergnosis/Amy_Ray_Interview_08.mp3?nvb=20080830004223&nva=20080831004223&t=00dc9ee7b21ff008e21ff

I also love Amy's appreciation of punk rock!

Ray Taps Into Her Punk Side On Solo Work:
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4188/is_/ai_n14605769

Another side of Amy Ray:
http://www.cnn.com/2008/SHOWBIZ/Music/08/06/amy.ray/index.html

Lyrics from LyricWiki.org

Salt Lake City radio radio
fighting the good fight for me
all the songs all the words
that don’t get played that don’t get heard

I’m pulling in to the LDS nation
looking for a community station
Cause we heard about the kids in SLC
and how they fight to be set free
and how they fight for you and me
and radio radio community

I’m sending love to all the Mormons
ain’t nothing wrong with changing their plans
I said keep the good things
and throw out the bad things
you gotta pull the reins
on a whole lot of suffering

Radio radio SLC
fighting the good fight for me
Boys and girls lend a hand
bend an ear in God’s land
Take your city on a holiday from pain
All you missionaries
can you hear what I say?

I know the bible belt
I know the sobering noose
and everybody’s got their own set of rules
But we heard about the kids in SLC
and how they fight to be set free
and how they fight for you and me
and radio radio community

I seen a lotta roads
and pastures and mountains
I met a lotta folks in a whole lotta towns
I feel a crack in the skin of the majority
They’re gonna figure it out
I ain’t here to fuck the family

Take your city on a holiday from pain
All you missionaries
can’t you hear what I say?

Way down in the deep south
I got the bible belt blues
I want to shake these chains off
what have I got to lose?
I said everybody across this nation
stand with me
and your community station
What have you got to lose?

Mother Goddess Wisdom in the Book of Mormon

2008-04-25T14:49:00.000-07:00

For parts 1-6 click HERE

WOMEN'S POWER

2008-04-15T21:42:00.000-07:00

This DVD can be ordered through the Suppressed Histories Archives:

Restoring Women to Cultural Memory

Monumental Women

African Queens

Female Farmers and Providers

Woman Shaman

Female Liberators and Revolutionaries

Mother-Right: Equalitarian Societies

Transformation through Family History: The Power of Genealogy

2008-04-15T21:38:00.000-07:00

The original story appears HERE:

The New York Times
April 13, 2008
Editorial Notebook
Of Witches and the Wait for Justice
By MAURA J. CASEY

In 1662, the colonists of Hartford accused 39-year-old Mary Sanford of witchcraft. Based on evidence — drinking wine and dancing around a bonfire — the court pronounced her guilty “for not having the feare of God before thyne eyes.” Sanford was hanged, leaving behind five children and a shaken husband who was later acquitted of similar charges.

More than three centuries later, Sanford’s descendants, 14-year-old Addie Avery and her mother, Debra, of New Milford, Conn., have petitioned the State Legislature to exonerate their distant grandmother and 10 other people executed for witchcraft. The fight has taught them something, perhaps more than they wanted to know, about the mob mentality.

The Averys did not always know they had a forebear accused of being a witch. A relative told them of their lineage and Sanford’s fate before a 2005 lecture on the Connecticut colony’s witch trials, which were sparked by widespread hysteria long before the better-known Salem witch trials of 1692. The lecture led to research, and the Averys took the first small steps toward asking the Legislature for exoneration. Along the way, they have learned what comes of taking a public stand.

Addie, who is home-schooled, researched every witch case in the colony. She was surprised to learn that all but two of the executed were women. Community leaders had presided over trials where the accused were usually the least educated and the least powerful. Women fit that bill nicely.

(Not much has changed there. Of the 170 people Connecticut has executed in over 300 years, only one was a college graduate, said Lawrence B. Goodheart, a University of Connecticut professor of history.)

Soon, the Averys’ lobbying attracted the support of other descendants of those who were accused. But critics spoke out, too, lashing out on Internet blogs. Ms. Avery was shaken to read the harsh comments, which reminded her of the mob frenzy that her ancestor faced. “The world has changed, but people haven’t,” she said.

Addie said she got a new education when she decided to publicly defend her ancestor. To her mother’s amazement, the attacks didn’t bother the suddenly thick-skinned teenager. “There are worse things than mockery,” Addie said. “Now, I’m not afraid to stand up when I see something wrong.”

Connecticut is slow to admit fault. It is not likely to soon join such states as Massachusetts and Virginia in acknowledging the injustice done to those accused in the witch hunts. A legislative committee passed on the issue this year.

But the prospect of returning to the Legislature next year, attending hearings and beginning the process all over again doesn’t seem to bother the Averys, least of all Addie. It may have taken more than 340 years, but finally someone is speaking up for Mary Sanford.

“I’ve discovered myself by honoring Mary,” Addie said.

Room for Reincarnation in L.D.S. Theology?

2008-04-01T17:16:00.000-07:00

Leon D'Souza - The Salt Lake Tribune

Robert Beckstead gets quizzical looks from fellow Mormons when he tells them that reincarnation is “eloquently embedded” in the writings of Joseph Smith.

Reincarnation? The Hindu doctrine that people may take successive births as god, human, animal, hungry ghost or denizen of hell based on their behavior? Nah!

But give this emergency-room physician a few minutes - and a slide projector - and he’ll present his case with confident vigor. The LDS Church’s doctrines of premortal existence and eternal progression, Beckstead told a forum at the Sunstone Symposium in Salt Lake City earlier this week, are remnants of Smith’s original ideas about soul rebirth - a doctrine he cautiously taught trusted followers after 1841.

The Mormon founder’s understanding of the concept may have been shaped by Alexander Neibaur, great-grandfather of revered LDS scholar Hugh Nibley. A Jewish convert to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Neibaur was an ardent student of the Kabbalah, a body of mystical teachings based on an esoteric reading of Hebrew Scriptures.

That tradition teaches that souls in the afterlife ‘must commence another [life], a third, and so forth’ in order to obtain the perfection ‘that allows them to associate again with God.’

It could be that Neibaur convinced Smith the Book of Mormon “was actually a reincarnation text,” Beckstead says, like the Zohar, Kabbalah’s greatest book.

But wouldn’t Smith know if reincarnation was central to his own revelations?

Not necessarily, says Beckstead, quoting Brigham Young University anthropologist John Clark, who “suggested in a recent symposium at the Smithsonian Library that Joseph Smith was the translator, not the author, of the Book of Mormon, and consequently ‘did not fully understand’ its contents.”

That being the case, Beckstead notes, the Zohar could have become “the mirror in which Joseph Smith finally understood reincarnation in the Book of Mormon.”
It was after his meetings with Neibaur that Smith began teaching about what he called “plural probations.”

In April 1843, for example, Smith taught that “the purpose of successive probations or ‘worlds’ was to permit the gradual accumulation of intelligence and knowledge,” Beckstead says.

Around that time, Joseph Lee Robinson, another Smith confidant, reported that Smith “discussed the ‘idea that we have passed through probations prior to this’ and surmised ‘that we must have been married and given in marriage in those probations.’

Several of Smith’s wives have written about his belief in plural probations.

“Mary Elizabeth Rollins, who wed Joseph in February 1842, claimed that he suggested to her they had an intimate relationship before they met,” Beckstead says.

And yet, if Smith did believe in the reincarnation of souls, why didn’t his teachings on the subject carry on after him?

The problem, if you believe Beckstead, was that Smith’s successor, Brigham Young, “fundamentally misunderstood” his reincarnation theology. And church leaders since Young have dismissed it as a “doctrine of the devil.” Although, on occasion, Smith’s teachings have found support among LDS leaders.

Apostle Orson F. Whitney, for example, in a 1919 article in the church publication Improvement Era, “subtly expressed his disappointment” that reincarnation wasn’t taught as church doctrine.

Generally, however, early Mormonism’s Kabbalistic ideas are no longer kosher.

As University of Utah historian Gae Lyn Henderson observed in her response to Beckstead’s lecture, “A belief in reincarnation, [or] what we might label ’second chance theology’ takes the fear out of religion, and that fear-free religion loses its power to strictly control human behavior.”

LDS apostle Bruce R. McConkie attacked reincarnation theology more directly, ridiculing the idea of plural probations. “There is no such thing as a second chance to gain salvation,” he said in a 1980 church address titled “The Seven Deadly Heresies.”

“This life is the time and the day of our probation. After this day of life, which is given us to prepare for eternity, then cometh the night of darkness wherein there can be no labor performed.”

Date: Saturday,July 30, 2005
Page: C4
http://www.sltrib.com/faith/ci_2900769

Elaine Pagels on Mormon Response to the Gnostic Gospels

2008-03-07T17:47:00.000-08:00

Theological scholar Elaine Pagels is the author of The Gnostic Gospels and the Harrington Spear Paine Professor of Religion at Princeton University.

Here is a delightful excerpt from an interview with Elaine Pagels when she visited Utah:

A caller asked,"What do the established religions, particularly the Catholic Church or the L.D.S. Church, do they have an official position on these gospels?"

Pagels: "That's a very good question. You know when we speak of either of those churches, we are speaking about a wide range of people. Now in the Catholic Church, for the most part, there has been a lot of skepticism about these texts. They were called 'heresy' in the 2nd century, which means 'choice,' and some of the leaders of the church felt that was not a good thing for people in the congregations to have. They were excluded from the canon of the Church. There are Catholics who welcome them, who study them, who explore them, as well."

"In the L.D.S. Church actually, when I was working in Egypt 25 years ago, a scholar who is now at Brigham Young [University] was working with us, very much convinced that something like the Gospel of Philip anticipated or actually communicated some of the mysteries that were later understood within the L.D.S. Church. So there are people within that community who see these as amplifications of what we know, which is very consonant with the teaching of that church."

The rest of the interview is fabulous, listen here:

9/24/08: Jesus and the Gnostic Gospels

KUER 90.1, The University of Utah

RadioWest
KUER news host and producer Doug Fabrizio brings you inside the latest news and issues from Utah and around the western region with newsmaker interviews, and in-depth reports, along with your calls.

In 1945, the sacred text of one of the world's earliest Christian sects was uncovered in Upper Egypt. The discovery of the Gnostic Gospels -- including the Gospel of Thomas -- has fascinated scholars and ignited imaginations since. Preeminent theologian Elaine Pagels joins Doug Fabrizio to talk about how Christianity may have been different had these teachings of Jesus been a part of church canon from the earliest days.

http://www.publicbroadcasting.net/kuer/news/news.newsmain?action=article&ARTICLE_ID=1373879§ionID=184

If that doesn't work, try this back up link (scroll down):
http://radiotime.com/program/p_1454/RadioWest.aspx

HAPPY HOLY-DAYS

2007-12-23T13:25:00.000-08:00

Contemporary Female Shamanism

2007-12-09T22:48:00.000-08:00

Judy Grahn, Jeannine Davis-Kimball, Geoffrey Ashe and others have documented that all of the original shamans were female - back to paleolithic times...

R.I.P. Richard Leigh

2007-12-02T01:12:00.000-08:00

SOURCE: http://tvnz.co.nz/view/page/536641/1470252

Controversial "Holy" author dies
Dec 2, 2007 10:00 AM

The author who filed a lawsuit saying Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code was a ripoff of a book he had written has died in London.

Richard Leigh had written The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail, in which he claimed Christ fathered a child and the bloodline continues to this day.

He and co-author Michael Baigent sued Random House, Dan Brown's publisher, saying The Da Vinci Code plagiarised their work.

In April last year the High Court in London threw out the claim, saying the ideas in question were too general to be protected by copyright.

Leigh died form a heart ailment, aged 64.

2007-12-01T00:39:00.000-08:00

HAPPY DAY of the DEAD

2007-11-01T21:00:00.000-07:00

~ Another cross-quarter holy-day ~

The Lovely Naomi Wolf ~

2007-11-01T20:59:00.000-07:00

Discusses her new book: The End of America: A Letter of Warning to a Young Patriot

SOURCE http://www.chelseagreen.com/authors/naomiwolf

NOW'S the TIME...

2007-10-20T17:59:00.000-07:00

"LET IT NOT BE SAID THAT WE DID NOTHING" - Ron Paul

"True Patriotism is more closely linked to dissent than it is to conformity and a blind desire for safety and security" – Ron Paul

"I accept the definition of patriotism as that effort to resist oppressive state power" – Ron Paul

"The true Patriot is motivated by a sense of responsibility and out of self-interst for himself, his family, and the future of his country to resist government abuse of power. He rejects the notion that patriotism means obedience to the state" – Ron Paul

"Each of us should choose which course of action we must take; education, conventional political action, or even peaceful civil disobedience to bring about necessary changes, but let it not be said that we did nothing" – Ron Paul

Quotes of the Day

2007-10-19T16:45:00.000-07:00

Minnesota Historical Society

“Well behaved women seldom make history” – Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, Mormon, Pulitzer Prize Winner

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

“On a visit to Salt Lake City a few years ago, Gloria Steinem quipped that the L.D.S. Church had probably created more feminists than she ever had.” – Margaret Toscano

2008 UPDATED: Ron more Mormon than Romney?

2007-10-13T01:43:00.000-07:00

Ron Paul more Mormon than Mitt?

The L.D.S. Doctrine & Covenants (section 98) says of the Constitution:

5 And that alaw of the land which is constitutional, supporting that principle of freedom in maintaining rights and privileges, belongs to all mankind, and is justifiable before me.
6 Therefore, I, the Lord, justify you, and your brethren of my church, in befriending that law which is the constitutional law of the land;
7 And as pertaining to law of man, whatsoever is more or less than this, cometh of evil.

This is one of the best short videos I have ever seen in my life! THIS VIDEO WAS #1 on YOUTUBE yesterday until they removed it and changed the view count!

Latter-day prophet? (1 Nephi 1:4)

Mormon prophecy in fulfillment? You decide (for more info go to http://www.awakeandarise.org and Latter-day Saints for Ron Paul:

New video - Joel Skousen on why Mormons should support Ron Paul and not Romney:

CLICK HERE for a color flyer for members of the L.D.S. church about Ron Paul.

HAPPY EQUINOX

2007-09-23T02:51:00.000-07:00

Happy CONSTITUTION Day!

2007-09-18T09:50:00.000-07:00

(courtesy Wikipedia)

"And now, verily I say unto you concerning the laws of the land, it is my will that my people should observe to do all things whatsoever I command them. And that law of the land which is constitutional, supporting that principle of freedom in maintaining rights and privileges, belongs to all mankind, and is justifiable before me. Therefore, I, the Lord, justify you, and your brethren of my church, in befriending that law which is the constitutional law of the land; and as pertaining to law of man, whatsoever is more or less than this, cometh of evil." -- D&C 98:4-7

Thanks to Captain Moroni (http://www.myspace.com/ldsfreemen) for this post!

SALT LAKE - Constitution Celebration and Public Rally

2007-09-13T20:51:00.000-07:00

Captain Moroni & the Title of Liberty via Meridian Magazine

Ron Paul is coming to S.L.C. on September 15th!

1:00 PM - 4:00 PM MT

Historic Grand Hall
Union Pacific Depot
91 S Rio Grande St
Salt Lake City, UT 84101

http://www.ronpaul2008.com/SaltLake/

Coincidence? "The Champion of the Constitution" in Utah on Constitution Day:

AWAKEANDARISE.ORG: That We Might Sever the Strings of Tyranny!

Latter-day Saints attach special significance to the Constitution of the United States of America

Avraham Gileadi's Hebraeus Foundation presents:

2007-08-31T13:54:00.000-07:00

Gileadi is a former Israeli rabbi who happens to be L.D.S.:

The Hebraeus Foundation

650 East 400 North, Lindon, UT 84042

Announces

Applying the Learning of the Jews

A Ten-Week Course by

Avraham Gileadi

Classes commence Wednesday 12th September 2007

Conference Room, Blendtec Corporate Offices (West Building)

1680 West Business Park Drive, Orem, Utah 84058

(Go west on University Parkway and cross Geneva Road)

Time: 7-9 p.m. Wednesdays

Cost: $80 (non-refundable by second week of class)

Discounts for Additional Family Members

Learn the "Manner of Prophesying among the Jews" as applied

to the book of Isaiah, the Book of Mormon,

and other, related scriptures.

For information, contact Charlene Stott, 801-785-0943

send a check to: 650 East 400 North Lindon, Utah 84042

register online at www.isaiahinstitute .com

Dear Paula,

2007-08-30T19:13:00.000-07:00

Your email address isn't working so here is my reply:

Dear sister in humanity!
How are you doing?

I have good news. An answer to your question about SLC City Hall.

I asked my cousin, when I was in Salt Lake. He is a historian, among other things and will be giving a free talk at the 55th Annual Utah State Historical Society Sept. 6-8 at the SLC Library ~ fond memories, btw ~

My cousin, Steve Richardson, will be speaking on Prisoners of the Utah War (including my 3rd great-grandfather), Friday, September 7, 9 - 10:15 AM at the Rio Grand Depot / Zephyr Roon, 2nd floor, North Wing, 300 South / 450 West

Anyhoo, I asked him about that figure on top of city hall and what he told me was:

Back in the 1800's it was common for city halls in America to have a statue of liberty on top of the building. Not THE Statue of Liberty but A statue of liberty. He said there was an earthquake in the late 1800's and it knocked the statue off the building - grin - but eventually they put up another.

Let me know whats happenin in Salt Lake!

Sincerely,

EQ aka Bethany Magdalene (you can email me through my profile on Blogger, or through my website: In Memory of Her

Check out this years Sunstone sessions!

2007-08-30T18:11:00.000-07:00

Click Here:2007 SUNSTONE SYMPOSIUM SESSIONS NOW AVAILABLE FOR DOWNLOAD, or hard copies are available on CD

2007 Sunstone Report

2007-08-16T01:10:00.000-07:00

This year @ SUNSTONE:

I learned that my pioneer ancestors were entheogen-imbibing anarchists.
I contemplated the yoga of Christ, practiced meditation for Mormons, flirted with a mohawked lesbian in the lobby, had the pleasure of hearing an Anais Nin quote during my panel session, and to top it off - Dennis Potter looked hot in fishnet stockings under his ripped jeans and purple finger-nail polish!

I attended a private test-screening of Richard Dutcher's latest film FALLING and found it to be one of the most harrowing yet beautiful films I've ever seen. Richard's attention to detail in this film is exquisite. This is his best one yet.

CLICK HERE for the PROGRAM

TO BE CONTINUED ~ stay tuned for the Salt Lake City report!

Women's Spirituality @ SUNSTONE 2007

2007-08-14T18:49:00.000-07:00

I returned to Sunstone this year for a panel on women's spirituality. MP3's will be available for download soon @ http://sunstoneonline.com/

LIFE IS A HIGHWAY: EXPANDED POSSIBILITIES
IN MORMON WOMEN’S SPIRITUALITY

Kathy Wilson, Jana Bouck Remy, Elizabeth Quick, Michael Farnsworth, Sharon Kennedy

Elizabeth Quick

Doe Daughtrey & Elizabeth Quick

Abstract
Twenty-first-century Mormon women of all ages
continue to discover new avenues for expressing
their spirituality, developing spiritual gifts, and
coming to terms with patterns that haven’t served
them. As they adapt the old and integrate the new,
they create new spiritual possibilities for themselves
and ultimately for those who stand beside them and
come after them. In the tradition of past Sunstone
panels on human potential and women’s spirituality,
this panel explores the spiritual journey of Latter-day
Saint women who embark on alternate paths
through practices such as dreamwork, channeling,
and earth-based ritual, and who maintain (though
not without struggle) intimate relationships while
engaging in extra-Mormon spiritual practices.
Moderator/ DOE DAUGHTREY, doctoral candidate, religion,
Panelist Arizona State University; member, Sunstone board
of directors

Panelists MICHAEL FARNWORTH, Ed.D., educational
psychology; recently retired from Ricks College
marriage and family relations department

JANA BOUCK REMY, doctoral candidate, American
history, University of California, Irvine; blogger at
Exponent II, SunstoneBlog, and
PILGRIMGIRL.BLOGSPOT.COM

SHARON KENNEDY, high school teacher,
Carlsbad, California; mother of five

KATHY WILSON, artist, art gallery owner,
Salt Lake City

ELIZABETH QUICK, M.A. student in women’s
spirituality, New College of California, San
Francisco; maintains several blogs and websites,
including, In Memory of Her (HTTP://
BETHANYMAGDALENE.ATSPACE.COM/HOME.HTM)
and Priestess Academy (HTTP://PRIESTESSACADEMY.
BLOGSPOT.COM)

Room Market Street

The Mushrooms of Mormonism

2007-08-14T12:58:00.000-07:00

THIS is PART 2 in a SERIES of REVIEWS & COMMENTARY on SUNSTONE 2007

EVERY SESSION WILL BE AVAILABLE FOR DOWNLOAD @ http://sunstoneonline.com/symposium/symp-mp3s.asp within the next few weeks

CLICK HERE FOR THE POWERPOINT PRESENTATION @ Mormonelixirs.org

I told Robert Beckstead during this session that I dare say that this was the most important session at Sunstone this year! The one thing I contributed to this session was an anecdote about how I heard one of the world's leading ethnomycologists, JAMES ARTHUR say on Coast to Coast AM, a few years back (before he tragically died) that he wanted to write a book called the Mushrooms of Mormondom (or something very close to that).

Paper:
THE RESTORATION AND THE SACRED
MUSHROOM: DID JOSEPH SMITH USE
PSYCHEDELICS TO FACILITATE HIS
VISIONARY EXPERIENCES?

Presenter ROBERT BECKSTEAD, M.D., emergency physician,
Pocatello, Idaho; medical hypnotherapist; integrative
medicine coordinator

Abstract Gnosticism and shamanism practice techniques
of “knowing”—entering spiritual dimensions and
experiencing the ineffable, both heavenly and
hellish. Derivative forms of these ancient traditions
were practiced in upstate New York during Joseph
Smith’s formative years. Interestingly, shamans and
Gnostics used certain psychotropic plants and fungi
during rituals and ceremonies to facilitate trance
states. Used in this setting, psychoactive substances
are often called “entheogen,” meaning to manifest
“God within.” I will review the use of entheogens in
shamanic and Gnostic traditions and the evidence
that puts Joseph Smith in proximity to their use.
It will also show how the use of entheogens can
reproduce many of the paranormal and mythmaking
abilities Joseph manifested.

Respondent Questions from the audience
Chair EUGENE KOVALENKO
Room Weights and Measures

INTEGRAL MORMONISM

2007-08-08T14:00:00.000-07:00

ASCENDING DESCENDING and TANTRIC THEMATIC PRACTICES
by Mormonism's own Ken Wilbur - JOHN KESLER

I attended my first session today at Sunstone. This (3 hr.) workshop was a hub of synchronicity for me!

MEDITATION FOR MORMONS with JOHN
KESLER

Description

The primary purpose of this workshop is to introduce
meditative practices that invite Mormons into the
mystical implications of their own tradition but also to
stretch a bit beyond the Mormon “spiritual field.”
A practicing Mormon, John Kesler has explored
many approaches to meditation including learning
from a number of teachers of the mystical schools
of Eastern and Western spiritual traditions. In this
context, John is one of a handful of people who
have received transmission to facilitate a Zen
meditative practice, the “big mind process”
developed by Genpo Roshi, the leader of the largest
Zen lineage headquartered outside of Japan. John
has developed and teaches a meditative system
which he calls “integral thematic practice.”
John will introduce several meditations that resonate
with the patterns and practices of the Mormon
tradition. Because they draw on the resonances of
the Mormon spiritual field, a Latter-day Saint who
participates in these meditations may get the eerie
feeling that “I have been in this space before” even
without ever having participated in meditation. John
will also introduce a few meditations which other
traditions would suggest would be fruitful meditative
explorations.

Instructor

JOHN KESLER is an attorney, consultant, and
lecturer. He is founder and executive director of
the Salt Lake Center for Engaging Community,
and speaks and consults regarding community
flourishing and transformation. John developed and
teaches meditation and related practices called
“integral thematic practice” reflecting Mormon, Zen,
and other influences. He is also a founding member
of the Ken Wilber-led Integral Institute and its politics
center and founding teacher of the Integral Spiritual
Center of the Integral Institute.

Proof that God/dess Loves us

2007-08-02T01:21:00.000-07:00

The Tree of Life

Tree of Life Sm

Add to My Profile | More Videos

Libertarian Answers to Post-Patriarchal (a.k.a. feminist) Values

2007-07-31T16:24:00.000-07:00

Libertarian Answers to Post-Patriarchal (a.k.a. feminist) Values

How can we replace the cultural ethics of dominance and control with more cooperative ways of interacting?

Government is the primary patriarchal institution in our culture. It is based on the ethic of dominance and control. Reject the culture of government and cooperation will blossom. Free the schools. Free the airwaves. Withhold your support of government and avoid dependence on it. If your goals can only be met by dominance and control (government action), it is time to re-evaluate your goals.

How can we encourage people to care about persons outside their own group?

By removing barriers to trade, travel, and charity. By abandoning the myth of the government safety net. Caring grows where there is no exploitation or restriction, but through taxes and regulations we exploit and restrict each other needlessly.

How can we promote the building of respectful, positive, and responsible relationships across the lines of gender and other divisions?

Respectful, positive, and responsible relationships cannot be created by law. Laws which now dictate our (personal and economic) relationships destroy respect, responsibility, and harmony. They should be repealed. Merchants everywhere compete to build positive relationships with their customers in spite of natural and artificial divisions.

How can we encourage a rich, diverse political culture that respects feelings as well as rationalist approaches?

Libertarians welcome voluntary social experimentation and the diversity it brings. Government seldom encourages political diversity or shows respect for feelings.

How can we proceed with as much respect for the means as well as the end (the process as much as the products of our efforts)?

Libertarianism is means-oriented. Libertarians reject the initiation of force as a means of achieving any social or political goal.

How can we learn to respect the contemplative, inner part of life as much as the outer activities?

Only if we have the leisure time generated by a free and prosperous economy.

--Harry Reid, The Liberator, page 9, Winter 1993

Currently listening:
Under the Pink
By: Tori Amos
Release date: 01 February, 1994

Pagan Libertarians / Libertarian Pagans

2007-07-31T16:21:00.000-07:00

The Wiccan Rede:

"And it harm none, do as ye will."

http://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla%3Aen-US%3Aofficial&channel=s&hl=en&q=%22libertarian+pagan%22&btnG=Google+Search

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&client=firefox-a&channel=s&rls=org.mozilla%3Aen-US%3Aofficial&hs=dqo&q=%22pagan+libertarian%22&btnG=Search

SEE ALSO - my post: Excerpt from a letter to a friend

I thought that other readers might be interested in this point:

PS -

Oops, there's one thing I forgot. Our founding fathers and mothers weren't perfect BUT something I have been reminding myself of recently (as I am engaged in the academic study of women's spirituality and religious studies) is that America - and the desire for liberty that birthed it - was born out of the ashes of 1000 years of INQUISITION in Europe. Fuck the naysayers! The men and women who founded our country (yes, there were women, I collect stories about them since they are underreported) were not stupid. They may not have been perfect human beings but when it came to Liberty and Freedom they were Wise. IN THE FACE OF THIS NEW INQUISITION ( THE TORTURE THAT IS GOING ON) THEIR WORDS/EXPERIENCES/DEEDS ARE MORE POIGNANT AND APPLICABLE THAN EVER! As Alex Jones says in a video on my page, "the answer to 1984 is 1776."

Peace

Currently watching:
Women & Spirituality: Burning Times
By:
Release date: 21 December, 1999

Armageddon can be AVOIDED

2007-07-22T15:42:00.000-07:00

This was an undergrad paper titled:

Mathematics as a Spiritual Tool

“11:15, restate my assumptions: 1. Mathematics is the language of nature. 2. Everything around us can be represented and understood through numbers. 3. If you graph these numbers, patterns emerge. Therefore: There are patterns everywhere in nature.”

-- Maximillian Cohen, Pi

“Each letter's a number. Like the Hebrew A, Alef is 1. B, Bet is 2. You understand? But look at this. The numbers are inter-related. Like take the Hebrew word for father, 'Ab' - Alef Bet... 1, 2 equals 3. Alright? Hebrew word for mother, 'em' - Alef Mem... 1, 40 equals 41. Sum of 3 and 41... 44. Alright? Now, Hebrew word for child, alright, mother... father... child, 'Yeled' - that's 10, 30, and 4... 44.”

-- Lenny Meyer, Pi

Most people in the West are at least superficially familiar with Hebrew gematria. In the classical Hebrew culture, there were no independent symbols to represent numbers. The letters of the alphabet also stood for numerical values. Practitioners of this art would add up the number values of the letters in a word to form a single number. This number-letter system was used as both a literary device and a form of divination (1) by converting words and sentences into numerical values and then examining the relationships between other words and phrases with the same, or related, numerical values. The movie Pi illustrates gematria by adding the numerical value of the Hebrew word for mother to the value of the Hebrew word for father. These add up to 44, the gematria value for child.

When we think of Gematria, we almost always associate the term with the Jewish esoteric tradition of Kabbalah. The word gematria, however, is actually derived from the Greek word for geometry, which points to possible origins in a similar, Greek system known as isopsephy. (2) Some scholars assert that the Jewish people were not the inventors of this system, rather its origins may have been derived from other cultures such as the Greeks, who were also using these techniques as early as the eighth century B.C.E. (3)

The “iso,” in the word isopsephy, means equal, and the “psephos,” means pebble: “The early Greeks used pebbles arranged in patterns to learn arithmetic and geometry. A Greek synonym for the word ‘pebbles’ is kalkuli and is the origin of the word ‘calculate.’” (4)

When people think of gematria we usually visualize practitioners who focus on the Hebrew Bible, especially its first five books known as the Torah, which is the most well known sourcebook for this mystical practice. What is less well-known is that the Christian “New Testament,” written in Greek, was also coded with symbolic numbers. (5) While the practice of gematria has continued in Hebrew:

The use of numbers in interpreting the meaning of Christianity’s sacred texts was anathematized by Irenaeus and other prominent Church fathers in the second and third centuries, and with the suppression of the Gnostic heresies, the practice of any kind of “numbers theology” apparently ceased. As Christianity spread to Western Europe, the lingua franca became Latin rather than Koine, the form of Greek spoken and written in the eastern Mediterranean in the Hellenistic and Roman periods, Near the end of the fourth century, Saint Jerome translated the Greek scriptures into Latin, with the direct result that every trace of the gematria of the original Koine was lost. (6)

Only esoteric teachers and their initiates could have fully enjoyed, “the meaning of many New Testament phrases enriched by gematria – those same individuals whom the gospels mention as having ‘eyes to see and ears to hear.’ Certain of these familiar phrases – ‘a grain of mustard seed,’ ‘a pearl of great price,’ ‘fountain of wisdom,’ illuminate secret teachings hidden for millennia in the numerically coded words of Jesus found in…sacred texts of the New Testament.” (7) Ancient poets, teachers and philosophers considered gematria an important way of underscoring the meaning of their text: (8)

When a literary phrase or epithet added up to the number of the cosmic principle it reflected, it naturally emphasized the original meaning of a phrase but on a higher plane. The practice enhanced verbal expression by giving it a mathematical and cosmological dimension reflecting its symbolic and literary value. (9)

I will illustrate the point, in my own words, by summarizing one example from Margaret Starbird’s book. Ms. Starbird studied at Vanderbilt Divinity School and includes in her book research by internationally renowned gematria scholars such as John Michel and Del Washburn, as well as her own original work:

The word “dove” is “peristera” in Greek and adds up to the number 801. The sum of the number added together is 9. 9 is the square of 3. This number can be looked at 3x3, or, “a trinity of threes,” or “the epitome of three.” The number three was the most holy number of the ancients. Pythagoreans believed triangles to be the fundamental building blocks of the universe. There are many ancient associations with this number from, “ultimate holiness and truth,” to the divine Trinity, to the Triple Goddess (maiden, mother, and crone). The dove is well-documented to be associated with the love goddess Venus/Aphrodite, and other ancient goddesses. In the Hebrew Bible, the Bridegroom in the Song of Songs calls his bride his “dove.” Numbers that added up to 9 were associated with the lunar principle and therefore the feminine, in ancient times. It is also well documented that many early Christian sects conceived the Holy Spirit as being feminine. The Holy Spirit’s number is 1080. 1080 and 801 are related because they both have the same numbers and they both add up to nine. 1080 was, “the fundamental number associated with the moon goddess and with the feminine principle in general.” The feminine significance was also based on the radius of the moon. (10)

This is just the tip of the iceberg. Starbird spent quite few pages elucidating these numbers. Six pages later she mentions that the esoteric meaning of Christ’s parable of the mustard seed lies in the numerical value of the phrase “grain of mustard seed,” which is 1746, the union of the numbers 666, the solar principle, and 1080, the marriage of opposites, the union of Sol and Luna, the Heiros Gamos, or sacred marriage. Even Plato used the same number for the word ‘fusion.’ Phrases that add up to 1746 include, “Emmanuel, son of Mary,” and “fruit of a vineyard.” Meanings associated with 1746 are the “wholeness” that results from the fruit of the sacred union which is the “Divine Child.” The symbolic numbers of the Book of Revelation lead us to a startling conclusion: Armageddon is avoidable! The Apocalypse is what happens when we deny or even demonize the feminine principle. The problem arises with the unchecked solar principle (666) dangerously out of balance when disconnected from the feminine principle (1080). Add the feminine back into the equation and you get 1746 – redemptive harmony on earth.

It is probably no coincidence that these symbolic numbers were used three times by Jesus, a rabbi who most likely spoke the Koine of the Roman Empire, “to illustrate his point about the reign of heaven, which is, according to its gematria, a domain of harmony and wholeness that accompanies the integration or yoking of the opposites.” (11)

This form of communication was also used amongst the Sufi. Idries Shah calls it “the secret language,” and “the hidden tongue.” (12) Arabic numerals also have numerical equivalents. Persian can also be used. Shah illustrates his point:

Supposing that we want to name a book, showing that it has a certain sort of disguised content, perhaps records of secret processes. We could name it Source of Records, in Arabic, Umm el Qissa. We examine the words we have chosen, with their meanings: UMM = mother, matrix, source, principle, prototype. EL= of. QISSA = record, story, tale. Umm el Qissa may mean something equivalent to: Mother of Records, Source of Story, Prototype of Tales. We now, if all these alternatives are agreeable to us, encipher the letters by substituting their numerical equivalents from the standard Abjad list [“a fairly simple substitution cipher” (13)] Now we add them together. The sum is 267. Now we have to find a sufficiently descriptive or poetic title for our book, made up of letters, which when added give us the same number 267. Our re-arrangement can give us the phrase: Alf layla wa layla. This means Thousand and One Nights. The title of a book, or the author’s name, will often give a most important indication of the emphasis which is to be placed upon the book, and what can be discovered from it. In the case of the Arabian Nights, the person who named the work intended to convey that herein would be found certain essential stories…Sufi teaching stories, descriptions of psychological processes, or enciphered lore of one kind or another. (14)

Not all Holy Books are written in Hebrew, Greek, or Arabic, however. A small handful of holy books have been written in English (15) and it was for this purpose that the Gnostic prophet Aleister Crowley was spiritually instructed to obtain, “the order and value of the English Alphabet.” (16)

Cipher that became the New Aeon English Qabalah (17)

In, A Brief Essay Upon the Nature and Significance of the Magical Alphabet, Crowley expresses his frustration with the difficulties a student experiences when trying, “to gain any clear idea of the meanings of the terms which he employs. Every philosopher has his own meaning, even for such universally used terms as soul; and in most cases he does not so much as suspect that other writers use the term under a different connotation. Even technical writers and those who take the trouble to define their terms before using them are too often at variance with each other.” (18) After hashing out the various major and minor meanings of the word, “soul,” Crowley states, “In view of this Euroclydon of misunderstanding, it is clearly necessary to establish a fundamental language,” and then goes on to quote Fichte: “If I had my life to live again, the first thing I would do, would be to invent an entirely new system of symbols whereby to convey my ideas." (19)

Although a system of Qabalah is “superficially open” to “elements of controversy,” “its real basis is perfectly sound.” Discarding the “dogmatic interpretation of the Rabbins, we can refer everything in the universe to the system of pure number whose symbols will be intelligible to all rational minds in an identical sense. And the relations between these symbols are fixed by nature. There is no particular point - for most ordinary purposes – in discussing whether 49 is or is not the square of 7...” (20)

“...We must not work towards any other type of central Truth than the nature of these symbols in themselves. The object of our work must be, in fact, to discover the nature and power of each symbol. We must clothe the nakedness of each prime idea in a many-coloured garment of correspondences with every department of thought.” (21)

Crowley’s New Aeon English Qabalah is a full-blown qabalah and not merely a system of numerology. According to Jake Stratton-Kent, three factors qualify this system as a "Qabalah" and not just another template for gematria: “one, a language; two, a 'holy' text or texts; three, mathematical laws at work in these two.” (22) Unlike simple systems of gematria or numerology, the English letters in this system, “correspond to the paths on the Tree of Life and their astrological, alchemical and elemental attributions.” (23)

Ceremonial magician, Gerald del Campo points out that, “Before NAEQ was discovered, the magician had to take an English word or name and try their best to phonetically transliterate the word into Hebrew. For example: a word like "table" would be transliterated in Hebrew as "TBL" and its numerical value was assumed to have something to do with "table." There is a problem with this. The word for "table" in Hebrew is not TBL. In fact, I don't know that there is a Hebrew word "TBL." Crowley defines magick as an art and a science. How scientific will one's result be by using transliteration? I suspect that is the reason that Crowley was instructed to come up with the order and vale of the English letters.”

Using the Cipher mentioned above, Jake Stratton-Kent made a discovery:

When I first had my attention drawn to the existence of a purported English Qabala, my first reaction as a qabalist was to use it on this meaningless string of digits and characters. I converted all the letters into their numerical equivalents in the E.Q., and added them to the numbers in the series.” In the original handwritten text, the string of letters and numbers is divided into two lines, the first ending with “Y” and the second beginning with “X”. Stratton-Kent says, "There are seventeen numbers and letters in the first line and eleven in the second...but in the manuscript the ‘X’ at the beginning of line two looks like a multiplication symbol, so I made this calculation; 17x11=187, the numerical value of the phrase ENGLISH ALPHABET.” By the same token, if one ADDS the numbers and letter values in the “meaningless string” one comes up with the number value 351. IF ONE TAKES THE VALUE OF ALL THE LETTERS OF THE ENGLISH ALPHABET, A+B+C+D, etc. to Z, one obtains THE SAME VALUE, 351. (24)

Mathematics have always played a large part in magical and spiritual systems, from the sacred geometry of temple architecture to the new mysticism derived from fractal mathematics and quantum mechanics. The most well-known and highly developed system of spiritual mathematics is to be found in the Holy Bible.

[Bible Code section left unfinished]

As to the primary question proposed in this class: Do mathematics originate inside of us or outside of us? Perhaps there is a finer line that divides the “inside” and “outside” than we comprehend. Maybe we exist in more of a paradoxical state than we know – a holographic universe, the microcosm and the macrocosm of the ancients.

I think that these systems access and foster parts of our being that are usually left undeveloped. The most highly developed scientific giants are sometimes also the most spiritually developed:

John Maynard Keynes once wrote a brief biographical chapter on Sir Isaac Newton in his book Essays and Sketches in Biography: (25)

. . . (Newton) looked on the whole universe and all that is in it as a riddle, as a secret which could be read by applying pure thought to certain evidence, certain mystic clues which God had laid about the world to allow a sort of philosopher’s treasure hunt to the esoteric brotherhood. He believed that these clues were to be found partly in the evidence of the heavens and in the constitution of elements (and that is what gives the false suggestion of his being an experimental natural philosopher), but also partly in certain papers and traditions handed down by the brethren in an unbroken chain back to the original cryptic revelation in Babylonia. He regarded the universe as a cryptogram set by the Almighty—just as he himself wrapt the discovery of the calculus in a cryptogram when he communicated with Leibnitz. By pure thought, by concentration of mind, the riddle, he believed, would be revealed to the initiate.

ENDNOTES:

(1)My definition of “divination:” A technology that accesses certain functions of the mind largely unused in ordinary reality.

(2) "Gematria," Wikipedia, 2005. Answers.com 8 Nov, 2005. http://www.answers.com/topic/gematria. Also, Kieren Barry, The Greek Qabalah, 24.

(3) Barry, The Greek Qabalah (York Beach, ME: Samuel Weiser, 1999), xiii.

(4) "Isopsephy." Wikipedia. Wikipedia, 2005. Answers.com 19 Nov. 2005. http://www.answers.com/topic/isopsephy

(5) Margaret Starbird, Magdalene’s Lost Legacy, (Rochester, VT: Bear & Company, 2003), 2.

(6) Ibid, 3.

(7) Ibid, 40.

(8) Ibid, 42.

(9) Ibid, 41.

(10) Ibid, 42-44.

(11) Ibid, 58-59.

(12) Idries Shah, The Sufis, (Garden City, NY: Doubleday/Anchor, 1971), 194.

(13) Ibid, p.196

(14) Ibid, p.197

(15) Most holy books composed in the English language appeared via hermetic prophets in the 19th and early 20th centuries. < http://gnosis.org/ahp.htm>

(16) Liber AL vel Legis II.55

(17) Liber AL vel Legis (Holy Book of the church of Thelema), Manuscript Page 3.16, Origin of the New Aeon English Qabala.

(18) Aleister Crowley, “A Brief Essay Upon the Nature and Significance of the Magical Alphabet,” 777 and Other Qabalistic Writings of Aleister Crowley, (York Beach, ME: Red Wheel/Weiser, 1986), xvii.

(19) ibid, p. xvii-xviii.

(20) ibid, p. xviii-xix.

(21) ibid, p. xix.

(22) Quoted in, The New Aeon English Qabala: A Brief Introduction by Frater D.T. QBLH, Q.B.L.H.

(23) Anothermoon.com, interview with Gerald del Campo,

(24) Quoted in, The New Aeon English Qabala: A Brief Introduction by Frater D.T. QBLH, Q.B.L.H.

(25)Essays and Sketches in Biography (New York: Meridian Books, 1956). Quoted in Isaac Newton, Bible Code Pioneer? March 2002, Bible Code Digest

Click here for more on Newton, "The First Modern Scientist and the Last of the Ancient Magicians"

Help my friend raise money for school!

2007-07-18T01:47:00.000-07:00

----------------- Bulletin Message -----------------
From: Ayla ~School fundraiser! Buy my E-book!
Date: 17 Jul 2007, 07:11 PM

Zion - Goddess of Liberty sayz:

2007-06-21T14:11:00.001-07:00

Read my BLOG!

Magic Mushrooms in Religion and Alchemy (2 min.)

2007-06-20T22:27:00.000-07:00

For the Next 7 Generations: the Grandmothers Speak (10 min.)

2007-06-20T22:23:00.000-07:00

The Council of 13 Indigenous Grandmothers:

http://www.forthenext7generations.com/

The Last Poem I Wrote

2007-06-01T19:37:00.000-07:00

Dark Moon, September 8, 1999

He tries to tell me I can't be angry and spiritual
In the name of Jehovah
Fuck You!
In anger Jesus threw the tables of the moneychangers over in the temple

Anger makes me strong
Doesn't let me lie down and take being raped
You wanna tell me I'm unladylike?
In the name of the Goddess
Fuck You!

Anger is power
He tries to take away my power by making me think
I'm not spiritual
Not Ladylike
But really he fears the power of a woman whose been bound on the ground
For far too long

He tries humiliation
"You're the most miserable 'spiritual' person I've ever met!"
Yeah?
Well check out my latest sermon
As I heave a potted plant into the fridge through the door

Spirituality is not all angel wings
Crystals and Light
I'm not your Cosmic Barbie!

The prophets of old were pretty pissed off too
When they saw their fellow men destroying themselves
"A prophet is most often honored in her own land with Death," the old proverb says

I walk past a stagnant creek once teeming with fish
Infected with filth
I grieve over the murder of my Creator
Whose raped and once beautiful body
Doesn't look very Ladylike today

Oh Kali-Ma! Dark Goddess!
Sorceress who will not be ruled
Comfort me with your Justice
Devour the flesh of those that violate Beauty
Transform my inner demons
Into tools of Power

Holy Rage

Motherless House

2007-05-25T15:58:00.000-07:00

Bad Yodelers – Mother
press the tiny arrow to hear a song that reminds me of driving around Salt Lake back in the day, as a real-life SLC Punk.

It dovetails nicely with this poem:

Motherless House
by Carol Lynn Pearson

I live in a Motherless house
A broken home.
How it happened I cannot learn.
When I had words enough to ask
“Where is my mother?”
No one seemed to know
And no one thought it strange
That no one else knew either.
I live in a Motherless house.
They are good to me here
But I find that no kindly
Patriarchal care eases the pain.
I yearn for the day
Someone will look at me and say,
“You certainly do look like your Mother.”
I walk the rooms
Search the closets
Look for something that might
Have belonged to her—
A letter, a dress, a chair,
Would she not have left a note?
I close my eyes
And work to bring back her touch, her face.
Surely there must have been
A Motherly embrace
I can call back for comfort.
I live in a Motherless house,
Motherless and without a trace.
Who could have done this?
Who would tear an unweaned infant
From its Mother's arms
And clear the place of every souvenir?
I live in a Motherless house.
I lie awake and listen always for the word that never comes, but might.
I bury my face
In something soft as a breast.
I am a child
Crying for my mother in the night.

http://notapostate.blogspot.com/2007/03/life-in-motherless-house.html

A Brief History of Mormon Feminism

2007-05-09T16:51:00.000-07:00

A Brief History of Mormon Feminism
by Margaret Merrill Toscano

If feminism is defined as a concern with the status and equality of women and/or the questioning of gender roles, then feminism has always been a part of the Mormon religion and culture. Nineteenth-century Mormonism was radical in many ways and challenged the status quo of American culture at large, including the position and role of women. Joseph Smith's theology introduced a concept of a Mother God, acknowledged the power and equality of women, and gave them priesthood through the temple ritual, according to a number of scholars (see bibliography below). Although Mormon women in early Utah were the second group in the USA to receive the vote in 1870, which was only two months after Wyoming granted women this right, Utah women were actually the first to use their franchise and vote in an election.

Mormon women had other rights during the 19th century unknown to most women in the rest of the country: married women had the same legal rights as single women, including the rights to own property in their names, represent themselves in court, and win easy access to divorce. In the 19th century Mormon women were avid suffragettes who argued and fought for the rights of all women. They were in contact with Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and others in the national women's movement. Through the LDS women's organization, the Relief Society, Mormon women controlled their own money and buildings, organized a hospital and other charitable organizations (which, among other things, collected, stored, and distributed grain and other food supplies), supported home industries (such as silk farms), and ran a women's newspaper (the Women's Exponent, 1872-1914), which advocated female independence, education, and careers, and emphasized female leadership and spiritual gifts.

In the early 20th century Mormonism went through a redefinition in order to fit into mainstream American culture and rid itself of its polygamous and politically autonomous past, which had been seen by many as anti-American. In a conservative reaction to its own history, Mormonism attempted to shuck off those elements of its theology and practice which made it unacceptable to the larger culture, while still retaining enough of its uniqueness to set it apart as a religion with a divine and separate calling from the rest of Christianity in America. Among the things lost during this period were the concepts of women's spiritual gifts and their role as priestesses (a term used to define such women as Eliza R. Snow in the 19th century). Although women retained control of their own Relief Society organization until the early 1970s, they gradually lost the management of their own affairs and publications from the time of statehood in 1896 onward, along with their sense of independence. Ironically, the image of Mormon women as docile homemakers, a la June Cleaver serving jello to a smiling family in a 1950s sitcom, is just one of the many things Mormonism adopted from conservative American culture.

Influenced by the national feminist movement in the 1970s, Mormon women began to reclaim their history and to participate in women's groups as part of an attempt to redefine women's roles and opportunities in an LDS context. This is not to say that Mormon women did not participate in feminism during the first half of the 20th century.(more of this article to follow soon)

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The Original post is here

Breaking Da Vinci Code News

2007-05-02T22:31:00.000-07:00

official website -
http://www.tjmitchell.com/stuart/rosslyn.html

Today's breaking news videos -

ABC News

Da Vinci Code's Mystery Melody

Secrets revealed at 'Da Vinci Code' Church

http://video.yahoo.com/video/play?vid=1114077983


AP's video story

http://cosmos.bcst.yahoo.com/ver/228/popup/index.php?cl=2581801

The Rosslyn Stave Angel - Music Cipher

New Grail Book Released

2007-03-08T16:34:00.000-08:00

From the Publisher:

Dr. Vern G. Swanson has produced a thought-provoking book on the topic of the Holy Grail and the bloodline of Jesus. His perspective on the subject has grown after reading nearly 400 books on the Holy Grail, and his 28 years of research on the topic. Going far beyond the mortally flawed best sellers, Holy Blood, Holy Grail and The Da Vinci Code, his epic book will be applicable to both Mormon and non-Mormon audiences. It is certainly the most significant scholarly tome on the Holy Grail and the bloodline yet.

Click here for more info

Ancient and Contemporary Female Shamanism in Judeo-Christian and Mormon Traditions - New Update!

2007-02-02T17:08:00.000-08:00

Abstract: Through a combination of newly excavated artifacts and biblical textual evidence, scholars are reconstructing an ancient tradition of women’s spirituality known as “drum, dance, and song.” Mormon women are heirs to a tradition that stretches from the Bee Priestesses of Neolithic Anatolia and Crete to the later Bee Priestesses of ancient Israel and on through Mary Magdalene and early Christian sects. Mormonism contains a highly developed theology and practice of embodied spirituality, and the arts are an important aspect of the Restoration, inextricably intertwined with the Sacred Feminine.

Respondent DOE DAUGHTREY, M.A., doctoral candidate, religious studies, Arizona State University; member, Sunstone board of directors.

To hear the sound of a frame-drum: turn on your speakers, open a new window and go to - http://www.layneredmond.com/framedrm.htm

and you can hear more at - http://glenvelez.com/

or right-click here or here

More new frame drum sounds: click here

To download this Sunstone Symposium session so that you can hear the response from Doe Daughtrey, M.A. (as well as Q & A from the audience) go to - http://sunstoneonline.com/symposium/symp-mp3s.asp

To see the actual survival of this ancient female shamanic tradition caught on film (for the first & only time in history) go to http://www.mysticiran.com/

This session was opened with the music of the San Antonio Vocal Arts Ensemble's Ancient Echoes

Click on the pictures (below) to ENLARGE

Women’s Prophetic Drumming Tradition
Elizabeth Quick
Copyright 2006
All Rights Reserved

The Biblical record contains a well-developed musical lexicon demonstrating the importance of music to Biblical peoples.[1] “Artifacts and ancient texts reveal that the people of ancient Israel wove music into nearly every aspect of society.”[2] Instruments were used in various cultural contexts such as sacrifices, prophetic activity, celebration of victorious battles, and the transportation of the Ark of the Covenant.[3] Both male and female musicians were highly esteemed and music was an integral part of temple worship.[4]

The Book of Genesis credits Jubal with the invention of musical instruments, specifically the kinnor (a member of the harp family) and the ugav (a pipe, or wind instrument).[5] The first mention of music after the Deluge is Jacob’s run-in with Laban.[6] Laban complains to Jacob that if he had known that Jacob was leaving, “I would have sent you off with festive music, timbrel and lyre.”[7] Dr. Eliyahu Schleifer, of Jerusalem’s Hebrew Union College, says that this passage suggests “a farewell ceremony which was probably common among the ancient nomadic tribes.” He notes that the patriarchal period does not mention liturgical music, but that only “family and folk celebrations are described as a means to invoke divine inspiration.”[8]

Professor Schleifer observes that the patriarch Laban mentions two instruments: a tof (or frame drum) and a kinnor (sometimes translated as lyre). These two instruments along with the ugav, a pipe or wind instrument, “constituted the main musical instruments of the patriarchal period.” The ugav and the kinnor were probably considered men’s instruments. The tof, however, “was associated with women's dance songs (mecholot), such as Miriam's song at the Red Sea,” a topic which we will be returning to shortly.[9]

Easton’s Bible Dictionary states that the golden age of Hebrew music arose during the classical period of Samuel, David, and Solomon. A class of professional singers arose during this period. For the first time music was “systematically cultivated. It was an essential part of training in the schools of the prophets.” It was in the temple, however, where the great school of music was to be found. “In the conducting of its services large bands of trained singers and players on instruments were constantly employed” [10]

Interestingly, Mormon scholars have been telling us for years[11] that, “music has a strong ritual, and symbolic meaning, closely tied to the creation and the temple,”[12] that the earliest forms of drama, dance and song originated in ancient temple ceremonies, commemorating both that great shout for joy at the divine council[13] where the creation of the earth was planned, as well as, “the time when the angels shouted praises unto the Holy One of Israel at the creation, when they both sang and gave the Hosanna shout.”[14]

If the Israelites were a musical people then surely they must have been a dancing people. The Old Testament confirms that eleven Hebrew roots are used to describe the various characteristics of dance and most of these roots occur only in intensive forms “pointing out the nature and character of sacred dance.”[15]

In his 1923 book, The Sacred Dance, the Vicar of St. Albans and Doctor of Divinity W.O.E. Oesterley, notes “the universal presence” of religious or ritual dance, its origins coming down to us from “pre-historic times.” Oesterley claimed that “sacred dance” could (in spite of local variations in ritual and mythology) be found amongst so many cultures and time periods “with extraordinary uniformity” that it was either descended from “an ultimately identical tradition” or was perhaps just an inherent part of human biology.[16] “That the sacred dance originated in pre-historic times goes without saying.”[17]

Contrary to popular belief the Israelites were not so different from other cultures.[18] When Oesterley classified these dances, not according to their “outward form,” but according to their intent and purpose, he found that “the Old Testament offers evidence of the existence amongst the ancient Israelites of most of the typical sacred dances of antiquity.”[19]

In contemporary times we tend to think of dance as a recreational or spontaneous activity but historically dance has been a powerful form of religious expression.[20]

Oesterley sees ritual dance as honoring a supernatural power or diety and taking that power upon oneself in a process of imitative magic or personification of diety that leads to mystical union with the divine.[21]

It was among some of the early prophets of the Hebrew Bible that “the most interesting kind of sacred dance, the ecstatic dance, was in vogue.” In this they were no different “from certain classes of holy men” or the spiritual leaders of the world’s cultures. “The earliest prophets,” says Oesterley, “believed that this sacred dance was the means whereby the divine spirit came upon them.”[22]

Naturally, the significance of song and dance continued on into the times of Christ and beyond. In Aramaic, the Semitic language spoken by Jesus, rejoice and dance are the same word, so the New English Bible translates Jesus in Luke 6:23, as saying: “rejoice and dance for joy.”[23] Jesus refers to Wisdom’s dance in Matthew 11:17 and19.

In Matthew 11:16 Jesus asks, “But whereunto shall I liken this generation? It is like unto children sitting in the markets, and calling unto their fellows, and saying, we have piped unto you and ye have not danced.”[24]

Hugh Nibley pointed out that:

The Greek and Russian Orthodox churches still preserve the ring dance around the altar in that most conservative of rites, the wedding ceremony, when bride, groom, and priest all join hands and circle the altar three times; H. Leisegang connects this definitely with the old prayer circle. At the coronation of the Byzantine emperor, everyone danced around the emperor's table three times. The most common representations of ritual dancing in early Christian art show pious damsels dancing around the throne of King David. And the Jewish apocryphal writings often depict a situation best described at the opening of the Book of Mormon, where Lehi sees God on his throne "surrounded with numberless concourses of angels in the attitude of singing and praising their God" (1 Nephi 1:8). Surrounding concourses are concentric circles, and the singing and praising are never static: it is a dynamic picture with everything in motion, as Lehi sees it, and as the cosmic pattern of the thing requires. The prayer circle is often called the chorus of the apostles, and it is the meaning of chorus which can be a choir, but is originally a ring dance, as Pulver designates it in the title of his study. The prayer was a song such as Paul prayed and sang in the darkness of a prison [in Acts 16:25]: “About midnight they prayed a hymn to God.” And if they sang in chorus, would they not dance? Philo says that the true initiate during the rites moves "in the circuit of heaven, and is borne around in a circle with the dances of the planets and stars in accordance with the laws of perfect music"--the music of the spheres.[25]

Nibley defined the chorus as not only a ring dance, but a circle, which comes from the Latin word, curvus, “going around.” Referring to the Greeks he said:

The chorus sings, and the chorus of the muses sings the poiema, the creation song. Remember, the blind muses? Each one is in charge of describing and studying one department of the creation. So they all get together. When they sing together, it's the poiema, the song of the creation. It's a glorious thing. It's a round dance like the Egyptian maypole. And it's the music of the spheres and those things we have heard about in literature.[26]

Mormon researcher Kevin Christensen says, “The very early Infancy Gospel of James depicts Mary as a ‘little girl in the temple, dancing before the high priest … exactly how Wisdom is described in Proverbs 8, playing and dancing before the creator.’”[27]

I can’t help but think of the cherubic Shirley Temple when I read:

“The priest received her and “set her on the third step of the altar, and the Lord God gave grace to her; and she danced with her feet, and all the house of Israel loved her.”[28]

As for our topic today, one of the most significant Biblical passages of interest to be found is Exodus 15:20, “a recounting of an important women’s dance ritual:”[29]

And Miriam the prophetess, the sister of Aaron, took a timbrel in her hand;

and all the women went out after her with timbrels and dances.

And Miriam answered them,

Sing to the Lord, for he has triumphed gloriously;

the horse and his rider has he thrown into the sea.

-- Exodus 15:20[30]

“The phrase “the women went out after her’ tells us it was a female rite,”[31] according to dance scholar Iris Stewart, and Oesterley says, “These dances, with accompanying music, were performed by women, even restricted to women.”[32] Miriam’s dance became “one of the climactic ceremonies” of the Passover festival, celebrating the Exodus. It is [also] prophesied in the Hebrew tradition, “that at the great banquet in the time of the Messiah, Miriam will dance before the righteous.”[33]

Recent archaeological discoveries are illuminating a forgotten aspect of women’s spiritual heritage. Terracottas depicting female drum players and figurines depicting other types of musicians, both male and female, have been found in Judah, Israel, Phoenicia and Cyprus. Plaques made from molds, about 4-6 inches in height, depicting women with frame drums have been excavated at Meggido, Beth-Shean, and Tel æIra, mostly dating to the Iron Age (1200-586 B.C.E.). Some of the finest pieces, depicting female drummers, are figurines in the round. They were discovered in Cyprus and several coastal cities of Israel/Palestine (Shikmona and Achzib). Archeomusicologist, Theodore Burgh, a post-doctoral fellow at Notre Dame asserts, “These figurines, and the Biblical record, clearly demonstrate that hand drums were used primarily by women.”[34]

The Book of Isaiah (30:32) paints the vivid image of a drum as an instrument used in spiritual warfare.[35] The transliteration of the Hebrew word for drum is toph, or tof, and is often archaically translated as timbrel, tabret, or tambourine. This is a play on words with the word tophet, which has the same etymological root as toph, and in the following verse (Isaiah 30:33)[36] represents a place of punishment. The word ‘tof’ is onomatopoeic meaning “the naming of a thing or action by a vocal imitation of the sound associated with it.”[37] Musician Daniel Bingamon emphasizes, “The term 'tof' implies the word 'tophet' which means ‘to smite,’ which is how you play the tof.”[38]

The history of the frame drum stretches back to the ancient Middle East.[39] Drummer Layne Redmond says it is, “one of the oldest known sacred ritual instruments and that, “It first appears painted on a shrine room wall in ancient Anatolia, present-day Turkey from the sixth millennium B.C.” Redmond elaborates, “Female performance ensembles of musicians, singers, and dancers appear in some of the earliest representations of religious rituals. The frame drum was at the musical and psychic center of these rituals.”[40] She continues:

The frame drum is the world's oldest known drum and for thousands of years was the primary trance inducing technology for religious and ecstatic rituals. It is the oldest means for altering states of consciousness for spiritual purposes through transformative sound. When played with hand and finger techniques, the frame drum has a long, clear, ringing tone with many audible harmonics. These overtones create a chord of magical and alluring sounds with every stroke.[41]

“These disciplines for transforming consciousness were transmitted and administered by the bee priestesses of Aphrodite, Cybelle, Demeter, Persephone, and the old goddesses of Crete – Rhea and Ariadne.”[42] Classical scholar, Jane Ellen Harrison states, “They are in a word Mellisae, honey priestesses, inspired by a honey intoxicant, they are bees…the priestesses of Artemis at Ephesus were ‘Bees,’ but also those of Demeter, and still more significantly, the Delphic priestess herself was a Bee.”[43] Interestingly, James Hastings translates the name of Israelite prophetess Deborah as “bee”[44] and Barbara Walker, author of The Women’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets, boldly titles her “the Jewish Queen Deborah, priestess of Asherah, whose name also meant ‘Bee.’”[45]

There are some interesting associations between the frame drum, the tree of life and the great mother goddess. When the Sumerian Goddess Inanna[46] descended to the underworld she asked her priestess to help her return through the beating of a drum, “the traditional shamanic path between worlds.”[47] Redmond elucidates:

In most historical forms of shamanism, the sound of the frame drum generates the trance state in which the shaman travels back and forth among the three realms – the heavens, the earth, and the underworld. The interconnectedness of these realms is universally represented by the Tree of Life, which is rooted in the underworld, bears fruit on earth, and reaches its topmost branches into the heavens…it also represented the spinal column, the channel through which divine energy traveled in consciousness raising techniques. The continuing beat of the shaman’s drum maintains the link with everyday reality so the shaman can safely return to the earth realm of the living.[48]

Redmond acknowledges, “This central image of shamanism figures prominently in the myths of Inanna, great Mother Goddess of Sumer.”[49] L.D.S. scholar, C. Wilford Griggs elaborates:

“Gilgamesh… appears on an Akkadian tablet containing a translation of the Sumerian legend, which tells… the story of a tree of life in the creation of the universe. Here the goddess Ishtar [the Babylonian counterpart of the Sumerian goddess Inanna] gives Gilgamesh a magical drum and drumstick made from the tree of life, which she has planted in her garden. Gilgamesh loses them to the netherworld—the world of the dead—and cannot retrieve them.”[50]

Like Inanna, the goddesses of the Hebrew Bible, Wisdom and Asherah, are both associated with a sacred tree. Quoting Proverbs 3:18, Old Testament scholar, Margaret Barker, identifies Proverbs’ personified Wisdom as a goddess and states that her symbol is the Tree of Life.[51] At a speech given at B.Y.U., Barker said, “The Book of Proverbs describes Wisdom as the Tree of Life and those who are devoted to her are happy, a wordplay which sounds like the name for Asherah.” She argues that the Menorah in the first temple was a stylized Tree of Life, and a symbol of “the Lady Asherah,” who was removed from the first temple during Josiah’s purge.[52]

L.D.S. scholar Daniel Peterson documents that Asherah is Wisdom, an anthropomorphic goddess as well as a tree, and that Proverbs 1-9 presents the personified Wisdom as the wife of God. Peterson’s paper, Nephi and His Asherah, highlights “two authentically pre-exilic religious symbols (Asherah and Wisdom)” found in the Book of Mormon. In it he cites I Nephi, chapter 11, where an angel asks Nephi if he knows the meaning of the tree that his father Lehi saw in a vision. “It was only when she appeared with a baby and was identified as ‘the mother of the Son of God,’ that Nephi grasped the tree’s meaning.” Peterson believes, “that Nephi’s vision reflects a meaning of the “sacred tree” that is unique to the ancient Near East.” Nephi identifies Mary with the Tree of Life.[53] Layne Redmond underscores the association between the frame drum and the Great Mother Goddess, “The drum is moon-shaped [and] the wood of the frame represents the Tree of Life.”[54]

Intriguingly, the name Magdalene is also associated with both the tree of life and sacred dance. Some scholars claim that the word Magdalene is cognate with the word amygdal, meaning almond.[55] Numerous scholars maintain that the menorah in the first and second Israelite temples represents a stylized almond tree.[56] Leon Yarden, “argues that the archaic Greek name of the almond (amygdale, reflected in its contemporary botanical designation as Amygdalis communis), almost certainly not a native Greek word, is most likely derived from the Hebrew em gedolah, meaning ‘Great Mother.’”[57]

The elements of music and dance in the legends about Magdalene have proliferated since the Middle Ages, some of the earliest legends about Magdalene's life, influenced painting and literature. She often appears as a dancer in mystery plays.[58] The Dictionary of the Dance states that Magdalene was a ritual dancer in the tradition of Delilah. Iris Stewart states that the almond is a significant religious symbol and is connected to women and their ritual dances. A European folk-dance, the Allemande, was “descended from the ritual dance for the festival of Al-monde…the dance was originally the dance of the almond,”[59] a dance connected to women’s fertility,”[60] now celebrated at the Feast of the Assumption on August 15. The almond shape was a female symbol from ancient times and the almond tree a symbol of new life, being the first flower to appear after winter.[61] In light of this, Stewart says, “it is perhaps no coincidence that Magdalene was with Jesus for his spring equinox resurrection,” and points out that in fifteenth-century France, “a ceremonial dance called Marie Magdaleine was still performed on Easter Monday, recounting the meeting with Mary and Jesus.” Despite persecution “the dance was still in full force at Ste. Marie Magdaleine’s Church, performed in the nave in rainy weather, until 1662. Even after the custom ceased in the church, it was perfomed outside. It was eventually turned into a hymn, ‘Hail Festal Day,’ as the choir circled the cloister three times.”[62]

The frame drum is still “one of the primary percussion instruments throughout the Middle East and other parts of Asia.”[63] Surprisingly, the tof has survived, virtually unchanged, into our very own day. Several significant musical traditions of the ancient Israelites[64] can be observed amongst Iraqi Jews. “The Iraqi Jewish community prides itself on the fact that it is the most ancient people in the Diaspora,” observes Galia Ben-Mordechai. They remained in Babylon for 2500 years preserving some of the most ancient traditions. One such tradition is the daqqaqat troupe, a small group of female entertainers (from about three to eight) who sing and play drums known as daff.[65]

The frame-drum still survives in a very broad region maintaining the same etymological roots as tof. Iranian percussionist, Peyman Nasehpour, notes, that the “similarity of the names of frame drums in these regions shows the common history of these drums.”

The tef can be found in

Turkey

. In

Armenia

, the dap, or duff, is a medium to large-sized frame drum mainly used in folk and classical music. The daf is also one of the most ancient frame drums in Asia and North Africa. In

Egypt

and Arab countries it is called the duff, daf, deff, and taf, a large diameter frame drum used to provide bass rhythm accompaniment. Persia’s ancient daf is considered a Sufi instrument, played at Kanghah-s (temple of dervishes) during Zikr (spiritual chanting) ceremony and having recently become very popular, it has been successfully integrated into Persian music. Even in

India

one of their frame drums is called a daf, dapphu, or daffali, and is played with drumsticks; it is quite large, about 2 feet across and commonly used in folk music but rarely heard in other styles.[66]

The tof has both survived and is being revived. The San Antonio Vocal Arts Ensemble, also known as S.A.V.A.E., spent several years researching ancient Middle Eastern instruments, languages, musical styles and rare musical manuscripts and then recorded an album entitled Ancient Echoes, complete with a female tof player.[67] “The music itself has been reconstructed from ancient melodic themes as catalogued by Jewish musicologist A.Z. Idelsohn.[68] Dr. Theodore Burgh, declares the project to be, “well researched.”[69]

S.A.V.A.E. asserts that the music of the second temple period “is believed to have shaped chant and other early Christian music.” Co-founder of the band, Christopher Moroney says, “Christianity today has many faces. But there has been a large European cultural influence. If you go back to the Aramaic, using Middle Eastern instruments, it becomes very clear that the roots of Christianity are Middle Eastern and that Jesus was a Jew until the day he died.”[70]

For...Moroney, the project has deepened and enriched his understanding of faith. He particularly likes [the song] “Abwoon,” [pronounced av-woon] the Aramaic Lord's Prayer, because of the depth and richness of images it conveys. Taken from the Peshitta (the Aramaic term used for the Bible), the opening lines of the prayer in English are translated to read: “Oh Birth-er! Father-Mother of the Cosmos, focus your light within us. Create your reign of unity now. Your one desire then acts with ours, as in all light, so in all forms.”

“'Abwoon' is a word describing ‘the male-female, creative essence of God,’" Moroney said. "It's not male. It's father-mother combined. It can be a huge difference in how that prayer is understood. For centuries, there has been a patriarchal influence, not only in the Western church, but in all of Western culture. If you look at this prayer, it's not patriarchal. If you look at the other translations of that prayer, the meanings are very deep and very mystical and very accessible.’”[71]

Moroney, says that the songs range from meditative to danceable and claims that much of the material can be integrated into modern worship. “Especially where you would have liturgical dancers,” he said. “We've done several concerts now where we've had liturgical dancers dancing to this music. We are also performing this music at synagogues. There's both the Christian tradition and the Jewish tradition. There is a place for this music.”[72]

Modern scholarship is shedding new light on an ancient feminine tradition. Harvard’s Semitic Museum website states that female drummers in Israel “provided rhythms for singing and dancing at family and community celebrations,” and according to Psalm 68, their music was incorporated into the ceremonies of the Temple,[73] “Your processions, God, are for all to see, the processions of my God, of my king, to the sanctuary; singers ahead, musicians behind, in the middle come girls, beating their drums.”[74]

From the earliest times music has been associated with the feminine divine. The English word, “music” is ultimately derived from a Greek word for “muse.”[75] Hugh Nibley states:

The business of the Muses at the temple was to sing the creation song with the morning stars. Naturally because they were dramatizing the story of the creation, too, the hymn was sung to music (some scholars derive the first writing from musical notation). The singing was performed in a sacred circle or chorus, so that poetry, music and dance go together. (Lucian’s famous essay on the ancient dance, among the earliest accounts, takes it back to the round dance in the temple, like the prayer circle that Jesus used to hold with the apostles and their wives…some have referred to this as a dance; it is definitely a chorus). So poetry, music and dance go out in the world from the temple – called by the Greeks the Mouseion, the shrine of the Muses.[76]

Carol Meyers, of Duke University, believes that there was actually a “female prophetic tradition” that “was grounded in musical performance.” According to Meyers, Miriam is the first of five women in the Hebrew Bible to be designated by the term “neviyah,” (prophetess in Hebrew.)[77] Meyers points to a recent discovery amongst the Dead Sea Scrolls, which show at least seven additional lines to the original Song of Miriam in the Book of Exodus. She asserts that “Miriam’s song was part of a broader tradition of ‘drum, dance and song’ in the Hebrew Bible, a genre exclusively associated with women.”

Meyers notes that none of the recent discoveries of ancient art depicts men playing the hand drum, only women, implying that men have not always dominated musical life:

"The women’s songs are, in a sense a product of the Divine Spirit. They represent theological statements about God's power to save. If the consensus that the poetry preserved in the Song of Miriam and the Song of Deborah and the others are among the oldest biblical texts, and that their attribution to women is authentic, then my radical claim would be that the first biblical theologians may in fact have been women."[78]

In a prophecy concerning the coming of Zion, a future society of peace to be established in the latter-days, the prophet Jeremiah personifies Israel as a female drummer, “I will build you firmly again, O maiden of Israel! Again you shall take up your timbrels and go forth to the rhythm of the dancers.”[79] The Jewish Study Bible notes that this oracle “draws upon the image of Miriam leading the women of Israel in dancing with timbrels at the Red Sea.”[80]

The use of percussion instruments fell out of use in western congregations until the Salvation Army revived the use of drums for praise and worship in the late 1800’s. “They formed Timbrel Brigades devoted to learning and playing the timbrel, especially during their outreach ministry, and they continue to this day,” write Vicky Rains and Paula Hitte. The two women run a religious ministry entitled, “A Call to Worship,” dedicated to the tof. They declare that divine creativity is reviving the arts in the Western religious tradition. They are dedicated to the revival of “drum, dance and song,” being used once again to praise God, “The Lord says in Jeremiah 31:4 that Israel will be rebuilt and that the original version of the tabret, which has been hidden from us, will be brought back in the last days. The tabret we use today is symbolic of this ancient instrument of praise, and is a forerunner of that which the Lord will restore to us. They are waved before the Lord in worship and praise to His name.”[81]

Women worldwide are reconnecting with their ancient heritage. Glenn Velez, a Grammy Award-winning percussionist, studied ancient materials and Biblical references and is applying his discoveries to modern day settings. Working with ancient visual images has inspired him to explore aspects of frame drumming, such as holding positions for the instruments as well as the incorporation of movement with sound. Glenn’s research led him to consider the role of women in drumming, He says, “In the majority of cases women were the frame drummers in ancient times. This is very different from our era when men are most often the drummers. I feel the re-emergence of frame drumming is connected with a re-emergence of an aspect of women’s nature and their power as drummers.”[82]

Here, in closing, are the additional lines of the Song of Miriam, found in the Dead Sea Scrolls:

You have put to shame.

For You are clothed in majesty;

Great are You, savior are You,

The enemy's hope has perished, and he is forgotten;

They have been lost in the mighty water, the enemy;

Praise to the heights; You gave and took;

Who does gloriously.[83]

PowerPoint illustration credits, in order of appearance:

Dore, Gustave. Jephthah Met By His Daughter, engraving, 1891, The Dore Gallery of Bible Illustrations, vol. 3. http://www.gutenberg.org/files/8710/8710-h/p3.htm#023

Tiziano, Vecellio. Presentation of the Virgin at the Temple, Oil on canvas, 1539, Gallerie dell'Accademia, Venice.
http://www.wga.hu/frames-e.html?/html/t/tiziano/4religio/presenta.html

Uccello, Paolo. Mary's Presentation in the Temple, fresco, 1435, Prato Cathedral, Duomo, Italy. http://www.wga.hu/frames-e.html?/html/u/uccello/2prato/04prato.html

Dore, Gustave. Jephthah Met By His Daughter, engraving, 1891, The Dore Gallery of Bible Illustrations, vol. 3. http://www.gutenberg.org/files/8710/8710-h/p3.htm#023

Harvard Semitic Museum, terracotta figurine of a woman playing a hand-drum. 8th - 7th centuries B.C.E., The Houses of Ancient Israel: Domestic, Royal, Divine
http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~semitic/HOAI/adultmain.cgi?article=music.htm

Art.com, Early Greek Jewelry from the Rhodes Necropolis Decorated with the Bee Goddess Melissa, Giclee print of a gold plaque from Rhodes, Greece, 7th Century B.C.E. http://www.art.com/asp/display-asp/_/id--20135/pg--5/Jewelry.htm

Reuters/STR/Iran, Photo of two Iranian women playing the daf, at Iran's first women's music festival, in Tehran, August 28, 2001. http://layneredmond.com/daughter.htm

Terracotta #2, female drummer and male pipe player. Source unknown. Please email me if you know the source for this photo.

Poynter, Edward. Miriam, relief print on paper, 1864, Dalziel's Bible Gallery, The Tate Collection. http://www.tate.org.uk/

ENDNOTES:

[1] The Semitic Museum at Harvard University, “Houses of Ancient Israel: Domestic, Royal, Divine.” http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~semitic/HOAI/adultmain.cgi?article=music.htm.

[2] Theodore Burgh, “Music and Musical Instruments in the Hebrew Bible and Ancient Israel/Palestine,” Archaeomusicology, University of Notre Dame, http://www.bibleinterp.com/articles/Music.htm.

[3] Burgh, “Music and Musical Instruments in the Hebrew Bible.”

[4] The Semitic Museum at Harvard, “Houses of Ancient Israel.”

[5] M.G. Easton M.A., D.D., Illustrated Bible Dictionary, 3rd ed. (Thomas Nelson, 1897), s.v. “music,” “instrumental music,” http://www.ccel.org/e/easton/ebd/ebd/T0002600.html#T0002625.

[6] Easton, Illustrated Bible Dictionary, s.v. “music.”

[7] Genesis 31.27 (The Jewish Study Bible). Eliyahu Schleifer, “Jewish Liturgical Music From the Bible to Hasidims,” Sacred Sound and Social Change: Liturgical Music in Jewish and Christian Experience, (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1992), http://www.liturgica.com/html/litJLitMusDev1.jsp?hostname=liturgica#Second.

[8] Schleifer, “Jewish Liturgical Music.”

[9] Schleifer, “Jewish Liturgical Music.”

[10] Easton, Illustrated Bible Dictionary, s.v. “music.”

[11] Hugh Nibley certainly led the pack on this one.

[12] James L. Carol, The Temple: Music, Circles and the Creation, http://james.jlcarroll.net/LDS/evidence/temple/music.html.

[13] An excellent source of non-mormon scholarship on the divine council can be found at the website of Michael S. Heiser, Ph.D., http://www.thedivinecouncil.com/

[14] Carol, The Temple: Music, Circles and the Creation.

[15] W.O.E. Oesterley, The Sacred Dance: A Study in Comparative Folklore (New York: The Macmillan Co. 1923), 44.

[16] Oesterley, The Sacred Dance, 2.

[17] Ibid., 8.

[18] Ibid, 31.

[19] Ibid, 8.

[20] Ibid, 20.

[21] Ibid, 22-24.

[22] Ibid, 31.

[23] Iris J. Stewart, Sacred Woman, Sacred Dance (Rochester, Vermont: Inner Traditions, 2000), 61.

[24] Stewart, Sacred Woman, Sacred Dance, 63.

[25] Hugh W. Nibley, Morminism and Early Christianity, (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Company and F.A.R.M.S., 1987), 53 – 54, quoted in James L. Carol, The Temple: Music, Circles and the Creation, http://james.jlcarroll.net/LDS/evidence/temple/music.html

[26] Hugh W. Nibley, Ancient Documents and the Pearl of Great Price, p.2, quoted in James L. Carol, The Temple: Music, Circles and the Creation, http://james.jlcarroll.net/LDS/evidence/temple/music.html

[27] Kevin Christensen, "Plain and Precious Things Restored: Margaret Barker and the Queen of Heaven," Meridian Magazine, 2005. http://www.meridianmagazine.com/ideas/051229plainprint.html

[28] Willis Barnstone, The Other Bible, 387.

[29] Stewart, Sacred Woman, Sacred Dance, 61.

[30] King James version.

[31] Stewart, Sacred Woman, Sacred Dance, 61.

[32] Oesterley, The Sacred Dance, 173-4.

[33] Stewart, Sacred Woman, Sacred Dance, 61.

[34] Burgh, “Music and Musical Instruments in the Hebrew Bible.”

[35] Vicky Rains and Paula Hitte, A Call to Worship, http://myweb.ecomplanet.com/mill8678/mycustompage0015.htm

[36] This wordplay was located in the original Hebrew using The Stone Edition, Tanach: The Torah/Prophets/Writings - The Twenty-Four Books of the Bible Newly Translated and Annotated (The Artscroll Series).

[37] Merriam-Webster Online, s.v. “onomatopoeic,” http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?book=Dictionary&va=onomatopoeic

[38] Daniel Bingamon, “The Tof: Hebrew Drum or Tambourine,” Biblical Instrument Series, May 28, 2001, http://www.tinwhistles.us/tof.htm

[39] Glenn Velez, “Ancient Voices of Frame Drums,” The Glenn Velez Website: The World of Frame Drums, (2004), http://www.glenvelez.com/history.php

[40] Layne Redmond, When the Drummers Were Women: A Spiritual History of Rhythm, (New York: Three Rivers Press, 1997), 10.

[41] Layne Redmond’s Official Website, http://www.layneredmond.com/trance.htm

[42] Redmond, When the Drummers Were Women,118.

[43] Jane Ellen Harrison, Prolegma to the Study of the Greek Religion (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1968), 442-443, quoted in Layne Redmond, When the Drummers Were Women: A Spiritual History of Rhythm, (New York: Three Rivers Press, 1997), 196.

[44] James Hastings, Dictionary of the Bible (New York: Charles Scribner’s sons, 1963) quoted in Layne Redmond, When the Drummers Were Women: A Spiritual History of Rhythm, (New York: Three Rivers Press, 1997), 196.

[45] Barbara G. Walker, The Woman’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1983), 407, quoted in Layne Redmond, When the Drummers Were Women: A Spiritual History of Rhythm, (New York: Three Rivers Press, 1997), 196.

[46] Inanna came to be identified with Ishtar and Ishtar is the Akkadian counterpart of the West Semitic goddess Astarte. Encyclopædia Britannica Premium Service, s.v. "Ishtar," http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9042899. Some scholars believe that the Hebrew goddess Asherah is related to the Assyrian goddess Ishtar, (see Hadley p. 8), they may have had a common origin in antiquity (see Hadley p.14, 16), Judith M. Hadley, The Cult of Asherah in Ancient Israel and Judah: Evidence for a Hebrew Goddess Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000). Astarte may be a variant of Asherah, see Judith E. McKinlay, “Gazing at Huldah,” The Bible and Critical Theory 1, no. 3 (2005), endnote 11, DOI:10.2104/bc050015.

[47] Redmond, When the Drummers Were Women, 143.

[48] Ibid, 39-40.

[49] Ibid, 39.

[50] C. Wilfred Griggs, “The Tree of Life in Ancient Cultures,” Ensign, June 1988, p. 28 http://farms.byu.edu/display.php?table=transcripts&id=16

[51] Margaret Barker, Temple Theology: An Introduction, (London: Society For Promoting Christian Knowledge, 2004), 77, 88, 90.

[52] Margaret Barker, "What Did Josiah Reform? The Earlier Religion of Israel," BYU Speeches, May 6, 2003.

[53] Daniel C. Peterson, “Nephi and His Asherah,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 9, no. 2 (2000), 16–25.

[54] Redmond, When the Drummers Were Women, 40.

[55] Stewart, Sacred Woman, Sacred Dance, 70. Raffe, W. G., comp. Dictionary of the Dance. New York: A. S. Barnes, 1964, 21.

[56] Carol L. Meyers, The Tabernacle Menorah: A Synthetic Study of a Symbol from the Biblical Cult (Gorgias Press, 2003). Robert Graves, The White Goddess, (New York: The Noonday Press, 1997), 263.

[57] Leon Yarden, The Tree of Light: A Study of the Menorah, the Seven-Branched Lampstand (Uppsala, Sweden: Skriv Service AB, 1972), 44–47, 103–6, quoted in Daniel C. Peterson, “Nephi and His Asherah,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 9, no. 2 (2000), 16–25.

[58] H. Colin Slim, “Mary Magdalene: Musician and Dancer,” Early Music, Volume 8, No. 4 (October 1980): 460-473.

[59] Stewart, Sacred Woman, Sacred Dance, 70.

[60] "Everyone Dances, From the Angels on Down." Rebecca Jones, Park Ranger, National Park Service. From Contra Conversations #1, March 8, 2001

[61] Stewart, Sacred Woman, Sacred Dance, 70.

[62] Ibid, 70-71.

[63] Redmond website, http://www.layneredmond.com/framedrm.htm

[64] Dating back to the time of ancient Babylon, after the destruction of the First Temple in 586 B.C.E.

[65] Galia Ben-Mordechai, “The Musical Culture of Iraqi Jewry: Three Countries and Two Continents,” Canadian Journal for Traditional Music (1992), http://cjtm.icaap.org/content/20/v20art3.html

[66] Peyman Nasehpour, “Daf and Other Frame Drums in Asia, North Africa and East Europe,” Drum Dojo, 2002, http://www.drumdojo.com/world/persia/framedrums.htm

[67] Cecile Holmes, “Temple Tunes: Restoring Ancient Jewish Music,” Religion News Service via The Baptist Standard, February 24, 2003, http://www.baptiststandard.com/2003/2_24/pages/savae.html

[68] S.A.V.A.E. founders, Covita & Christopher Moroney, http://tinyurl.com/hvul2

[69] Cecile Holmes, “Temple Tunes.”

[70] Ibid.

[71] Ibid.

[72] Ibid.

[73] The Semitic Museum at Harvard, “Houses of Ancient Israel.”

[74] Psalm 68.24-25, (New Jerusalem Bible).

[75] Carol L. Meyers, “Mother to Muse: An Archeomusicological study of Women’s Performance in Ancient Israel.” in Recycling Biblical Figures: Papers Read at a NOSTER Colloquium in Amsterdam 12-13 May 1997, Ed. Athalya Brenner and Jan Willem van Henten (Leiden: Deo Publishing, 1999), 50.

[76] Hugh Nibley, Temple and Cosmos (Provo, Utah: Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies, 1992), 22-23.

[77] The feminine form of the Hebrew word for prophet (nebiah) is used to describe five women in the Old Testment (Miriam, Deborah, Huldah, Noadiah and the wife of Isaiah).Two of those women (Miriam and Deborah are described as cult singers (Ex. 15:20 & Judges 5:12). From, And Sarah Laughed: The Status of Woman in the Old Testament by John H. Otwell Philadelphia, Westminster Press, 1977, quoted in, http://www.womenpriests.org/classic2/otwell09.asp

[78] Cynthia Ramsay, “Miriam, Music, Miracles,” The Western Jewish Bulletin, March 21, 2003,

http://www.jewishbulletin.ca/archives/Mar03/archives03Mar21-03.html

[79] Jeremiah 31.4 (Jewish Study Bible).

[80] Adele Berlin and Marc Zvi Brettler, eds., The Jewish Study Bible (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), 988.

[81] Rains and Hitte, A Call to Worship.

[82] Glenn Velez, “Ancient Voices of Frame Drums,” The Glenn Velez Website: The World of Frame Drums, (2004) http://www.glenvelez.com/history.php

[83] Cantor Elihu Feldman, “Cantorial Comments,” http://uscj.org/njersey/w-orange/cantor/cantor2001jan.htm

LEAP!

2006-07-06T16:20:00.000-07:00

Chicago Tribune 14May00 A4
By Donna Seaman.

LEAP
By Terry Tempest Williams
Pantheon, 338 pages, $25

CHICAGO, ILLINOIS -- Mormon naturalist Terry Tempest Williams' latest book is getting strong reviews in major newspapers and magazines like the Chicago Tribune and Time. Williams' book, Leap, looks at Mormonism more than her previous books, "Refuge: An Unnatural History of Family and Place" and "Desert Quartet: An Erotic Landscape." In Leap, Williams uses a trio of paintings by 15th Century Flemish painter Hieronymus Bosch, "The Garden of Delights" as a jumping-off point for her examination of both

On the surface, Williams' book is a description of Bosch's trio of paintings in which she examines every detail that Bosch painted. Williams goes much farther than most that visit an art museum, examining the paintings with "the purposeful attentiveness of a wildlife biologist in the field," according to the Tribune, which notes that she surprised other museum visitors by bringing binoculars, as a way of identifying the birds that Bosch painted. "Were Hieronymus Bosch's acute skills as a naturalist appreciated?" she wonders.

But the book goes deeper, beyond just an analysis of Bosch through a naturalist's eye. Each of the details in Bosch's paintings leads Williams to memories that involve her family, her marriage, and her Mormon upbringing. In one of the paintings, Bosch depicts the creation of Eve in Paradise, and his inclusion of a grove of trees in the painting leads Williams to reflect on the First Vision, in which God was revealed to the young boy Joseph Smith. She credits Mormonism with its reliance on personal revelation and notes that it is a religion whose "sacred texts were housed and hidden in the earth." Donna Seaman, writing in the Chicago Tribune says, "The recognition of the significance of personal revelations, and of the sanctity of the earth, resonate profoundly for Williams, and become key themes in her bold and fluent interpretation of Bosch, which, in turn, inspires candid, often provocative musings on the difference between religion and spirituality, and fresh insights into our complicated and crucial relationship with nature."

Seaman says that Williams' exploration allows her to "bridge the divide between the teachings of Mormonism and the gospel of nature, and to articulate a 'living faith' based on 'the healing grace of wildness.'" Seaman goes on to call the book a "dynamic, shape-shifting and lyrically interrogative meditation," and she credits the book with covering "matters of life and death." In the end, according to Seaman, Williams "tells us that we must restore our sense of wonder, and recognize that we live in paradise, a garden of earthly delights that deserves our reverence and our love."

In a much shorter review in Time magazine, Steve Henry Madoff says that Williams' description of Bosch may be more than a match for Bosch's 'wild' painting. "Strange and endlessly fascinating, her reflections on Bosch's images of Heaven, Hell and Earth take on the burning urgency of a dream, says Madoff. "'Can a painting be a prayer?' she asks. Her answer is yes, prayer. Incantation and benediction too."

Related Links

Move Over Martha: There's a Mormon Domestic Goddess in town!

2006-04-01T21:24:00.000-08:00

Move Over Martha: There's a Mormon Domestic Goddess in town!

Deseret News write-up on Margaret Starbird @ Sunstone Symposium

2006-01-19T21:58:00.000-08:00

http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,600152175,00.html

Mary Magdalene's Role Missing, Speaker Says

By Elaine Jarvik
Deseret Morning News

"There are a lot of people who want to debunk me and send me home," Margaret Starbird announces, standing at the front of a small lecture hall at a downtown Salt Lake Hotel on Wednesday afternoon.
"Not here," calls out a woman from the second row.
"No, not here," Starbird answers. "That's what I like about Salt Lake City."
Her audience are attendees of the annual Sunstone Symposium, the annual meeting dedicated to "independent Mormon thought." This is the symposium's 30th anniversary and the second consecutive year that Starbird has been among the invited presenters. For the second time, Starbird addressed an idea she is convinced of but is also the source of recent worldwide controversy: Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene and had a baby with her, that Mary Magdalene was Christ's disciple and that the Catholic Church has kept this information under wraps for centuries.
The claims have gained worldwide exposure in Dan Brown's mega-seller "The Da Vinci Code." Brown cites Starbird in his bibliography and mentions two of her books — "The Woman with the Alabaster Jar" and "The Goddess and the Gospels" — in the body of the novel. Brown's and Starbird's ideas are also part of a larger debate about the role of women in the early church.
Starbird's conclusions about Mary Magdalene are part of a journey, she says, that began with her own skepticism about these radical ideas. The journey began in 1983, when she was what she describes as a Roman Catholic mother of five who taught Sunday school and a scripture studies class for women. That's when a friend suggested she read a book called "Holy Blood, Holy Grail," a book that postulates Mary Magdalene's role as Christ's bride.
Starbird says the dust jacket was enough to make her shun the book for two years. When she finally read it she says she asked God to help her discern whether the ideas in it were true. If they weren't, she told God, "I'll just burn this book."
She was looking for a sign. So she opened her Bible — to the page that read "New Testament, Revised Version." Revised was the word that jumped out at her. But she wanted to make sure. "I don't understand, Lord," she said, asking for another sign. This time she opened her Bible to a passage that read "Restore my wife, whom I am espoused to."
"Maybe he's talking about your inner bride," a friend suggested. So the friend prayed, too, for a sign. And shortly thereafter, on her hands and knees in her bathroom trying to find a leak in her toilet, the friend saw the name of the toilet manufacturer: Church.
"We didn't know whether to laugh or cry," Starbird remembers. "It was like my words had taken flesh in her bathroom."
Convinced now that this was her life's mission, Starbird enrolled in the Vanderbilt University Divinity School, where she devoted herself to answering four questions: could Jesus have been so human as to be married; if so, when; "how did we lose (Mary Magdalene); and how do we get her back."
Starbird says her research unearthed "mountains of evidence for the sacred union." To those who call her work heresy, she says, "We're not changing the gospel. We're just throwing new light on it. . . . I teach what the church taught in the beginning and then forgot."
Now living in the Seattle area, Starbird devotes her time to traveling around the country spreading the word and to continuing her research. A new book, "Mary Magdalene: Bride in Exile" will be published in November.
The importance of uncovering Mary Magdalene's role as Christ's wife, Starbird says, is that both Christianity and Christians need the "sacred feminine" that Mary provides.
"What we lost when we lost Mary Magdalene," she told her Sunstone audience, "was ecstasy, passion, a relationship with the body and with one another. We are earthen vessels filled with God."
Acknowledging Christ's marriage and Mary Magdalene's role as both a wife and disciple is a way of acknowledging the need for the feminine in both men and women, and in the church itself. "The feminine is a way of knowing and being," whereas the masculine is about "going and doing," she says. "That's why the self is a marriage of both."

Mormon Connection to Masons Explored Ahead of 'Da Vinci Code' Sequel

2006-01-14T08:35:00.000-08:00

Holy Mackerel! I was waiting for school to start this morning at 8:38 AM and I was running out of things to do on the Internet so I just plugged in "Da Vinci Code" on Google just to see what's up with "the Code" these days. Top of the page! Number one headline, posted just 9 hours ago:
Mormon Connection to Masons Explored Ahead of 'Da Vinci Code' Sequel

Mormon connection to Masons explored ahead of 'Da Vinci Code' sequel
Mason-Mormon ties: What's fact, what's fiction
By Peggy Fletcher Stack
The Salt Lake Tribune

Flanking the main entrance is a pair of sphinx guarding the Temple. They are comprised of a lion's body and a man's head, signifying great strength and master intelligence and are symbolic of mystery. Between the paws is a granite sphere, polished and inscribed to represent the Terrestrial Sphere (shown) and Celestial Sphere. (Chris Detrick/The Salt Lake Tribune)

Dan Brown clearly enjoys playing with legends, history, symbols and secrets. And readers' minds. In his best-selling novel, The Da Vinci Code, Brown wove all these - real and imagined - into a breathless mystery about Christianity, Mary Magdalene and the Divine Feminine that has spawned an industry of de-coders eager to separate fact from fiction.
Now that he has turned his attention to the mysteries of Freemasonry, the centuries-old fraternal order, the new book also might deal with Mormonism.
But rather than announce the Da Vinci sequel in a news release, Brown embedded tantalizing clues to its subject on the book's jacket. Written in typeface that is slightly larger and bolder than the rest (it requires a magnifying glass to find them all) are the words: is there no help for the widows son.
"O Lord, my God, is there no help for the widow's son?" was used historically as a Masonic distress call, but when journalist David Shugarts plugged it into Google, the first hit was a 1974 speech given by an LDS Institute of Religion teacher, Reed C. Durham, at the University of Utah.
Joseph Smith, the founder of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, reportedly began to utter the call as he fell from a second story window after being fatally shot by a mob in a Carthage, Ill., jail in 1844, Durham said.
In an electrifying presidential address to the Mormon History Association meeting in Nauvoo, Ill., he traced close parallels between Smith's account of digging gold plates out of a New York hillside and Masonic tales of Enoch and buried treasure. Smith wore a "Jupiter talisman," or what his wife called "his Masonic jewel," and LDS temple ceremonies bear a striking resemblance to Masonic rituals, he said.
The

The Winding Staircase, like all Masonic symbols, is illustrative of discipline and doctrine, and opens to us a wide field of moral and speculative inquiry. (Chris Detrick/The Salt Lake Tribune)

speech was so controversial that Durham's superiors in the LDS Educational System forced him to issue a public apology.
The speech was never published but was surreptitiously taped and has floated around on the Internet for years.
It may have also caught Brown's attention, Shugarts speculates, and may provide one plot twist in Brown's next book, tentatively titled The Solomon Key. Brown confirmed in a speech last year that the book's mystery will be set in Washington, D.C., where many architectural features were drawn from Masonry, and will feature the same lead character, Harvard-professor-turned-detective Robert Langdom.
Getting a jump on the novel's historical context, Shugarts has written Secrets of the Widow's Son: The Mysteries Surrounding the Sequel to The Da Vinci Code.
He provides a broad history of Mormonism, including its brush with Masonry in the 19th century. It also offers nuggets about Masonic history such as these: At least eight signers of the Declaration of Independence were Masons, as were 13 U.S. presidents including George Washington. A Freemason released Paul Revere from British custody on the night of his famous ride, after he determined that Revere was a Mason. Mozart's "Magic Flute" and Rudyard Kipling's The Man Who Would Be King were written as Masonic allegories.
The Washington Monument and a similar monument on Bunker Hill in Boston, were not just coincidentally shaped like an Egyptian obelisks, but intentionally designed to honor Masonic allusions to ancient Egyptian mystical wisdom.
Much of the symbolism is mathematical, even geometrical, which could explain why the fraternity has attracted rationalists such as Voltaire, Goethe, Benjamin Franklin and Mark Twain.
"We've heard from Masons

One of the rooms in the Temple. The Salt Lake Masonic Temple was completed in 1927 and was built in 1 year, 3 months, and 22 days. The architect of the temple was Carl W. Scott and George W Welch. (Chris Detrick/The Salt Lake Tribune)

that they feel that [Brown is] going to do them justice," says Dan Burstein, who wrote the introduction to Shugarts' book. "He seems to be favorably disposed to thinking of Masons as an important historical underground movement, pushing the world towards democracy and enlightenment."
Today there are nearly 2 million Masons in the United States, with 2,250 members in 29 Utah lodges.
"We have a lot of Mormons who are Masons in this state, but we don't know exactly how many," says Ridgley Gilmour, Grand Master of Utah Masonic Lodge. "Anyone with a belief in God can petition to join but we don't ask what religion they are."
Gilmour was adamant the Masonry is not a "secret society," but a fraternal order with large-scale charitable giving built on deeply held American values of family, God and country.
"The only secrets we have are little signs and passwords which we use because it's an ancient custom, and, frankly, it's fun,'' Gilmour says.
It remains to be seen how much Mormon history will feature in the novel, (Brown's wife reportedly was raised in the LDS Church) but if the reaction to Durham's 1974 speech is any indication, any link between the two could be controversial in Utah.
For his part, Nicholas S. Literski, an active Mormon and Mason living in Nauvoo, thinks Latter-day Saints misunderstand the similarities. But they are significant.
"Everybody wants to obsess over supposed similarities in ritual," he says. "But that's just one aspect. Everything about Joseph and his family was tied into Masonic legends."

The Mormon connection: Smith's father, Joseph Smith Sr. joined a Masonic lodge when the family moved to Palmyra,

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N.Y., in 1816. Later, Smith's brother Hyrum also joined. From them, Smith heard the story of a lost sacred word that was engraved upon a triangular plate of pure gold. The word was the name of God.
It makes sense that he would go searching for such treasure in the large American Indian burial mounds near his home, says Literski, author of the forthcoming book, Method Infinite: Freemasonry and the Mormon Restoration.
And when Smith reported finding an ancient record written on plates of gold, he used "distinctively Masonic language to describe the experience," Literski says.
The church, which claimed to restore ancient truths of Christianity lost through the ages, attracted many members of the Masonic fraternity who traced their own roots back centuries and had similar esoteric teachings.
By the 1840s, many Mormon leaders in Nauvoo, including Smith and apostles Brigham Young and Heber C. Kimball, became Masons and organized a lodge there under the auspices of the Grand Lodge of Illinois. It wasn't long before nearly every male member of the church in the area had joined. At the same time, Smith introduced LDS temple rituals that included secret handshakes, signs and symbols like the all-seeing eye, the compass and square (tools of the mason's trade) and the sun, moon and stars that echoed Masonry.
Soon, though, other Masons felt that the Mormons were dominating the fraternity. In 1842, the Nauvoo Lodge was suspended. Many Mormons believed that Masons contributed to the murder of their prophet.
Antagonisms built up between the two groups. In Utah in 1860, Masonic lodges were established but they prohibited Mormons from joining. At the same time, Young forbade Mormons from joining and refused to allow any Mason to hold priesthood leadership positions in the church, Literski says.
It wasn't until 1984 that LDS President Spencer W. Kimball removed the prohibition against Latter-day Saints becoming Freemasons. Later that year, the Grand Lodge of Utah removed its own ban on Mormon membership so that, in the ensuing years, many Latter-day Saint men have returned to this part of their heritage.

In the novelist's mind: Shugarts says it was not his intention to be a plot spoiler for Brown's sequel. He couldn't do that if he wanted. But he did offer a primer on Masonry and Mormonism for those who will want to explore, as they did with Da Vinci, just how much of what Brown writes is really history.
"I had to push out in every direction possible," Shugarts said in a phone interview from his Connecticut home. "I read five books about Mormon history and thousands of Internet Web sites. I tried to be thorough and fair."
Though he only dedicated four or five pages to Mormons in a 200-page book, he's already heard from unhappy Latter-day Saints who accuse him of misreading or a biased approach to LDS history, a charge he rejects.
"Prior to embarking on my research, I had no particular opinion of Joseph Smith or the details of the founding of the [LDS ]Church," he wrote to one critic. "But I had met a few Mormons and they always impressed me as fine people. After delving into the story of Joseph Smith, I understood a lot more about LDS. I remain impressed that Mormons are fine people."
It will be interesting to see if Brown sees them that way as well. Literski isn't worried.
"He'll weave a good conspiracy," Literski says, "but no matter how inventive Dan Brown gets in terms of the connection, he will fall short of just how deep that story does go."
Even in Smith's day, there were Masons who believed the legends were historical truth and saw Freemasonry as a deeply spiritual, mystical quest. Other, more sophisticated members, discounted the old stories, wanting to refocus it along the lines of a charitable and benevolent institution.
The Smiths were about as far into mysticism as you can get, Literski says. "Joseph was rebuilding Solomon's temple with all the legendary baggage that came along with that."
Seeing the relationship between the two groups forces Mormons like Literski to revise his ideas about how God interacts with a prophet.
"You cannot understand what is going on in Joseph's mind unless you can know what he is seeing, hearing, feeling and touching," he says. "That gives me a stronger position of faith than would this idea that revelation is ex nihilo. Joseph was not a puppet."
---
Contact Peggy Fletcher Stack at pstack@sltrib.com or 801-257-8725. Send comments on this article to religioneditor@sltrib.com.

Joseph Smith FOUGHT Polygamy ?

2005-12-24T13:20:00.000-08:00

In the wake of Joseph's 200th birthday, why not give the poor guy a break and give him the benefit of the doubt for once...

Joseph Smith Fought Polygamy

"I want to dare to speak..."

2005-12-05T15:27:00.000-08:00

"I want to dare to speak the language women speak
when there is no one around to correct us."

Terry Tempest Williams, Mormon Bioneer

Real-Life Mormon Pagans!

2005-11-17T12:34:00.000-08:00

Long before the Internet, and the legendary Mormon Mystic, there was a virtual pagan ward on Prodigy which tackled topics like:

What do prayer circles and Goddess worship have in common?

What do you get when look at Mormonism and Neo-paganism side by side?

Can you be Mormon and Wiccan at the same time?

Is Mormonism a "New Age" religion?

Is orthodoxy a useful concept for Mormonism?

Are Mormons Pagans?

Who is Michael Quinn? Is he good for anything?

Space Mormons! The name says it all.

Take a peek at a mormon cyber-coven:

CLICK HERE

Women's Spirituality at Sunstone

2005-11-16T16:24:00.000-08:00

Here is a list of Women’s Spirituality-related sessions available at the Sunstone Symposium over the last few years. There may be more but I compiled a list of the most prominent sessions. If you missed the symposium this year, or in the past, you can download sessions in MP3 format via the Internet. Cost ranges from free - $4 per session:

2005 Salt Lake Symposium

This year Sunstone introduced workshops to the symposium! The highlight of which was the return of Margaret Starbird, whose workshop was entitled

MARY MAGDALENE: THE GREATEST STORY NEVER TOLD.

Program excerpt:

Was Mary Magdalene the wife and Beloved of Jesus? What became of her after the Crucifixion of Christ? Why did the Church Fathers suppress her story, and why must we now retrieve it? This workshop will explore the legends and mythology of the Sacred Union that was once at the very heart of the Christian faith. Reclaiming Mary Magdalene as the “Sacred Bride” helps to correct the tragic “design flaw” in Western civilization—the devaluing of the Feminine—that has become painfully obvious at the threshold of the third millennium. –end of excerpt.

Unfortunately, there were technical difficultues during this session and they were unable to post an MP3 to the website. They did catch it on video however, and I emailed Sunstone to let them know that they could make some money if they decided to sell the tape, since Starbird is such a popular speaker.

SL05171, Joseph Smith, Women, and The Feminine - speakers: Margaret Toscano, Lavina Fielding Anderson, Linda King Newell - This panel examines Joseph Smith’s life and teachings in relationship to women. How did Joseph treat women? What influence did they have on him? What role did they play in his life and theology? In ushering in “the restoration of all things,” what did Joseph restore about women and the feminine?

SL05273, Advancing Feminist Sensibilities Among Mormon Men

The following session was in the preliminary program but not on MP3, does anyone know if this session took place?

This session was sponsored by the relatively NEW Moonstone!

excerpt:

PANEL. EXCAVATING THE SACRED FEMININE
In western religious cultures, female roles are often suppressed, disguised, or diminished in a variety of ways. Yet gender is central in the construction of religion, theology, texts, and culture, and women are present or integral to the formation of a religion. Panelists will discuss how their work excavates female or feminine roles from obscurity in religious contexts where they are embedded.
• MARGARET STARBIRD, author, The Woman with the Alabaster Jar and The Goddess in the Gospels (key sources used and cited by Dan Brown), also The Feminine Face of Christianity and Magdalene’s Lost Legacy.
• MAXINE HANKS, writer, lecturer, feminist theorist, Gnostic; editor, Women and Authority: Re-emerging Mormon Feminism, editor Moonstone column; author of numerous articles and essays on feminine theology
• Additional panelists to be announced

2005 Sunstone West - California Symposium featured:

SW05051, PANEL. MORMON FEMINIST LITERATURE REVIEW - speakers: MARY ELLEN ROBERTSON, CAROL LYNN PEARSON, LAVINA FIELDING ANDERSON, NADINE HANSEN - Join panelists for a lively discussion of our favorite, provocative, thought-provoking, revolutionary, inspirational, and faith-enhancing books in the field of feminist spirituality. Re-discover the classics, and hear about newer volumes too good to keep to ourselves! A list of our top picks will be available for the audience.

2004 Salt Lake Symposium

SL04091, RECLAIMING MAGDALENE: THE LOST BRIDE IN CHRISTIAN MYTHOLOGY - speakers: MARGARET STARBIRD - excerpt: In this second Smith-Pettit lecture, Margaret Starbird will discuss the partnership of Jesus and Mary Magdalene, providing evidence from the Hebrew and Christian sacred texts that the Sacred Union was originally at the heart of the Christian mythology. The loss of the 'Bride" in the Christian story has had tragic consequences. Restoring the holy mandala of the hieros gamos--the sacred marriage tha...

SL04271, REAL GODDESSES HAVE CURVES (AND IDENTITIES) - speakers: HOLLY WELKER, DOE DAUGHTREY, MAXINE HANKS, JANA BOUCK, REMY, MARY ELLEN ROBERTSON, MARGARET M. TOSCANO - symposium: 2004 Salt Lake Symposium - excerpt: This panel invites Mormon women to talk about how they find meaning and inspiration in images of divine female power drawn from other religions and traditions. What do we learn about ourselves as women and as agents of the divine by studying the stories or representations of goddesses such as Shakti, Kali, Rhiannon, Venus, Athena, Spider Woman, White Buffalo Woman, Isis, Kuan Yin, and so forth? Es...

SL04132, WOMEN’S SEARCH FOR MEANING: SPIRITUAL PRACTICES THAT HAVE ENRICHED MY LIFE - speakers: LISA HANSEN, DOE DAUGHTREY, WENDY DUTSON, JANA BOUCK REMY - This panel will explore the contribution of spiritual practices to our connection with “that which matters most.” Panelists will discuss the way prayer, meditation, temple worship, yoga, spirit world journeys, lucid dreaming, symbol and energy work, Native American sweat lodge ceremonies, and other contemplative activities have helped them find meaning in crisis and in everyday life.

SL04153, MOTHER EARTH, FATHER PATRIARCHY: EMBRACING A MYTHOLOGY OF RESPECT, EQUALITY, AND HARMONY - speakers: JENNIFER CHANDLER JONES, KERRY SHIRTS - Deep within human consciousness and throughout mythology, we observe the earth symbolizing the feminine energy of the cos-mos. In much of the world, human beings have inherited a mythology that promotes men’s authority and dominance over the earth and over women. This core belief has left a legacy in which women are subjugated and our planet is being destroyed. As we enter the 21st century, we are...

SL04215, PERSEPHONE AWAKENED: A POETRY READING AND DISCUSSION OF NEGOTIATING FEMALE POWER WITHIN A PATRIARCHY - speakers: DANIELLE BEAZER DUBRASKY - By contrasting the traditional Demeter/Persephone myth with a contemporary interpretation, this session will explore how LDS women negotiate power within patriarchy and the possibilities of creating more balance. Persephone Awakened is a book of poems written in a contemporary voice of Persephone as she addresses a childhood companion whom she loses after her abduction. The poems are accompanie....

SL04371, WHAT’S BEHIND THE DA VINCI CODE CRAZE? UNCOVERING THE DIVINE FEMININE - speakers: PAUL TOSCANO, JANICE ALLRED, JODY ENGLAND HANSEN, MARGARET M. TOSCANO - This panel will be a roundtable exploration of important questions raised both by Dan Brown’s book, The Da Vinci Code, and by its enthusiastic reception in the national and LDS markets. What makes the book so popular? The desire for the divine feminine? The pos¬sibility of Jesus being married? The connec¬tion between Mary Magdalene and the holy...

SL04362, 'THE GODDESS IS ALIVE AND MAGICK IS AFOOT': MORMON PAGAN WOMEN IN THE 21ST CENTURY - Reviewed separately in this BLOG!!!

2004 SUNSTONE WEST

SW04001, IN SEARCH OF HER: WOMEN AND DIVINE FEMININE - speakers: Carol Lynn Pearson, Carol P Christ

SW04041, WHERE HAVE ALL THE MORMON FEMINISTS GONE? - speakers: Peggy Fletcher Stack, Maxine M Hanks

SW04071,PANEL. FACT IN FICTION? CRACKING 'THE DA VINCI CODE' - speakers: Maxine M Hanks, Dennis McDonald, George L Gorse, Bradley A Tepaske, Kristy Coleman

2002 Salt Lake Symposium These sessions are FREE to listen to online

SL02161, Our Greatest Challenge: Why Women's Priesthood Needs to Be Recognized in the LDS Church Today - speakers: Todd M Comptom, Vicke Stewart Eastman

SL02-212, Moonstone/Sunstone Dyad as Metaphor of Wholeness - speakers: Maxine Hanks, Linda P Wilcox

SL02254, Body, Parts, and Passions: Representing the Divine Feminine in the Mormon Church - speakers: Doe Daughtrey, Margaret Toscano - This paper examines why Mother in Heaven has been progressively eliminated from institutional discourse. Viewing Mother through the lens of iconography, I suggest that the Church’s move to designate her as “sacred” is an iconoclastic act that dissociates her from Mormon collective memory. Given Mother’s significance in Mormon cosmology, why has she disappeared from our discourse and become so “sac ...

SL02336, Anniversary Looks at Two Feminist Books - speakers: Maxine Hanks, Mary Ellen Robertson, Sonja Farnsworth, Judy Dushku, Nola Wallace, Rodello Hunter

2001 Salt Lake Symposium FREE SESSIONS

SL01123, Mormon Women in the 21st Century - speakers: Lynn M Anderson, Molly M Bennion - Six years ago, I presented 'Issues in Contemporary Mormon Feminism" at the first-ever Mormon Studies Conference at the University of Nottingham, United Kingdom. This paper, revised since I presented it initially at the second Mormon Studies Conference (University of Durham, UK, 1999), takes an updated look at official, quasi-official, and unofficial views of Mormon women--especially of their role...

THE ONE BELOW WAS AWESOME!!!

SL01275, Women in Religious Studies - speakers: Maxine Hanks, Janet Kincaid, Jana Riess, Mary Ellen Robertson, Cherie Woodworth - More women are pursuing advanced degrees in religious studies than ever before and a number of Mormon women seem to be following suit. This panel is comprised of Mormon women who are doing work in religious studies and/or Mormon studies. They will describe how they became interested in studying religion, what their areas of specialty are, what work they have done in these areas, and how the...

1999 Salt Lake Symposium FREE SESSIONS

SL99276, IS THERE A FUTURE FOR MORMON FEMINSM? - speakers: Sarah R Allred, Stacy Burton, Jayne Clifford, Margaret Toscano, Cherie Woodworth

SL99313, WAS JESUS A FEMINIST? - speakers: Kent E Robson, Todd M Compton

SL99331, THE EARTH AS SACRED GROUND - speakers: Larry Stammer, Eric L Jones

SL99337, WHAT NEXT? Mormon Women in the Twenty-First Century - speakers: Christine M Durham, Jill Remington, Kathy Wilson

1997 Salt Lake Symposium FREE SESSIONS

SL97165, Sarah and Her Sisters Are Alive and Well In Non-Mormon Bookstores - speakers: Molly Bennion

1993 Salt Lake Sympoium FREE SESSIONS

SL93225, If Mormon Women Have Had the Priesthood since 1943--Why aren't They Using It? - All particpants: Linda King Newell, D Michael Quinn, Margaret Merrill Toscano, Maxine Hanks.

"The Goddess is Alive and Magick Is Afoot:" Mormon Pagan Women In the 21st Century

2005-11-14T15:39:00.000-08:00

The presenter at this session, Doe Daughtrey, is rumored to be lurking on my Mormon Goddess list-serv!

Here is Doe’s extraordinary interview with the Deseret News on the Divine Feminine! Click Here

Highlights, notes and quotes / session summary: 2004 Salt Lake Symposium (session # SL04362)

'THE GODDESS IS ALIVE AND MAGICK IS AFOOT': MORMON PAGAN WOMEN IN THE 21ST CENTURY -

Presenter DOE DAUGHTREY, M.A., religious studies, Arizona State University, and student in its Ph.D. program; associate faculty, ASU religious studies department; member, Sunstone board of directors.

Program excerpt: ''Scholars of religion report that Wicca, Paganism, and other “earth-centered” or “nature” religions are the fastest growing of all new religious movements in America. This discussion will explore why some LDS women have chosen Wiccan and similar practices as either supplements to or replacements for their Mormonism. How and where were these women exposed to these new beliefs and practices? How do they characterize their new identity? What impact have these spiritual-religious changes had on their families? How do those who have chosen to remain LDS view their relationship to the Church and church activity? Do they see their practices as acts of apostasy?"

Respondent JOHN DEWEY REMY, student, writer, and half-Japanese LDS religious eclectic

Chair NADINE HANSEN
-----------------

Doe was awakened while she was in the Princeton ward, when D. Michael Quinn’s book Early Mormonism and the Magic World View was first released. At Princeton she met a woman who had been born into an LDS Puerto Rican family whose grandmother read tarot and used other forms of divination. This woman shared with Doe, “routine experiences with the spirit world.” This “reinforced” Doe’s “awareness of the diversity of Mormon spirituality.”

When Doe began work on her Masters thesis, Bodies, Parts and Passions, Erasing the Divine Feminine in the Mormon Tradition, she revisited Quinn’s book “to better understand what might have been early Mormon women’s engagement with the magical elements of Mormonism’s intersection with local folk culture.” At the end of the book Quinn stated that in contemporary times LDS women in the Salt Lake Valley still read tea-leaves, cards, and even used crystals and seer-stones for divination and healing, “implying a continuity of divinatory practice which originated in early Mormonism.”

Whether a direct link to early Mormonism via ancestral transmission could be proven or not was irrelevant to her. She was eager to find out, “just what these women had been doing.” Doe reasoned that since interest in “Women’s Spirituality,” was on the rise, if Utah women were doing these things then so were other women in other places.

“I felt that it would be important to try and discover as much as possible about these women for a variety of reasons, beyond what they can tell us about these women themselves or about early Mormonism or contemporary Mormonism.”

Doe continues: [It was good to hear Doe’s definition of religious studies since we are both Mormon women in the same academic field]

“The main disciplinary goal of religious studies is to present information about what a religious tradition says about itself, as well as to reveal the inherent diversity of insider views. In addition, religious studies provides insights into, and analysis of, what others say about religious traditions and offers non-religious explanations for religious phenomena. This type of analysis inevitably raises questions about related issues such as social, cultural and economic ones.”

“Knowing something about LDS women who are what Janet Bennion calls “double dippers,” Mormons who double dip into other cultural or religious pots in order to either supplement, complement or replace mainstream Mormonism can add to several other larger conversations in religious studies such as those taking place about new religious movements,” such as: conversion, religious change, virtual (Internet) religion, ritual studies, epistemologies, ways of knowing and religious identities.

“My thoughts and questions about Mormons and the New Age are concomitant with the interest of the Sunstone community, much to my delight given that each symposium for the last several years has included papers and panels featuring discussions on these topics.”

Sister Daughtrey cites a session about the pentagram on the Nauvoo temple, as well as philosopher Dennis Potter’s 2001 paper, Defending Magic: Explaining The Necessity of Ordinances (which is one of my favorites). Daughtrey, discusses the concept of symbolism: she says, “The notion of a symbol is a western idea. We’re the only ones who say, ‘oooh, that’s syymbooliic!’ Everybody else on the planet says, “NO! That’s powerful, that does something!” And so when we say the word symbol we’re automatically not getting it!”

A discussion of these topics ensues, then Doe cites a fabulous fact! “In 2001, Publishers Weekly reported the rise in divination sales and noted two interesting and seemingly unrelated reports: New Age materials in all areas have increasingly expressed, ‘goddess wiccan and other pre-dominantly female themes.’ and that science fiction authors are more likely to be LDS than any other religion! The article quoted somebody else as saying, ‘Mormons have an outlook on God and the universe similar to science fiction writers, that other Christian churches do not.’ This outlook, I would argue, involves that magical world view and is why the group of LDS women I interviewed sought out New Age and Women’s Spirituality resources, to supplement or replace what they find missing in Mormonism. It is also why they find their hybrid spirituality at least somewhat congruent with traditional Mormonism, if not institutional Mormonism of the 21st century.”

Doe says it is important to try and understand the LDS churches position on this issue of Mormon-pagan identities. What is Mormon identity, she asks. How does it take shape? What does it mean to convert to something? People gain “testimonies” of the Mormon tradition for different reasons. She discusses various institutional reactions to the issue of “the New Age,” when it is brought up by members. “Given these institutional attitudes [not very positive] about witchcraft and quote New Age, why would an LDS woman confess to being a witch or a pagan and how could anyone see neo-paganism as being in any way congruent with Mormonism? Moreover, to what degree is it possible to blend Mormon identities with self-identification as a pagan or a witch? These questions about identity and identities are the overarching concern of this study.

“I asked 13 women a series of questions relating to their experience of and feelings about Mormonism and paganism and received 5 responses, which is not bad!” She found out about them because she had a student in her Ritual, Symbol and Myth class. In the first class she always has them write a personal statement: “tell me one thing about yourselves that you want me to know,” so that she can create a mental picture to help remember who they are. One of her students wanted Doe to know that she was raised Mormon and was now Wiccan. Doe already had some experiences with this but she started doing searches on beliefnet.com and looking for people on message boards. She said this is all over the country, all different ages, different sexual orientations. She has others who have contacted her desiring to be respondents since this initial study was made.

Doe wanted to know:
• What aspects of paganism they were interested or studying
• How they were exposed to it
• What they found most appealing about it
• What does their spiritual practice look like?
• Does it contain any elements of Mormonism?
• What elements of paganism does it contain?
• What, if anything, do they find in paganism that is congruent with their understanding of Mormonism?
• Were they born and raised LDS or are they converts?

She found it interesting that three of her respondents were converts and that the two remaining generational Mormon women had severed all ties to the LDS church. The three converts were working to integrate and reconcile their Mormon and pagan identities, “perhaps because as converts they already made a major conversion decision and therefore experienced their religious identities as being more fluid and more accommodating.”

Doe devised a “spectrum of Mormon / Pagan identity:”

• Quintessentially Mormon
• More Mormon than Pagan
• Hybrid-Mormon-Pagan
• More Pagan than Mormon
• Quintessentially Pagan

“Mormon identity is negotiated through communal agreements.” Doe cites that Mormonism acknowledges a Heavenly Mother. “The LDS community agrees that she exists but also agrees that attempts to draw attention to that knowledge, or to worship her, in any way, is a breach of a boundary.” “Based on reports that interest in and a hunger for devotion to the goddess is what drives the New Age market and the increase in conversion to Wicca and other earth-based and mystery religions, I suspected that these women would report having a ‘testimony’ of the existence of Heavenly Mother as a driving force in their hybrid spirituality. This did turn out to be the case, as every respondent noted the desire to know and develop a relationship with Mother in Heaven, as well as frustration at the churches position on her role in their lives. Their personal identities seem to be linked to hers.”

Every respondent expressed that knowing Her had something to do with knowing themselves. “Every respondent considered Heavenly Mother to be the aspect of Pagan belief and practice most congruent with Mormonism.”

One respondent stated: “I…believe that when the Church states [that] there is more truth that hasn’t come to light, but we’re not ready for it yet, it’s about Goddess, it’s about pagan practices. It’s about worshipping them as parents. My kids will have both God and Goddess in their lives.”

Another respondent says she has, “always seen Heavenly Mother as completely beautiful and powerful, like a wonderful wise and gorgeous queen. In the temple when we think of what we may become. I envision being powerful, beautiful and wise just like Her, filled with light and love, brilliant beyond words. I do wish we would focus more on her in church.”

Further quotes from respondents include:

“I think there are many other LDS women who believe and wish they could pray to Goddess but don’t have the guts or knowledge that would allow them to do so.”

Doe says, “this insight came to her after Mother’s Day last year when she gave the Relief Society closing prayer when she, ‘wished our Heavenly Mother Goddess a happy Mother’s Day.’ She said, ‘I heard a few gasps but after the prayer I had several people thank me for it. I’ve never seen anyone thank others for a closing prayer before.”

One respondent wears a pentacle to church. “I have a charm bracelet I wear, it has a pentagram with a tree of life, intertwined. It has the goddess and it has a bumble bee. I wear it to church without worry because I know in my heart that those who would pass judgment are just ignorant of what can be, of what other pieces of truth are waiting for us all to find.”

The temple-recommend holding respondent whose identity is the most hybrid argues that, “’paganism is absolutely congruent with Mormonism and this is based on Mormonism, that Mormonism contains the whole. It is the container for all truth. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that Mormonism and paganism are two shadows cast by the same Truth, with a capital T.’ With regard to human identity she states, ‘ I believe we can all be little mini-prophets of our own and that if we would just believe in ourselves and the possibility of miracles we can all be so inspired and magical. We have that Divine heritage! We should be magical.’ Interesting.”

One respondent feels that because of the presence of pentacles on temples that, “Mormonism is true while validating her chosen hybrid Mormon-Pagan path.”

After further discussion, Doe lists the elements of spiritual practice that each of these women have in common, “Each of these women engages in the same core practices: The wearing of pentacles, altar construction and maintenance, meditation, and prayer to the God and Goddess (they haven’t dumped the God, or God, Heavenly Father, he’s still there), and the practice of some form of divination. Beyond that Charlene attends the temple.” Doe further details each case and mentions that although Jane has had her name removed from church records that she is attending church again.

Again, summarizing after much further discussion, Doe mentioned another element that Mormonism and Wicca have in common, “the motif that shows up in Mormonism, I’ve heard so many people say, [so have I – ed.] ‘I just recognized, I saw in Mormonism, things I had believed all along, but never found anywhere else.’ This is also the case with Wicca or witchcraft.”

A list of similarities between Wicca and Mormonism follows:

• Witches identify with a past persecution chain of memory and they defy patriarchal authority or they seek after their own

• They are overwhelmingly university educated

• In the U.S. they are women, 2-1

• “In terms of Mormon identity Mormons recognize multiple gods and goddesses but they only worship one god.”

• They identify with a past persecution chain of memory

• They are strongly tied to patriarchal authority but they do recognize individual authority to some extent

• In the U.S. they are most likely to be university educated

• Pagan and Mormon identities have been outside the mainstream

• Both groups have been simultaneously engaged in a process of identity rehabilitation

“It wasn’t so long ago that identifying oneself as a Mormon could generate suspicion and contempt.” [What?! It still does! – ed.] The same, of course is true for pagans. Both traditions still raise eyebrows though both are transcending stereotypes about their goals, their motives and places in society. In the context of our emphasis this week on the Divine Feminine, this paper is only a tease. I still know very little about these women and others like them. I’m making contacts all over the country with independent bookshops, New Age and other types of bookshops and women’s groups who suggest that this Mormon-Pagan hybrid identity is not as rare as one might think…..”

“I hope that if any of you know a woman like this, or are a woman like this you will first know that you are not alone and make it known to the person you know that they are not alone and then [laughs] you will contact me. Thank you.”

After Doe finished her paper, the chair of the session mentioned that her grandmother, “who was as devout a Mormon as you would find anywhere and who knew her pioneer grandparents, visited The Peepstone Lady of Cache Valley. There was a Dialogue article about the Peepstone Lady a number of years ago… and it was written by Wayland Han of UCLA and you might want to look that up. Thank you for that paper.”
--------------------

After this, John read a "word-image" that he wrote about Heavenly Mother that had tears streaming down my face. John was choked up as well.

--------------------

After that a man from the audience got up and said that a friend had once prayed to Mother In Heaven to know "why don't we hear more," with tears and a choked up voice he continued, "and she heard the answer, 'Why, no one has ever asked.'"

Boy, I was really bawlin’ at this point!
--------------------

One guy got up and mentioned that he had dated a Wiccan for awhile. “Often we would talk about Mormon metaphysics…the idea of animals having spirits, or how human’s embody God. ‘Well witches believe that', 'mainline Christians don’t believe that', the idea of embodying God is completely pagan as far as mainline Christian world is concerned – the theological tradition of Christianity anyway…so I was shocked that there was a lot of commonality here…she married someone else but I dated another witch who had converted to Mormonism, and she did leave – mostly because of inadequacies in the community, but part of her conversion story was reading the Pearl of Great Price and some things and she said, ‘witches believe this.’ and I said OK now I know that because I’ve dated a witch before.”

He proceeded to ask Doe how we could incorporate the Divine Feminine more actively into the institutional church without “throwing everytihg into a complete tailspin.”

In her answer she said that she really hasn’t “thought that far” Her plan is to go and visit people like Charlene, the super-hybrid temple-recommend holder (and the most extraordinary of her interviewees, IMO) and see how people at church treat her.

"She said that Adam and Eve were taught, paganism was what they were taught in the Garden of Eden and that it just got kind of diluted and then Joseph Smith was the one who restored all of these ideas."

[This might be shocking to some. But I believed every one of Charlene’s comments before I ever heard her quoted. I independently came to similar conclusions because this is the logical fruit of Mormon thought if you are privy to the same sort of information that Charlene and I seem to be!]

Doe mentioned that despite some negative-ish comments by church leaders on New Age topics that she is actually surprised that she hasn't been able to find more, “but my suspicion is that there probably isn’t all that much [more] and the reason is that there are so many congruences that it only calls attention to it…they don’t want totalk too much of it because the church has such a strong tradition of divination…there are articles out there that talk about congruences and try to explain them….where could all of this go?”

Nadine’s question was a good one: “I’ll tell you what has always concerned me about developing the idea of Mother in Heaven within Mormonism. I guess part of it is that if we talk about Mother in Heaven, maybe she is just one member of God’s harem and part of it is also that if the church, the institutional church were to begin to define Mother in Heaven, rather than have this groundswell from the grass-roots, where people are empowered by mother in heaven, I am afraid that she is going to be defined as the docile silent behind the scenes patriarchal woman that is idealized for Mormon women here, that she’s just going to be one more way, that the patriarchy tells women to be subordinate to men, and I wonder if you’ve given any thought to this?”

Doe responds:

“You’re absolutely right…and it’s like this contradiction and this tension between…they’ve done us a favor - but they’ve made us be private about it so we don’t connect with each other.”

Hot on Doe’s heels Holly [I think - I recognized her voice] Welker bounds up to the podium – it’s great, the session is at a fever pitch!

“This is one of the reasons why you should read The Spiral Staircase by Karen Armstrong which I keep talking about [laughter from the audience because she’d burst onto the scene, all pumped up] One of the things I read to introduce one of my panels was a discussion she has with a Jewish scholar where he makes the point that Christianity is unique in that it stresses theology. As she says ‘belief is the sin qua non, the point without you cannot be religious.’ In so many other religious traditions what you believe really doesn’t matter, it’s what you do. Orthodoxy - who cares, it’s orthopraxy. The problem is we let them tell us what to think! If we just said, ‘to hell with you! I’m going to believe what I want!’ [laughter from the audience] They could say whatever they wanted about Joseph Smith, Father in Heaven, Mother in Heaven, garments, whatever! [more laughter] Decide for yourself goddammit! [Much laughter and clapping from the audience]

The final comment:

“I don’t know how to quite talk about this, but I want to go back to the idea of magic in the Mormon church, and I think that when we talk about paganism and Mormonism its very limiting of who we really are. I have practiced this kind of work for many years: I put my hands on people and they find a way to heal themselves; I talk to trees and they talk back to me [everyone is laughing with her]. I think I’m in trouble now. I’m outing myself but…I remember when I moved back here from the Bay Area and I went to a BYU game and I walked into the stadium, because I’m very sensitive to energies and I had to literally lean against the wall because the power and the spirit in there was so great [voice quavers] I said, ‘I don’t understand how if people understand the power and the spirit that they contain within themselves, and it reminded me a lot of the movie Willow…you know he’s a little man who tried to work great magic with a little wand and as the story progresses he realizes – he is the wand. I look at that movie and I think that as members of the church, or not members of the church, are like… we have these wands and we’re just picking our noses with them [laughter] and I just feel like it’s time that we stepped up to the plate and become all that we can be and stop limiting ourselves and labeling ourselves in a lot of ways.”

Wow!

I WAS A REAL-LIFE SLC PUNK

2005-11-14T14:02:00.000-08:00

The Sunstone Symposium is putting their past sessions online. I was just going through the program for the 1999 sessions and found out that my old friends from Salt Lake did a session on Salt Lake City's infamous straight edge scene!

Excerpt:
1999 Salt Lake Symposium SL99134, STRAIGHT EDGE: THE EVOLUTION OF A YOUTH MOVEMENT IN UTAH - speakers: Alex Beckstead, Paul Kreutz, Sean McClaugharity, Trent Nelson, Michael Van Wagenen - ''Straight Edge began as a philosophy that espoused a drug- and alcohol-free lifestyle among youth in the early 1980s. Deeply tied into the punk rock movement, the philosophy has always been suspect by outsiders. In the 1990s, Straight Edge is a favorite target of Utah and national media alike. How did Straight Edge develop, and why has it reached such extremes in Utah? Moderator Michael Van Wagenen . . .

Here are the chronicles of a real-life SLC punk:

I was at almost ALL of these shows at the Speedway, and the Word, and Reptile Records! As well as most of those old-school shows at 924 Gilman St. in Berkeley, like Greenday, at Operation Ivy's last show!

Click Here

Salt Lake City Weekly said, "SLC Punk! (Columbia TriStar, R) James Merendino’s rebel yell, featuring less actual SLC punk than an episode of Touched by an Angel." I thought that was hilarious.

Here's another review from Salt Lake City Weekly:
Click Here

It was quite an oversight to not include any of Salt Lake's actual legendary punk bands in the film. I'm a sucker for Magstatic myself - Click Here

A Snapshot in Space and Time

2005-10-04T20:06:00.000-07:00

...So I'm listening to Glenn Kimball as I fold laundry on Coast to Coast AM...I am smoothing out a pair of pants on a hanger and Glenn says the word 'pants,' he's telling one of his legendary adventure stories to Ian Punnet. I put the hanging pants together with the hanging shirt and Glenn says, "shirt and pants."

Last BA Weekend of the Second Trimester

2005-08-15T22:59:00.000-07:00

The synchronicity rolls on!

Over the last two semesters I spoke with my classmate, Julianne, about her senior thesis. She mentioned that she was doing it on Jeanette Rankin, the first U.S. congress-woman. We had talked about it a few times, but outside of that I hadn't given it much thought.

On Sunday,August 14, Julianne's presentation had morphed from Jeanette Rankin, to a full-blown, multi-media presentation of the History of Women's suffrage, primarily in the U.S., but also in Britain.

She gave each of our cohort members a card with a re-print of a Women's Suffrage poster from 1913. Attached to the card was a Susan B. Anthony dollar and the caption: " Spend this dollar when a woman is elected president "

I felt like something momentous was happening! During this time the Goddess felt like a tangible presence. For the next day or two I was overwhelmed with this presence!

Utah Women Were the First to Vote!

2005-08-04T11:00:00.000-07:00

I have been reading a lot of books on gender and marriage and family and women's issues, etc. the last several weeks.

I completed Ashley Montagu's The Natural Superiority of Women a couple of days ago. I glanced at a turn-of-the-century book, Woman and Social Progress by Nellie Seeds and H.L. Mencken's 1917, In Defense of Women.

I was doing a book review of Montagu's book for my Social Construction of Identity class when I came across a passing, brief reference to Susan B. Anthony.

Suddenly, it came to my mind...something that I had heard once, that the first women to vote in the United States were Utah women. I decided to diverge from my paper for a bit and look into the matter. I did a search for "Utah" and "suffrage"

I read quite a few articles and biographies online about early Mormon feminism, and confirmed that Utah women were the first women in the United States of America to vote, 50 years before the 19th Amendment was ratified.

I am now doing some extensive research on and compiling an Amazon.com wishlist of books. The first list of books that I have compiled are diaries, ethnographies, historical writing by and about Mormon women, of the past and present, from Laurel Thatcher Ulrich to Terry Tempest Williams.

Sunstone

2005-08-03T08:21:00.000-07:00

For the last few weeks I have been listening to one or more graduate-level seminars in Mormon studies per day at the Sunstone Symposium, via the miracle of cyberspace!

Sunstone Symposium decided that the theme for this years conference was to be the Divine Feminine!

In 2004, they asked Maxine Hanks, the editor of Women and Authority: Re-emerging Mormon Feminism if she could help them find a keynote speaker for the plenary session.

They said they wanted someone was familiar with the Divine Feminine; had published research; was well versed in Mary Magdalene; someone who was known/had books, a popular speaker with accessible ideas, oh, and if there was some kind of connection to the Da Vinci Code that would great, and not just a scholar but some one spiritual as well....

Maxine just couldn’t stop thinking: you're describing Margaret starbird!!!

Opening the session, Maxine expressed that she has noticed increasing interest in the Divine Feminine coming from men, even BYU professors!
i.e. Dan Peterson’s paper on the Asherah:
http://farms.byu.edu/display.php?table=jbms&id=223

Maxine talks about her excommunication as the typical pattern of the exiled feminine.

Maxine says that Starbird's books contain close scholarly work into the scritptures but Maxine also realized that she was "reading the words of a mystic." Dan Brown and starbird share a common thesis:

There is a hidden concept of sacred marriage or the balance of opposites symbolized by Jesus and Magdalene and it’s the central mystery, or the underlying pattern of Christianity and western culture.

After the time was turned over to Margaret she began to illustrate how the Song of Songs, aka the Song of Solomon, is at the very heart of the Christian story.

Margaret reported the story of how she came across the Book Holy Blood Holy Grail and sought out to discredit the book. She then discusses the mystical, synchronistic experiences that led her to do a 180 and come to her current thesis.

Click on the link below to go to the Sunstone MP3 store. Many of the sessions are free. For the more recent sessions they are asking for a $4 donation.

Select the 2004 Salt Lake Symposium below:
SL04091
RECLAIMING MAGDALENE: THE LOST BRIDE IN CHRISTIAN MYTHOLOGY
http://www.sunstoneonline.com/symposium/symp-mp3s.asp

JUST IN!
Margaret Starbird's appearance at the 2005 Salt Lake Sunstone Symposium. Check the link above for the latest symposium.

Moroni Olsen

2005-07-26T15:42:00.000-07:00

I've been trying to get better at recording the synchronicity that seems to take place at an exponential rate in my life. Ususally there are just too many. But I thought I would record this one, just as a classic example:

My mom came over to my house to visit and spend the night. She wanted to watch some old movies and so we visited the indy video store here in town.

She really wanted to see A Place In the Sun with Elizabeth Taylor and Montgomery Clift and also an old Jimmy Stewart movie that I was surprised I had never heard of. It was titled Call Northside 777

After the movie was over and the credits were rolling and I was looking at the floor thinking about something entirely different, in this case Joseph Smith,
I glanced up as the credits were rolling and right in front of my face appeared the name Moroni Olsen. With a name like that I immediately knew that if nothing else he was at least an ethnic Mormon!

When I looked him up on the internet I found out that we have the same birthday! But my birthday is already a great synchronicity:
it is the anniversary of Joseph's assassination.

Another synchronous person in my life has written a book on synchronicity:

Consider the Butterfly by Carol Lynn Pearson. I grew up hearing a lot about Carol Lynn, an internationally known poet and playwright, because she was a well known Mormon feminist and she appeared on Donahue, frequently, because of her famous autobiography about caring for her husband in San Francisco, while he was dying of AIDS. She was always part of the family legend cycle because my cousin had been a good friend of hers at a much earlier time in their lives. When I grew up and moved back to the place that I was born after not living there for over 20 years, I wound up in her ward. That was a number of years ago....

How interconnected this tapestry of life is. It's a small world.

Dream

2005-05-18T16:45:00.000-07:00

This morning I had a dream. A woman walks into the room with a big, brown dog on a leash. She had blondish hair and was kind of shi shi and demanding. She asked me if she could use a phone book. I handed her a phone book that said BRITTANY. She said, "oh do you need it?" I said, "yes" and so she handed it back to me.

Later that day I spent some time researching Brittany, which I knew nothing about. I had heard the name and was vaguely familiar with the fact that it was somewhere in France but had no idea that it meant "Little Britain" and that it was a Celtic stronghold and former colony of exiles just accross the English Channel from England.

I did a search on one of my very favorite websites, answers.com, and came up with an amazing photo of the traditional regalia of these ancient people who speak one of the very oldest languages (a celtic dialect) in Europe.

Traditional costume in Brittany around 1900

Answers.com says:
"Brittany and the Breton people have retained many old customs and traditions. Breton, their Celtic language (akin to Welsh), is spoken in traditionalist Lower (i.e., western) Brittany outside the cities (see Breton literature). Brittany has remarkable stone calvaries, some built at the close of the 16th cent. to ward off the plague. Many megalithic monuments, formerly ascribed to the druids, dot the Breton landscape, notably at Carnac. These sights and the local traditions (old-fashioned peasant dress and high lace headgear, processions, and pilgrimages), which its inhabitants jealously maintain, have made Brittany an outstanding tourist attraction."

I read up on the Breton language and Breton music. But it was when I went housesitting and pulled a book off the book case a few weeks later that was really crazy. The book, Mysterious Britain, or something like that, said that the local legends in Brittany claimed that St. Anne, the mother of Mary and the grandmother of Jesus was from Brittany!

DFC Annual Meeting

2005-05-18T16:44:00.000-07:00

Since we moved to Davis we have been members of the Davis Food Co-op. We've decided to get involved through weekly volunteering and attending the Annual Meeting. There were a number of people there that we also got acquainted with at the Whole Earth Festival.

One of the key speakers wrote a book on the topic of Cooperatives, which are very popular here in Davis. We got a slide-show and a talk on Coopertive movements and history. Best of all we got to drink beer while we participated and had a nice little dinner there. It was a very inspiring event for me.

Whole Earth Festival 2005 Report

2005-05-18T16:35:00.000-07:00

Jose Arguelles was a former professor at UC Davis when he became one of the founders of Earth Day,(First Whole Earth Festival, Davis, California, 1970).

The WEF is cool because it is one of the oldest continuously running Earth Days in the world. The coolest thing about it is that it's FREE!!! So many festivals these days are just about making a profit. The best festival just also happens to be the one that my family can afford to go to! And it's within walking distance!

Unfortunately I didn't bring a camera but I got ahold of some pictures anyway and there's my little baby in the upper right hand corner with the yellow shirt, near the kids craft table.

The next best thing, well maybe it's a tie, is the sense of community. We got to see a lot of people that we knew from this blessed small town that also hosts one very effective natural foods CO-OP, also within walking distance. We also got to see a few old friends from Santa Rosa which was very cool. A mixture of old friends and new friends. Here's our new friend Morgan on a biodiesel tractor at WEF:

2005 Whole Earth Festival's Crowining Moment

HAMSA LILA!



	After a long Saturday, the sun began to set and the ecstatic dance began. Hamsa Lila bills itself as a sacred, even religious act, beyond mere entertainment, and they deliver! They set up an altar and sang some prayers. A truly devotional ecstatic performance for all of us that trance danced under the stars...

Hot tears steaming in the rain

Sunday's Closing Ceremony at the 2005 Whole Earth Festival

	Local activist, Sunny, inspires us with words and ritual to last us another year until we meet again.

We had a nice sing-along and a spiral dance. Sage and Tim can be spotted through the Tibetan prayer flags, above.

After the festival, Tim and I went home, or tried to. We were so amped up we just couldn't go home. We realized that a number of our acquaintances would be working with Project Compost, going through garbage and recycling late into the night. We decided to get involved!

Permaculture and its Application to Global Justice

2005-05-12T15:50:00.000-07:00

Holistic Movements with Permaculture

Notes from a talk at the 2005 Whole Earth Festival, Saturday May 7th:

Picture the blackboard at the front of the inside of this giant yellow dome -
A circle is drawn in the center with the word forest within it. Five spokes of a wheel emanate outwards like the rays of the sun, containing the words: diversity, cooperation, stacking, cycles and evolution.

Erik Ohlsen, the facilitator of the workshop, co-founded P.E.A. Planting Earth Activation.

In two years the Sebastopol-based group has planted 100 heirloom gardens.

Erik asked the group to re-form in a circle and then asked us to say why we think it is good to sit in a circle. The conclusion was that it was non-heirarchical. Yes, heirarchy exists in nature at times, he said, but so does cooperation, and it's useful to use de-centralization in social organizations. It "brings us into a common place."

Erik founded P.E.A. and took it to World Trade Organization protests in Seattle where they began planting guerilla gardens. They began taking over traffic meridians. Eric said that he wanted to create a model, bringing solutions in a place of resistance, and not just shut down the streets. During the Battle In Seattle Eric saw mega-unity-in-diversity from punks to business suits.

Our host gave us a basic definition of Permaculture: Modeling nature, create a "forest" of perrenial plants, and create a permanent food-culture...it's basically "food forest" gardening.

Eric's thesis was that Permaculture model can be applied to every aspect of culture, not just gardening. We need to model a forest in how we design every aspect of society.

Diversity the diversity we find in nature and therefore Permaculture. We are currently experiencing a proliferation of monoculture and homogenization in both farming and western corporate culture.

Cooperation it is a Darwinian myth that all is competition in nature. Competition does exist but there is also cooperation. Scientists couldn't understand how a strawberry plant was able to live and produce fruit in the understory of the rain forest with so little light available. They discovered that the tree whose leaves were high and able to reach the sun would produce the sugars and could bring them down to the mycorrhyza (fungi) which would deliver the sugar to the strawberries.

Stacking In nature and Permaculture "stacking" is an arrangement of plants to take advantage of all possible space, using tall and medium-sized trees with a lower shrub and herb layer. Care must be taken so that water and light compettion are at a minimum. The societal implications were not recorded in my notes on this one.

[Relinquishing Power] Another principle in Permaculture or a self-maintained, organized system (not listed on the board as one of the spokes). This is vital to understanding power dynamics, according to Erik.

Cycles Everything works in cycles. Time.

Evolution How can we evolve out of corporate empire?

IMHO, these last two seem more suited to being combined.

Erik asks: How can we apply Permaculture design to create communities that will last? It doesn't just take sustainability but "Resistance to Ivaders", using Starhawk's analogy to the pattern of historical patriarchal takover/military occupation. Erik works closely with Starhawk.

Permaculture is about webs/relationships/everything connected to everything else...

"We're a circle of designers!"

A group participation excercise begins:

The dome is divided into four quadrants: Yes, No, Effective, Not Effective.

We answer questions by moving to different quadrants and then we discuss our views. Why did we choose the way we did.

The questions include:

Is Peak Oil real?
Will solar power save the world?
Will biotech feed the world?

I went to the Yes quadrant for Peak Oil being real.

For "will solar power save the world" I went to No. Most people went to yes, except for me and Tim and Gabe. I spoke into the microphone and asked, "don't solar panels utilize some petroleum in their manufacture?" Gabe expressed concern over disposal issues.

The biotech issue was long and passionate, of course.

After the excercise Erik began to continue to inspire with more tales from the front lines. He started this organization, he said, to provide an alternative to the polarization rampant within the social justice community. He was tired of everything being "No" and "against." "The problem is the solution," he says. "Think whole systems."

In September of 2003, at the WTO ministerial in Cancun, they set up an eco-camp, utilizing rainwater catching, graywater, composting and rainforest gardening to create models. If you submerge enough oyster shells in acid rain it can neutralize the water.

"We don't have a water crises but a runoff crises! A consciousness crises!"

Every group of people contains all aspects of community for survival: you've got doctors, sewers, talents galore. We are each others resources.

The stories about geurilla gardening at the May, 2003 summit on genetic engineering in Sacramento were the most entertaining and inspiring. The homeless were able to harvest some of the produce, as one homeless woman who was present testified. She said the gardens are still being propagated through seed-saving.

Erik discussed the process of making seedballs and throwing them, in shell containers to protect from birds, onto degraded property. They include a diversity of seeds so that the plants that prefer to grow in that particular environment can choose to do so.

The seedballs were eventually charged with a crime and arrested by the local police. The police said they were weapons and put them in a box and hauled them off.
P.E.A. decided to host a workshop on the steps of the police station. They got a press-conference out of it. He said this is so much about "messenging." The cops got a press-conference out of it too. The police started lobbing seed-balls on film and called them weapons.

The conclusion of the day was: "We need sustainability and social justice woven together."

From the program guide: "Erik Ohlson is a Permaculture, Global Justice Organizer/Educator. he has spent the last six years building movements and nurturing campaigns that range from community gardens with ecological designs to global justice actions that confront Empire while modeling solutions to privatization. He tavels internationally, teaching permaculture courses and working with civil society movements in building soloutions and resistance at summit meetings of the WTO, G8, IMF, FTAA."