Irish Gods

[Occult Forum Archive]

Original post: edparadise

Samhain:

You make a fine point. Ed just about agrees with you, because he sees little reason not to, which is to say that: if there are pagan neoceltic groups out there who take themselves serious enough to have some good standards, than hurrah! Ed has little problem with these sorts, as I'm sure you remember - Ed's an eclectic himself, and hardly cares for religious purism - that's not where he's coming from here.

What is important (besides the quibbles) is this: Ed doesn't believe that anything we reconstruct as a religion ever has much connection because our basic ideas about religion itself have really changed. The "Celts" and us - even the pagan types (maybe especially the pagan types - and that's a whole other thread probably) had and have radically different concepts about what seem like normalized ideas - like "Irish Gods". Although my self-education on the matter is presumably deficient, that is why my own conclusions upon the matter are fairly conservative - that is, I always tend to fall back on purely archeological texts, etc. To be clear: I always side with the boring scholars, rather than other work, although there is clearly value - I'm not singling anyone out...

To be honest - and this is only me - my experience with people's use of "Celtic" gods is that the failure of traditional correspondence is obvious purely through linguistic study of the neoceltic's work. "Celtic" god X is almost always simply a label for concept Y from movement X which derives from cultural moments Z and A which were really reactions to cultural elemtns B and C which are usually fairly recent (some of them within our own lifetimes).

Some of this is quite fair, of course - I mean, imagine the case that there was traditional coherence, then the tradition itself would have been changed and reformed by the very cultural patterns and shifts that have formed the responses that we ourselves are dealing with in our own lives, and therefore in our own religions, pagan or not. But on the other hand, and again this is only me - I don't like dishonesty. I don't like the pretense of tradition when it is not there.

As you say - "inspired". Which is, of course, beautiful, in the end. If we are not inspired to reinvigorate our cultural objects, they will have no life.

So, to sum up: I agree with you some and some more, Samhain. It's just how touchy you get about it sometimes that cracks me up. But I forgot that there may be something of a standing argument between R and you that I was ignoring. Sorry about the quibbles - but I love them.

- Eddy.

[Occult Forum Archive]

Original post: Samhain

[QUOTE=edparadise]Samhain:

...............
So, to sum up: I agree with you some and some more, Samhain. It's just how touchy you get about it sometimes that cracks me up. But I forgot that there may be something of a standing argument between R and you that I was ignoring. Sorry about the quibbles - but I love them.

- Eddy.[/QUOTE]
Actually, that was the first time I had responded to anything Rakesh said. And I don't see myself as touchy. I thought I was quite diplomatic about it. Of course, others may see ourselves quite differently from how we see ourselves. On which topic, I suppose I should avoid commenting on your habit of referring to yourself in the third person.

I've read books by leaders of British Druid groups (e.g., Emma Restall Orr, Philip Carr-Gomm) and talked to ADF leaders (Isaac Bonewits, Liafal, Ian Corrigan) and none of them think that they can be just like the Druids of 2000 years ago. What they're trying to do is learn as much as they can about the Druids of the past and figure out what part of it can and should be incorporated into modern Druidry. The Celtic Recon websites I've visited seem to take the same approach. And I'm impressed by the level of scholarship I've found in these groups. However, I personally see myself as the descendent of Picts, rather than Celts, and there's no way I'm ever going to be able to learn enough about Pictish culture and beliefs to reconstruct that. Not without a time machine.

[Occult Forum Archive]

Original post: tonic

''Find the clan that your family stems from and find a God or Goddess you identify with. Learn to speak Irish and ask them to help you "as Gaeilge".''

maith thú

celtic history is one of the oldest and most complex of Europe. i'm from ireland myself, and there are new lessons and discoveries around every corner when studying this. anyone else from ireland/n.ireland here? an bhfuil gaeilge ag aon duine?

it makes me smile when i see other people taking an interest in something so close to me, and something so diverse

[Occult Forum Archive]

Original post: tonic

[QUOTE=Sidhe]---Heres a good place to start...
http://www.timelessmyths.com/celtic/cycles.html

~~~SIDHE~~~[/QUOTE]
sidhe, that site is quite good, but to anyone reading through it, the names are in Séanghaeilge, or old irish. just to let know. there are quite a few mistakes too, but i suppose it's a good starting point..

[Occult Forum Archive]

Original post: Aunt Clair

i think that the mabinogen is my fave source of celtic magick
it is a classic one of earliest sources and full of the mythos of celts

i also learned from Practical Celtic Magic by Murry Hope
but it is dry and heavy a hard slog and not romantic either
the only graphic is on the cover sadly
hmmmm

i found it hard to find any books that was not a historical account and actually dealt in practical magic as the title above implied but did not deliver , the book still was worth a skim

as a mystic mage i like to go straight to source and learn from spirit
some celtic teachers appeared to us along our path without invocation
Cerunnos came a lot during a stage and taught well like thoth
the green lady came but was hard for us to hear

Rhiannon comes regularly but that is because 2 mates in circle were druids together in past lives and love her dearly so she has taken our circle under her arm and treated us lovingly

fae and banshees too come regularly banshees teach but fae are harder to learn from they are quick to come and go

Merlin /Melchior appears as a world teacher and is one of the 3 wise man too

Morganna le Fay taught us when we were manifesting the chamber of the bees in the queens chamber within the golden bowl of the energy body . She taught the entire sequence there and I missed her when she left us .

these are strong teachers and appear around the world to students of magick
Lugh appeared because we humbly invoked him . A mate had a book on celtic gods and goddesses and
forgive me i dont recall the name of that source
but the book said Lugh was willing to come to teach how to heal relationships
and would give sage advice and magic
he taught us to manifest a huge emerald energy centre beneath a spot on the floor
where a man in circle was sitting on angry s-stirring red
we valued him as a peer but he was a bit bombastic and too much warrior for subtle works
the emerald quieted him, pacified him and we avoided further conflict
Lugh was shockingly handsome and very vivid btw

I feel learn to see spirit and project learn to meditate and then the teachers arrive
you can learn so much more than any book i have ever been able to get my hands on anyway

So I would say read what falls into your heart and hands
go to bookstores and see what draws you in
if nothing does try elsewhere
and dont forget google
read about the doreen virtue style of descriptions of gods and godhead
the ones that give the name the alignment the nature of their patronage and their willingness to be invoked