Herbal Rituals by Judith Berger

Author:Judith Berger
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: sage, dandelion, herbs, violet, pine, elderberry, comfrey, rosemary, hawthorn, burdock, thyme, rituals and ceremony, earth awareness, stinging nettles, black birch, elderflower, mugwort, red clover, red raspberry, yarrow
Publisher: Judith Berger

MARRYING

Many, many years ago, when the calendar followed the wax and wane of the moon and women marked time according to the monthly shedding of their shiny, garnet mantles of uterine blood, the first of May was a day of celebration, a day of ritual known as Beltane. Beltane was named after a Druid sun god called Belenos, who, awakened by the flowering, spring scent which wafted through the air behind the earth goddess’s every movement, descended from the sky and asked for her hand. Warmed by the radiant heat of his extended palm, stirred by the light of his eyes, she took his fingers in her own. These two offered themselves to one another in marriage, vowing to endure all weathers together, and to return eternally, year after year, to renew their commitment to fertility. The seeds sown of their lovemaking gave birth to the shadowy forms of fruits which grew plump and full on the sky food of sun and rain, and ripened to fit the palms of human hands as summer deepened into fall.

But this holiday could not occur without a similar vow on the part of humans, a vow sung and danced around trees and sealed through human mating upon the freshly plowed and seeded fields. The two-leggeds made a game of running through the forest in search of the perfect tree, which from previous hunts they knew would be found lying heart to heart with the ground, and whose powerful, solid form resembled the phallus of the virile male. When the tree was chosen, it was carried out of the woods, laid upon the ground, and decorated with white and red ribbons. These ribbons symbolized the streaming forces of life and death which danced together to create new life.

The humans then knelt upon the ground and dug gently into the soil with their hands, slowly carving a deep hole to represent the holy womb of the earth mother. Finally, the people lowered the tree into the open place they had fashioned out of the earth’s substance, and crowned the top of the now upright tree with a wreath of hawthorn blossoms, leaves, and thorns. Gathering up the ribbons, young and old danced round and round the tree, singing of the marriage of earth and sky, of the ever returning cycle of regeneration, and of the glorious flowers which would miraculously swell into fruit come autumn’s harvest.

It was believed that these dances energized the soil and awakened the earth’s desire to create, and so people danced deep into the night, their stomping feet arousing yet another land: the inner fields of their own desires. Slowly, couples took hands and disappeared into the far fields and thickets, the juices of their own lovemaking fertilizing the soil in the manner of the god and goddess.

In this way, humans married themselves to the earth, promising to bear with her through her cycles of life, death, and rebirth. The humans who honored this vow, bending close to the earth that

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