Pantheons; Gods, and Goddess.
Recommended Reading: Solitary Witch by Silver Ravenwolf.
Today’s post, I’m going to gear a bit differently – as I walk through this journey of learning and understanding Wicca once more, I also find myself learning about other religions as well. Pantheon of Greece, the Celtic Pantheon and Norse or Germanic Pantheons, as well as Egyptian Pantheons. I also took it upon myself to learn more about Christianity and our Goddess, the Great Mother.
All religions come from the belief of a God, or Goddess, or both – many, and singular. Our Goddess, the Maiden, the Mother, and the Crone might have taken shape around the duration of man in the Paleolithic Age (The Paleolithic Age: 5 million, to 10,000 B.C.E), where she was perceived as the life-giver and identified with the power of fornication or procreation; i.e. fertility, sowing of seeds in the land, new growth. She was especially important in the means of gathering food, for our Neolithic cultures.
However there was a shift, a transition from gathering of food, to production of meals, when being fertile and agricultural abundance were extremely vital to growing life of Neolithic community. In archaeological digs, there have been many statuettes of the Mother Goddess found within Neolithic grave sites, that indicate this transition, where she was important to the production of food, more-so, than to the gathering.
I had little understanding in my previous attempts at becoming a witch, or studying Wicca, that we used multiple pantheons, whether it be the Wiccan pantheon, or a pantheon of the caster’s choice (If you don’t know by now, but a pantheon is like a family tree, for Gods and Goddesses). From Silver Ravenwolf’s Ultimate Book of Shadows or Solitary Witch, she names many pantheons that I’ve mentioned above, in the first paragraph of this post. I quote, “Traditional Wiccan groups normally have a single, chosen pantheon used by all members for sabbats, esbats, group workings, initiations, circlecasting, and quarter calls.” – Solitary Witch, pg 31, part 1.
That being said, a witch can work with her own pantheon outside of the circle, when she does her solitary magick. Calling upon two or more pantheons, leads to a muddy mess of misconceptions and wayward Gods and Goddess, that might become angry because the attentions are spread and focused on different omni-present individuals.
How interesting, yes? The more I read, the more I learn – but, I also know and understand that not everyone follows the same words, by law. How do I get my own pantheon? I’m going to wait, suggested to me, to work with just the Lord and Lady, for now. I will await my pantheon to choose me, and build relationships with the pantheon until one finds me worthy, and begins my life-long journey into working with them.
Likely, I will fill another blog post out more, as time goes on and until then, Blessed Be, and have a wonderful day.
Wiccan Winds 