Somethin' About Yeshua...

Christmas fast approaches. And even though I consider myself a Druidic sort, the scholarly "Happy-Everything" Sagittarian in me can never quite resist going back and revisiting the topic of Yeshua, aka "Jesus." After all, his birth has been celebrated on December 25th for centuries now, starting around 354 CE, within the Roman Empire.

This date is approximate, given one particular fact: The Jewish calendar is lunar and so the attempt to calculate the day based on solar measurement places the date of Yeshua's birth around December 25th...or April 6th, depending on the source of info. In fact, there has not yet been a month in which scholars have NOT tried to place Yeshua's arrival, simply because he was truly born so long ago, we don't know precisely when his birth actually took place. For all we know, it could have been December 25th and no one would truly be the wiser.

Oh, sure, my fellow Pagans are keen to argue that the December 25th date is also the Roman festival of Saturnalia, which also falls on the week of the Winter Solstice, a scientifically provable solar event, whether or not you are a Pagan or any other spiritual path. :-P My fellow Pagans--particularly the more vociferous ones--also opine that the date of December 25th was chosen solely for the purpose of converting the pagans of the time to Christianity.

Upon researching further, I discovered a few interesting tidbits.

In the year 354, (the earliest time recorded for celebrating Yeshua's birthday on the 25th of December), Constantius II, one of the sons of Emperor Constantine I, was Rome's head cheese, the direct predecessor to Julian, another of Constantine's sons. Julian himself went back to being a Roman Pagan, and thus earned the title "Apostate." But that's a topic for another time.

Constantius II partly subscribed to the philosophy of Arianism, NOT to be confused with "Aryanism." A church priest named Arius posed the question "Is Jesus unbegotten?" The upshot of this challenge to the more popular trinitarian view of Yeshua (The whole Father-Son-Holy-Ghost schmere) was that Yeshua was created like any other human soul, and Arius backed up his hypothesis by referencing John 14:28, in which Yeshua says that the father "is greater than I", and John 17:20-26, where Yeshua requests of his disciples to "become one as we are one." Both scriptures indicated, at least as far as Arius was concerned, more of a oneness of will and thought, rather than ultimate unity within a Trinity.

End result? Arius was branded a heretic, but his ideas ended up becoming the longest-running controversy within the Church. (This tells me he was likely onto something, at least philosophically speaking, because if something challenges the political powers-that-be, that means their ideas are not very solid and they darn well know it.)

So, what about Yeshua, anyway? Begotten or not? After all, the word "begotten," in this sense meant that the Divine Essence had always existed, and theforefore Yeshua did, too...that is, if one believed that Yeshua was the "only begotten Son of God."

Whether or not Yeshua was "begotten" or "unbegotten" does not necessarily matter to me, personally. His intent was Love, and that is that, to my mind. Same thing with the whole "Messiah" deal. The concept of his being "begotten" and the idea that he was THE Messiah are long-intertwined, but as far as I am concerned, Yeshua was simply a good, loving man with some pretty extraordinary gifts for healing, if the Synoptic Gospels have any ring of historical truth to them, regardless of what time they were written.

That being said...

Such an apocalyptic view of someone--ANYone--anticipated to be a Messianic figure in the time of John (Yohannan) the Baptist and Jesus (Yeshua) was a popular one, given that the Israelites were under the harsh thumb of Rome at the time. I mean, if I were in that time cycle, in that tribe of people, having to deal with the way Roman emperors made such dictatorial--and often cruel--decisions about the populace, I'd kinda be a bit anxious for some relief, political or religious, or a bit of both.

And when you put that anxiety together with some pretty convincing prophecies by Micah, Nahum, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and a bunch of others, you have a recipe for the multitudinous cries of "Save us!"

Add a pinch of "original sin" doctrine of one type or another, and you have a religious mixture that lends very well to the well-entrenched belief and action of "taking Jesus as one's personal savior," and "Jesus is the reason for the season" holiday cards and lighted yard signs at this rather magical time of year.

Do I believe in original sin, as put forth by many religious scholars and priests? No. I do not. "Adam and Eve" to me are simply symbological names given to the evolutionary jump from Homo Erectus to Homo Sapiens. In evolutionary theory, there existed no such being as "the Devil," no matter what form such a being might take. "Sapiens" is loosely translated, according to my inferences of the phrase "sapiential eschatology," as 'human being with the ability to think or reason.' "Sapiential eschatology" in this sense, is the concept of using reason to act in a 'Godly' manner, thereby not requiring God to intervene as far as the concept of the "end of the world" is concerned. Perhaps it is a philosophical stretch between one 'tribe' and another, but I think the Hopis said it best: "We are the ones we have been waiting for."

Besides, I have personally come to the conclusion that we never really were "separated" from the Divine in the first place. Okay, so we lower our vibrations in order to manifest in, and "operate" a physical body...but does this mean we are somehow "faulted" or "weak" because we are embodied spirits and have been this way since humans first existed as a result of some sort of "temptation"? Not by my reckoning. The only "hell" that exists is within our minds and hearts, in our false assumptions about ourselves and others, in our illusions about human nature ("we behave badly therefore we are inherently bad").

My point, and I do have one, in all this meandering around from subtopic to subtopic is this...

In my readings about Yeshua and other topics (inside and outside of my college religion classes), I have come to understand three salient ideas:

1) Yeshua very likely existed; he was raised in the extant faith of the time, but seemed to develop some very controversial ideas that, in the minds of the Sanhedrin, posed a religious threat to their power as well as a threat to Rome, who might punish the Israelites for "aiding and abetting" someone who might advocate the beginnings of a revolt against the Empire.

2) Yeshua did not come here to purposefully BE a revolutionary, though his ideas of "love your enemy" and to be self-sacrificing on behalf of someone else who is in trouble were certainly eyebrow-raisers. This dude was more like Gandhi or Buddha and less like the "uber-warrior" that the politicos of the time thought he might be.

3) Ultimately, he came here and showed us a very beautiful way to live in the Divine Light of Love.

Is the fact that his approximate birth date, (at least according to the Jewish calendar day, which has been roughly translated into the solar day of December 25th), happens to fall during the week of both Winter Solstice (a scientifically observable occurrence) and the old Roman holiday of Saturnalia a coincidence? We have no real way of discerning the factual truth of it, considering Yeshua was alive and kicking a good 2.5 millenia ago.

So perhaps we may be allowed to put aside our scientific hats for a time, and put on a more meditative mystic's robe, and ponder a while the mystery of the healer and teacher so many have come to revere. Whether or not he is some sort of "savior," is doubtful to my reasoning mind (what a burden that ephithet must be!), but what I am never doubtful of is what he taught, and what he taught can be used by the rest of us reasoning members of Homo Sapiens to better ourselves in the hopes that swords CAN be made into plowshares, that we will one day taste the sweet juice of peace and never again the bitter flavor of war.


In the words of my Yes-brothers: "The Time is Now, the Word is Love."

Always Love...


Brightest Holiday Blessings,
Rev. Kat ^.^

Divine Fabulousness

I find it highly improbable that I would be referencing a book by a fashion maven in a blog that is supposedly devoted to "spiritual" things.

But I feel compelled to write anyway...

As I posted in my Foolbard blog, I just finished reading a book by gay fashion maven Simon Doonan. It's called "Eccentric Glamour: Creating an Insanely More Fabulous You."

And as I finished the last few delectably witty pages, chuckling till the end, I realized that in many ways, I could suggest this book be reviewed in "SageWoman." Okay, so SageWoman is not a fashion mag, but for me, the book he wrote was a nod from the Goddess Herself to be my own woman and not try to look like anyone else as far as how I use clothing and makeup to show my individuality. I am having difficulty finding the exact words to describe how I feel after getting this huge nudge from the Goddess-Force...

And how I would connect it to being more of what it might feel like to embody the myriad facets of the Goddess...Her Divine Fabulousness...that too is challenging my skills, and I think I'm a pretty decent writer.

Heh...unbidden, yet welcome, comes a line from a Jon-n-Vangelis song, into my head: "Be the Light you are." I think my Spirit Guide or Guides like to use the lines I like to bite me in the butt or hit me over the head if I'm talking or acting in a rather dense way. I, like other humans, can be a bit thick.

Anyhow, back to the book. Doonan writes that the allure inherent in being eccentrically glamourous is largely a state of mind. As a Witchy Woman, I can't argue with this. If we think we are not glamourous, we're not going to be...we're going to sit round the house all depressed and negative about ourselves. We especially do this if we're brought up to believe that glamour belongs to the wealthy and being wealthy is somehow bad...that old chestnut.

Yet, in magickal work, a 'glamoury' is nothing more than a mental charm, a spell cast to enhance what is already there, or even disguise a feature.

And what is the artful application of makeup, perfume and spiffy clothing that suits the wearer but a gigantic glamoury on not just others (think of a woman seeking out a date) but herself?

Scent alone has the unbelievable glamoury of either setting one's chakras spinning in sexual and even emotional arousal, or turning someone off completely because someone *else* wore that perfume or aftershave and that someone else broke hearts--perhaps including yours--like a squirrel breaks walnuts.

Okay, so I'm writing this to women, as a woman.

What about men who are eccentrically glamourous?

I can name a few...and it doesn't have anything to do with the clothing they wear or their orientation. Again, it's all about the allure...the mindset that they have about themselves that draws women--and even other men (gay or straight)--like bees to nectar.

Most people would call it charisma. But what is charisma but an enhanced glamoury--apart from being physically attractive?

It's sort of like 'Austin Powers' (Mike Myers) in the scene with the fembots in the first movie. They're all like, "You can't resist us, Mr. Powers." And Powers says, "Au contraire, baby! I think *you* can't resist *me*!" 'Austin' knows he's attractive, he knows he's got the mojo to get the ladies going in AND out of bed, so he figures he might as well live life to the fullest and enjoy the effect he has on women. Yet what really gives 'Austin' his allure is his UN-James-Bond-like sweetness and shyness...for instance, in the beginning credits for the first movie, one scene shows him hiding in a phone booth with a disguise on, hoping to outfox the ladies chasing after him...which is probably why they *are* chasing him to begin with...we ladies love a guy full of contradictions.
 
For us, that's what creates the allure a lot of the time.

Talk about your je-ne-sais-quoi and Divine Fabulousness! ;-)

Speaking of Divine Fabulousness, I seek to create some of that in my room later on, but I seriously need some of that fabulousness called 'shuteye.'

Blessed Be,
Rev. Kat ^.^