Never Again
Cambodia
Never Again
Bosnia
Never Again
Rwanda
Never Again
Darfur
May never forget mean more than never again.
Thank you to those who keep the memory from dying, so that others may live.
Archive for January, 2005
It’s hard to get in the mood of Tu B’shvat when there’s snow on the ground and it’s freezing cold outside. But when you think about it, isn’t this when we need to believe that the sap is rising and spring WILL come back?
Simple Tu B’shvat Ritual
Please modify this however you like. I kept it very simple to allow people to play with it and add pieces that would speak to them. Consider ideas like using a bonsai or lucky bamboo instead of a bulb.
Supplies:
- Bulb or Flowering branch prepped for forcing (available from many florists and garden shops)
- Container for bulb or branch
- Water
- Soil
- Candle
Intent: Coaxing Spring Back
Begin by taking three slow deliberate breaths to change your mindset from ordinary to sacred. Prepare your space by casting a circle in what ever technique you are most comfortable. Take your pot with soil or water and hold it between your hands. Focus on it and reach down into the dormant earth, drawing the energy into your body. Let this energy flow from your hands into the soil.
Say, “Blessed be the Source of Life, source of beginnings and endings, source of life and death, source of sleep and rebirth. May Spring come again in its time, and with it abundance for all.”
Take the bulb into your hands. Draw up Earth energy and feed it into the bulb.
Say, “Blessed be the Source of Life through whom we receive fruit and flowering trees. May the flowers return in their time, for the benefit of all.”
Place the bulb into the soil. Hold both together. Focus one by one on the elements of nature that the bulb will need to grow both the physical and the metaphysical. Earth, Air, Fire, and Water. As you move through each, symbolically sprinkle that element on the bulb. (Careful with the fire!)
Imagine the bulb growing and flowering and with it the Spring returning.
“So Mote It Be” (I create as I speak)
Sit quietly for a moment, and release your circle. Finish by taking three more deliberate breaths to return to ordinary space. Be sure to keep your bulb where you can easily care for it and watch it grow.
“I want to be an active participant in my reality. I want to happen upon my world rather then live in a world happening to me.”
This is a quote from my friend Sarah or Sera as she is also known. She is currently traveling through India learning, as well as teaching dance and movement. Sara is a dance shaman, if there is such a thing. She discovers universal truths and spiritual growth through movement and dance. She is one of the most beautiful people, inside and out, that I’ve had the pleasure of meeting in my life.
It was such a beautifully clear way of explaining my path, that I wanted to share it with you.
I was asked last night where the line between Renewal or Eco-Jew and Jewitch is. My immediate answer was, “Magick.”
Of course, during this whole conversation about my life as a Jewitch, I avoided the subject until that moment. I find it unbelievably difficult to talk about magick or magickal experiences with people, even Pagan friends. It seems like talking about it puts human limitations on experiences that are beyond human. Aspecting, spiritual/fey/elemental beings, energy work, pathworking, spellwork — all of these things are part and parcel of my life, but I can’t talk about them.
Perfect example is an experience I had last year after a ritual. I wandered off into the nearby woods because I kept seeing what appeared to be verdant, golden clearing about 50′ back. I didn’t really say anything to the other people, I just walked back there. Here’s where things get hard to explain. The simplest way to describe it, is that I was kidnapped by fairies. That however, does not begin to describe or explain what happened.
When I finally heard people calling my name about 15 minutes later, and apparently they had been calling me for several minutes before I heard them, I had to actually ask permission to leave. I seriously couldn’t find my way the 50′ feet back until I did, and then the way was clear.
I tried to explain it to people and they just kind of looked at me. Who knows, maybe I just had a mini-stroke.
What I do know is that talking about what makes me a witch, instead of just a earth-concious Jew, is next to impossible. There’s no one thing. It’s who I am, and how I interact with the world around me. I have a simple definition of magick, but not of living a magickal life. I just don’t know how to put these things into words that have meaning.
Maybe that’s the difference. Living a magickal life instead of just practicing magick.
No Blacks.
No Jews.
No Dogs.
That’s what the signs used to say. Jews gained nearly as much from the work of Dr. King as African-Americans. Rabbi Joseph Heschel, a personal hero of mine, marched in Selma with Dr. King, and many other less famous faces were in the crowds at that and other marches. Many people today cannot fathom a time when Jews were not considered “white.” We owe this to Dr. King. If there was any other group in America at that time who truly understood, it was the Jews. Segregation, degredation, bigotr, lynchings, or pogroms — these are all the same battles that Jews had fought for generations. Fresh from the horrors of WWII, it was not difficult for Jews to see the importance of African-American’s battles for civil rights.
Thank you Dr. King.
Thank you for your faith. Thank you for your expression of faith. Thank you for your commitment to humanity.
We have come so far, but there is still so much work to do.
