We started today with our practice of self-reflection; travelling back to the last time we met, checking in with where we’re at today, and imagining ahead to the story of ‘The Loathly Lady’. Within the rich and varied world of King Arthur, The Loathly Lady is one mythic motif amongst countless others, and it is our doorway into the imagination today. Before meeting the hag in the story to whom the story owes its name, we looked towards the ‘loathly’ aspects of ourselves; areas of our character and our life that are perhaps neglected and calling for our love and attention. We also asked ourselves at the beginning of our day together, ‘what is it that I need from today?’. There was a common theme of needing to feel connected, needing soul friendship, needing community and needing to feel that we belong. As beautiful as it can be at times, soul work can also bring loneliness as the soul invites us into decisions that sometimes sever relationships, or draws us down paths that are distant to that of others. There was acknowledgement and deep appreciation for the community that we feel amongst ourselves in our Wild Wisdom School, and how essential this is for each of our unique but interconnected soul journeys.
Our wider community in the garden of Wild Wisdom School
Moving into the story itself, we followed Arthur’s quest to discover the answer to a question given to him in threat of his land and ruling. The question was this… “what is it that women most desire?” After asking many women and receiving as many answers, he finally receives the one true answer from a hag – ‘the loathly lady’ – who asks for the marriage hand of one of his treasured knights in return. Arthur accepts and offers her Gawain, and then receives her answer which is this… what women most desire is the freedom to make their own choices, their own power, their own sovereignty.
This is a story I have heard a few times now since I arrived in the storied land of Devon. The first time was during a pilgrimage on the moors that I took with my fellow students at Schumacher College as we began our exit from the college and into the world. Martin Shaw came to visit us one evening and brought with him this story. Being with many non-native English speakers, the most prominent question after the telling was ‘what does sovereignty mean?’. Interestingly, I actually had this same question in my head too but I felt stupid asking. I knew what it meant on a political or societal level, but it is less familiar on an individual level, and I see now requires an unravelling of meaning. In our Wild Wisdom study pot, we unravelled the idea of what sovereignty really means, leading to us asking ourselves “What is my sovereignty? And what do I have that I can share in the service of all beings?”
Moreover, within the many layers of meaning and symbol of the Loathly Lady, the hag is often seen to represent the land. When she asks Arthur for one of his knights in marriage, she is also asking ‘are you willing to serve the land?’. When Gawain marries the hag she becomes beautiful for one half of the day because a spell she was under is half broken in the act of marriage. She asks him – would you prefer me beautiful by day and ugly by night, or ugly by day and beautiful by night? Gawain passes the question back to the hag, and in doing so grants her the freedom to choose her own path, her own sovereignty, and the spell is broken completely. I feel this is such a significant story for our times, both in relation to women and to the land we depend upon. It grants voice to the previously silenced, and empowers us into relationship rather than dominion.
We ended our day in ceremony, which we co-created and weaved together from the various strands that had emerged since the morning. And we sung:
This is my second cycle of Wild Wisdom School year one, which for me and a few others also runs alongside year two. This means there is a double helix pattern that unfolds itself through the year; one month in the time span of year one – meeting themes for a second time – and the next in the time span of year two – meeting themes afresh. However, each weekend with year one feels very different to the previous time because one year later the ears that hear are different ears! In Ancient Egypt this week, our story was of the goddess Isis and her consort Osiris, and our portal into this mythology was through the Biblical mythology of Dinah, Asenath and Joseph*. Last time I heard this story, I was in the beginnings of a beautiful relationship, this time I was in the endings of this relationship. Last time, the Biblical portal was familiar but not close to me, this time the story of Dinah was embedded in my heart after having read Anita Diamant’s telling in “The Red Tent”. These differences in my being direct the focus of my attention in the story. On hearing the story last year, what moved my heart most deeply was the image of Isis crying tears of grief for the loss of her love Osiris, and later tears of joy for his return. Her tears fell to the dry and cracked ground until the waters of the river Nile began to swell, and the land became fertile and full of life once again. This image holds so many layers of truth, revealing (in Sam’s words) “the power of love to restore, heal and rebirth that which is lost, wounded or broken…”
This year, I was so moved and gripped by the story of Dinah and her daughter Asenath, that when we entered the story of Isis I found myself stubbornly not moving on, but rather dwelling for longer with Dinah. In the Bible, Dinah is the only daughter of Jacob and Leah; Jacob being the son of Isaac and Rebekah, Isaac the son of Abraham and Sarah. Like other female characters, there is very little emphasis on Dinah’s story in the Bible, but people like Anita Diamant have dug her up and put flesh to her name. In Sam’s telling, I returned to her passionate story; from her birth to her first blood to the bloody murder of her husband, and then to the story of her daughter Asenath (who in The Red Tent is actually a son). I am reminded of how dynamic and alive story is; never do I hear the same story in quite the same way.
Sacred Icons painted by Sam
After lunch – a feast as always – we moved into the studio and into a different way of being with the story through Sacred Art. Each with a patch of papyrus and some acrylic paint, we painted symbols and motifs from the myth of Isis and Osiris. We were guided by Sam into the practice of Sacred Art, something she’s been exploring at the Princes School of Traditional Arts (see her icon drawings above). She advised us that “Sacred Art isn’t about what you produce; it’s about what’s going on inside you during the process”. So I slowly felt into which motif I wanted to paint, and it was the Eye of Horus that caught my painting hand. I entered deeply this symbol through painting it, and to paint on the material used at this time in history was very cool. I am certainly no painter, but painting this symbol with such attention and sacred intent, I found something of a love for painting that is very unfamiliar to me! I even loved what I managed to produced, which again is an unfamiliar feeling when it comes to artwork.
Our collection of papyruses, with my Eye of Horus in the forefront.
Our ceremony today was short and simple since we were all a bit too caught up in our pieces of papyrus! But a ceremony it was nonetheless; including sharing in collaborative communion with Jan’s Orange and Ginger vodka, contemplatively appreciating each other’s artwork, and exchanging in hugs. Four weekends on, there is a definite felt sense of love and depth in our Wild Wisdom vessel, and so the journey in the wild seas of the Western Mysteries continues…
*This is a speculative association between the Biblical myths and earlier myths and is based on the location and time period that Dinah is thought to have lived.
