Dance Of The Divine Feminine

Raven Dance
Extraordinary Ordinary Light Of Dark

א' תשרי התשס"ט
Blodlessing 2
Rosh Hashanah 1

The second of thirty-six shaman stones I am gathering in the manner of my Celtic ancestors was collected on Sunday afternoon, from beneath the lilac bush which grows right outside the bedroom window of the room I occupied as a child. It was from the closet connected to this room of my childhood that I experienced the epiphany. The rock is a whitish limestone with metamorphic calcite crystals. In the crevices remain streaks of earth and chlorophyll-containing vegetation material.

The second shaman stone in Celtic magic corresponds to the spirit of Raven, the spirit of the Dark Moon, to Crone consciousness, and represents contact with the Ancestral spirit of transformation. Flowing from the hidden depths of the Dark Goddess, Raven symbolizes the Divine Feminine, Ancestral Wisdom, Silence, Stillness, Creativity, Link between Heaven and Earth, Connection to one's Source, Prophecy, Renewal and Manifestation.

Limestone is a rock of biogenic origin (בנן). One of the most important building (בנה) materials used by humankind for construction over the course of history (including temples and pathways), limestone also gives us the caves and caverns (בין) within which much has been revealed about the origins of humanity and its vision quest for Divinity.

Calcite is a stable polymorph of calcium carbonate whose single crystals "display an optical property called birefringence" which is "double refraction or the decomposition of a ray of light into two rays (the ordinary ray and the extraordinary ray) when it passes through certain types of material, such as calcite crystals."

Given the historical uses of limestone and the optical property distinguishing its calcite crystals, representing the spirit of Raven and the Dark Divine Feminine, my second shaman stone flows from Ancestral Wisdom and also corresponds to the "second conscious power of the intellect in Creation", that is Binah. Binah is the emanant "power to grasp, develop and integrate an idea."

The soil of the earth and green chlorophyll-containing material dwelling within the stone's crevices represent manifest living life, and thereby, represent the soul powers of devekut and actualization of Creative force (stone-ohr-light, earth-chayut-lifeforce and life-koach-energy).

My second shaman stone will be marked with the three Hebrew shorashim (roots) as written above, as well as with the Welsh prefix aber (denoting the mouth of a river) and the Gaelic word tuig (meaning to understand) in Ogham letters. The Welsh word dawnsio (pronounced "down-see-oh", a verb meaning "to dance") will be written in Bardic Runes.