Mabon v Autumnal Equinox

“That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” - William Shakespeare.

Recently contemporary Pagans celebrated the festival day of Mabon or the Autumnal Equinox. It’s an understatement to say that the festival was controversial. Everything from its name to its celebration as a festival day. 

Let’s start with the name “Mabon.” In 1974, an American named Aidan Kelly was pondering the Wheel of the Year when he noticed that the Autumnal Equinox didn’t have a unique name. He decided it should be called Mabon, after the Welsh god. He shot off a letter to the classic Pagan magazine The Green Egg, and the name stuck.

It’s important to note that there is no historical Celtic Autumnal equinox holiday by the name Mabon. 

This leads to the next controversy. The celebration by contemporary Pagans, especially Wiccans, of the Autumnal equinox. We know that the medieval Gaels (Scots and Irish) celebrated Beltane (1 May), Lughnasadh (1 August), Samhain (1 November), and Imbolc (1 February). But we have no evidence of a pre-Christian Autumnal Celtic equinox festival, especially in pre-Christian Wales.

So does this mean that the festival of Mabon is illegitimate? Not at all.

First, it doesn’t matter that there might not have been an Autumnal equinox festival in pre-Christian Wales. This is only a problem if we limit our traditions to pre-Christian British culture. Since ancient times, the start of Fall has been celebrated by different pre-Christian cultures. For example, in Europe, the ancient Greeks used the Autumnal equinox to mark when the goddess Persephone returned to her husband, Hades.

Second, it doesn’t matter that the myths about the god Mabon aren’t historically associated with Autumn. All festivals are artificial. Let’s look at a major Christian festival for comparison.

Christmas is considered by most Christians to be a high holy day. However, there’s nothing historic about it. None of the Christmas narratives happened. The virgin birth, the star of Bethlehem, three magi, the census causing them to travel, the murder of the innocents by Herod, angels singing to shepherds, and so forth are all legends with no connection to reality. On top of this, the early Christians didn’t even celebrate Christmas. This didn’t start until the 3rd century CE.

So, if contemporary Pagans want to celebrate the Autumnal equinox, we can. And if we want to call it Mabon because some random guy in the 1970s decided to call it that, we can do that too.

Worship and Change

There is so much to discuss concerning gods and other divine beings. Most of which goes beyond the scope of a blog. There are two issues concerning gods that I want to address before I move to different topics in future blog posts.

Should We Worship Gods? 

It’s common among those who self-identify as being on the Left-Hand Path (LHP) to oppose the worship of gods. This makes sense if we define “worship” as the abandonment of autonomy and groveling to another. If that was the only meaning of worship, we shouldn’t practice that with any entity, even to a god. You should never surrender your self-respect or autonomy to anyone. This includes gods.

However, many contemporary Pagans see worship not as groveling but as “extravagant respect,” as defined by Merriam-Webster. All entities, physical and spiritual, inherently deserve respect. Unfortunately, universal respect is not considered a virtue by many. A god deserves special respect if for no other reason than the greatness they possess. So, “extravagant respect” is appropriate for a god.

Being in a relationship adds something to respect. For example, I consider all senior citizens to be due great respect. However, I believe my father deserves greater respect from me because of our relationship. Applying this to the gods, if one is lucky enough to have a close relationship with a particular god, it takes respect to a higher level than other gods.

The Norse goddess Hel.

Birth and Change

Can new gods come into being? Also, can gods change? The answer to both of these questions is found in the physical world. 

Change is a part of life. Each of us must and will change as we get older. Plus, new species are originating all the time. The Hermetic Principle, “As Above, So Below,” therefore demands that new gods are born and existing gods change.

We need to remember that gods are spirits. And according to Judika Illes, new spirits are constantly coming into being. There’s every reason to think that some of these new spirits are gods. So, yes, there are new gods that didn't exist in antiquity.

Also, gods can change. Just as humans can and do change during their lifetime, gods can and do change over time. Therefore, there’s no reason to think that the gods of old are the same today as when they were worshiped 3,000 years ago.

More About Gods

I first need to state what many consider an obvious detail about gods. Gods are a class of spirits. According to occultist and author Judika Illes in her book The Encyclopedia of Spirits, spirits are non-corporeal and alive with their own needs and desires. 

Is there one Spirit or multiple spirits? We can look to life on Earth for guidance.

It’s estimated that there are nearly 9 million species of life on Earth. Even if we limit ourselves to our own species, nearly 8 billion humans are alive today. Each one of us has our own personality with our own desires and a capacity for autonomous behavior. In addition, humans aren’t the only conscious lifeforms. We now understand that many other lifeforms, such as elephants, dolphins, octopuses*, and ravens, have their own complex form of consciousness. 

Therefore, applying the Hermetic Principle “As Above, So Below” necessitates that the spirit world should have a wide variety, just as the physical world. Not only must there be numerous types of spirits, but there must also exist various levels of consciousness, some equal to or possibly greater than our own.

What makes one spirit a god while another spirit not? To paraphrase Herald from the play Henry V, how do we sort noble spirits from the common? I turn to Stephen Dillon, who, in his book The Case for Polytheism, distinguishes gods from the other spirits as entities having something he calls “remarkable greatness.”

“Remarkable greatness” is somewhat fuzzy and hard to pin down. I can best describe it as a sense of awe and wonder one experiences when in their presence. I’ve worked with different spirits, some of whom left me speechless and scared the crap out of me. But there is nothing like the presence of a god. 

Now that I've provided a basic definition of what is meant by a “god,” I can further explore their nature and our relation to them in future posts. 

*Note: according to the Ocean Conservatory website, the plural of octopus is “octopuses.”

Gods and Other Divinities

“I have known many gods. He who denies them is as blind as he who trusts them too deeply.” ― Robert E. Howard and L. Sprague De Camp, Queen of the Black Coast

A distinguishing feature of Dark Paganism is that, as a part of the larger Pagan family, it’s a polytheistic philosophy. Polytheism differs from monotheism in that it views the divine in multiplicity rather than as a singularity.

Polytheism doesn’t prohibit an underlying unity to divinity. We can look to nature for guidance. A unity in nature exists in that all biological life has DNA at its core. However, there’s also a glorious diversity of lifeforms. Like nature, while the gods share a unified divinity, there is a multitude of gods with many different attributes.

At this point, Pagans, Dark and otherwise, begin to differ. Pagans are divided into three camps about the nature of the gods. These three views are Archetypal, Soft Polytheist, and Hard Polytheist.

Some Pagans see the gods as archetypes. Some archetypists view the gods as purely psychological manifestations, while others as a phenomenon arising from the collective unconscious and universal forces of nature. For some archetypists, the various gods are Currents that flow like great rivers from a unified Source.

There are Pagans who view the multitude of gods as “masks” of a Divine Masculine (God) and Divine Feminine (Goddess). Known as Soft Polytheism, gods such as Zeus, Marduk, Ra, Odin, and so forth are simply aspects of one God. The same is thought about goddesses, where Inanna, Aphrodite, Hera, and Isis are all considered to be aspects of one Goddess.  

Finally, some Pagans are Hard Polytheists. In this view, the gods genuinely exist as autonomous persons. While their nature may not be exactly like ours, humans can have relationships with the gods.

While all three camps have strengths and weaknesses, I consider the Hard Polytheist view to be the most sound. I'll return to this topic in the future. So, watch this space.