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              The Dark Goddess

A Charge of the Dark Goddess
Wisdom and empowerment are the gifts of the Dark Goddess
Of Transformation.

She is known to us as Kali, Hecate, Cerridwen, Lilith,
Persephone, Fata, Morgana, Ereshkigal, Arianhrod, Durga,
Inanna, Tiamat, and by a million, million other names:

Hear me child, and know Me for who I am. I have been with you
Since you were born, and I will stay with you until you return to Me At the final dusk.

I am the passionate and seductive lover who inspires the poet to dream. I am the One who calls to you at the end of your journey. After the day Is done, My children find their blessed rest in my embrace.

I am the womb from which all things are born.
I am the shadowy, still tomb; all things must come to Me and bare their Breasts to die and be reborn to the Whole.

I am the Sorceress that will not be ruled, the Weaver of Time, the Teacher of Mysteries. I snip the threads that bring my children home To me. I slit the throats of the cruel and drink the blood of the Heartless. Swallow your fear and come to me, and you will discover True beauty, strength, and courage.

I am the fury which rips the flesh from injustice.
I am the glowing forge that transforms your inner demons into tools of Power. Open yourself to my embrace and overcome.

I am the glinting sword that protects you from harm.
I am the crucible in which all the aspects of yourself merge together in a rainbow of union. I am the velvet depths of the night sky, the swirling mists of midnight, Shrouded in mystery.

I am the chrysalis in which you will face that which terrifies you and From which you will blossom forth, vibrant and renewed. Seek me at The rossroads, and you shall be transformed, for once you look upon my Face, there is no return.

I am the fire that kisses the shackles away. I am the cauldron
in which all opposites grow to know each other in
Truth. I am the web which connects all things.

I am the Healer of all wounds, the Warrior who rights all wrongs in Their Time. I make the weak strong. I make the arrogant humble. I raise Up the oppressed and empower the disenfranchised. I am Justice Tempered with Mercy.

Most importantly, child, I am you. I am part of you, and I am within You. Seek me within and without, and you will be strong. Know me. Venture into the dark so that you may awaken to Balance, Illumination, and Wholeness. Take my Love with you everywhere and find the Power within to Be who you wish.
Author unknown







Excerpt from Yoni.com

I'm the bitch from hell.



I think you know me well.







I am the dark goddess



Excerpt from Yoni.com

These faces of the feminine are much less easily acceptable than those of Aphrodite the Goddess of Love or Demeter the Great Mother. But it is in the energy of the dark goddesses that a vast store of feminine power lies.

Kali is the creator and the destroyer. She is depicted as one who cuts off the heads of men. Scary stuff! But this is a symbolic representation, it is not actually their Life she is after, simply their Ego.

The dark goddess lives in us all. Often suppressed and denied she will eventually leak out in hostility and sarcasm, with sly cutting digs, nagging, gossip and put downs. She reveals herself at her most ugly in our closest relationships. Liz Taylor in "Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolfe" plays her out admirably. Jung calls her the 'animus suppressed'. She is everything that nice girls are not. Suppressed too far she turns her destructive energy inwards and creates deression and disease.

The energy of the dark goddess brews and bubbles in the belly. Suppressing her simply adds bite to her words when they do manage to escape. If the energy of fermentation in a bottle of rich wine starts to become more than the cork can contain the wine will ooze out. If we ignore this and shove the cork back down harder the build up will become greater and next time the leaks will become spurts. Finally the pressure will shoot the cork off completely and the precious liquid will be lost. This is the path of denial, of refusing to acknowledge the truth that needs to be spoken. The alternative is to appreciate that bottle, to nurture the rich gift that is brewing, turn it and tend to it and to choose when the cork should be removed and the sweet dark flavour be offered to the world.

Accepted and celebrated the dark goddesses give us the strength to overcome the fear of rejection and to dare to stand in our truth and tell it how we see it. This is an enormously empowering experience

 love the above from Yoni. com it is right on and I love the words used.
Our relationship with the Dark Goddess and the way in which she works is essential for all those who seek a deeper understanding of the Mysteries. While not as obviously welcoming as her gentle sisters of healing and life, the Dark Goddess has other gifts to offer. Dark Goddess brings Death, Transformation and Regeneration We also have a dark side or shadow we also need to acknoledge the Dark Goddess aides us in healing and embracing our Shadow so we may be whole

These faces of the feminine are
When Moons light fades  till no more Her face is seen

Waning year belomgs to Her

She is the Crone.

When you think of the word Crone what comes to your mind?

The word Crone in truth does not mean ugly hag it means an Elder, Older wise woman

The Crone is the third aspect of the Goddess . Just as  to the Christians a trinity in the godhead so  our Goddess is a trinity or triplivity. Maiden Mother Crone.

Crone defined  in werbsters dictionar a  older women  a wise women.

The Crone has been  through the excitement of life, the joy of play the passion of love, the  pains of birth, the  love of Mothering and nurturing, and now She is wise with the years of life  behind  and has much to offer and teach us.. She j has been called the old hag  ...and very misunderstood over the years. Men have made  demonic tried to  get rid of her or just made her evil  for the Crone is the dark Mother She is about endings death, transitions, major change, the shadow, mystery.She has been called by many names.

The Crone
By Lillith Silverhair



TThe Dark Mother is the most misunderstood of the triple aspects of the Goddess. Her color is Black and she absorbs everything, including light and life. The dark of the Moon is Her time, the Abyss and darkness of space Her home. Her number is nine, symbolizing wisdom and sacred magick. Nine is also the number of completion and the completion of beginnings is the Crone's place in the cycle of birth-life-death. The greatest fear in Western Society is the fear of death and so many have turned away from this face of our Mother. We see this in our fevered need for eternal "youth and beauty" (as defined by society) and in the medical community's fight against aging and death. Who among us had not had a friend or family member kept "alive" on life support long after the soul has left the body to resume its journey? We also see this turning away in the way this country treats its elderly. At a time of life in which a person should be venerated for wisdom and knowledge they could pass on to the young ones among us, the elderly are at best "taken care of" (read: loss of privacy, dignity and freedom) or at worst completely ignored. Advanced age should be a time to look forward to in our lives. We should be able to look back and remember all that has happened to us with wisdom and good humor. We should be given the chance to relax and rest and contemplate our lives in preparation of a joyful reunion with the Dark Mother, come to take us into Her starry womb once more. Instead because we don't build a comfortable relationship with the Crone early in our lives, near the end all we feel is frustration and fear. How do we build a
Relationship with the Crone, this Dark Mother who upholds the laws of life
And death with a rigorous need for balance that may seem so many times harsh
To us? First we must realize that Death is not the only domain of the Crone.
Endings of all sorts fall under Her sway, and endings always lead to new
Beginnings. You can get in touch with the Crone during many transitional periods in your life; during the ending of relationships or jobs, when you need to regroup your energies at the end of a project or problem, even when you are getting your garden ready for the winter. The Dark Mother also covers trance states, spirit communication, and prophecy. Menopause is also a time to learn about the Crone  spect of the Goddess. Crone magick is not all that different from Her other three aspects, one must simply remember that the Crone is not a Goddess of birth, but of the harvesting and resting of all life. One may use meditation, candle burning and other general tools of magick to draw Her energies near. Her power may be called upon with dark candles such as black, dark blues or deep purples. Another of Her magickal domains is retribution, but you must be certain that you are justified in your need. Do not ask for revenge (remember the Law of Three!), do not be specific in anything that you want done. Simply lay the problem before Her and allow Her to decide whether or not there has been a true imbalance of justice. At the Winter Solstice, you can burn white, red and black candles to be reminded that everything is born, lives and dies to be born again. In the end, all must confront the Dark Mother, willingly, or unwillingly. How much better it would be to realize that She is not to be dreaded, a figure in black come to take us away from all we know and love, but a loving Goddess come to take us home so that we may rest and revive and begin our journey on the Wheel of Life once more


Another good ref about Crone and women mysteries is www.heactescauldron.org Look in the witchcraft section. Lady Hecate has  muck kn owldge andf experience as a High Priestess and She has been in the craft many many years.

 NAMES: Crone, Cerridwen (Celtic), Hecate or Hekate (Greek), Carravogue (Goddess of winter County Meath Ireland), M�RR�gan or Morrigu (Celtic), Nemglan (Irish battle goddess), Ala (Nigerian), Ama No Uzumi (Japanese), Asase Yaa (West African), Annis (Celtic, later turned into various evil fairies or ghosts such as Black Ann and others), Badb (Irish), Baubo (Greek). Baba Yaga (Russian), Tripura Bhairavi (Tantric), Cailleac Bhuer (Celtic), The Corrigan (from Cornwall to Breton, France), Elli (Nordic), Grandmother Spiderwoman (Native American), The Hyldermoder (Scandinavia), The Leanansidhe (Isle of Man), Oya (Yoruba), The Muireartach (Scottish Highlands), Changing Woman (Navaho), Ereshkigal (Sumerian), Estsanatlehi (Native American), Kalma (Finnish), Lara (Roman), Lilith (Hebrew), Macha (Irish), Mother Holle (German), Nicneven (Celtic), Sedna (Inuit), Xochi Quetzal (Aztec), The Wyrd, Nox or Nyx (Greek), Snow Queen (versions in Sweden & Japan), Queen of Shadows, Nightmare, Hag, the Wicked Witch.

SYMBOLS: (Depending on the culture) Caldron, Owl, Snow and or winter, Yew tree, Dogs, Darkness, Waning Moon, Dark Moon, Cat, Frog, Raven, Snake, Spider, Ghosts, Triquette, Triple Spiral, )O(

PERSONIFICATION OF (or) AREA OF CONTROL: Sacrifice, the Destroyer, the Huntress, Curses, the Underworld, Wisdom, Karma.

USUAL IMAGE: Depending on the time, culture and various aspects of the different goddesses in question, whither they are shown as kind or fierce, common or imperial, or are associated with other aspects such as night, winter, death or rebirth the different Crone Goddess are depicted very differently, however they are usually depicted as elderly women.

HOLY BOOKS: The Trimorphic Protennoia (Gnostic), Lilith's Fire by Deborah Grenn-Scott, Wicked: The Life & Times of the Wicked Witch of the West by Gregory Maguire.

HOLY DAYS: Dec 25, Feast of Frau Holle, on the night of which Mother Holle was said to fly around the world giving presents to the good, and punishing the wicked like a combination of Santa Claus and Batman. / January 6, when the good witch La Befana flies though the skys of Italy giving candy to good children and coal to bad ones. / August the 13th, November the 30th, and the 29th of each month are holidays for Hecate. / October 31, Halloween or Samhain which is associated with a number of Crone Goddesses. / The Kali Puja, a movable holiday which takes place on the same day as one of Hinduism's brightest holidays Diwali, the Festival of Light.

RELATIVES: (Sisters) Maiden and Mother Goddesses all as varied and diverse as their senior aspect the Crone Goddess / (Children) As she is the mother of many Mother and Father Goddesses and Gods, as well as any number of sacred sacrificial kings/sons, she is the ultimate Mother of all.




From plastic surgery, up to and including the injection of toxic chemicals into our faces, to the Balkanization, if not outright exile of those over a certain age, to the rendering of people, mostly women, over 45 years of age to almost invisibility by the mass media, it is plain to see, if you have the vision to look at it, that we as a whole are not dealing with the natural progress of aging well.

This was not always the case, there was a time when those who had managed to survive a remarkably harsh world were regarded as someone who might actually have something important to contribute.

Mythically this was expressed by a goddess figure that, along with the Maiden, and the Mother, was the most powerful part of the first of all trinities. The Crone is found in India, among the Greeks, the Celts, as well as single a deity. .

The Crone goddess made sure that everyone remembered that while at the time they may have been alive and vital, winter was still inevitable, and all life would someday have to deal with old age and death. And as hard and ugly as death could be, it was possible to look it in the eye and not be afraid of it.

The Crone was too old to let deceit stand and from her karma, severe or benevolent, fell on those who had created it so they got just what they deserve.

She is the one who sees what needs to be destroyed and is without sentimentality seeing to it's destruction, in her older forms she was also the one who, as the huntress, knew that life could only come from death.

She was the Goddess who was beyond the giving or restraning of sex as a gift as the Maiden did, or sex as a way to bring about new life as the Mother did, she saw it as either something no longer needed, or as a way to teach a lession, or as simply a thing for pleasure and nothing else.

She was the goddess that became such minor deities as the many different fairies who appeared to men as a beautiful maidens who after a night of preternatural bliss, would in the morning, leave the man to find himself in the arms of the crone, where he, if unable to deal with this transformation was eaten, or if able to accept her, find her beautiful again.

The crone also turned up in the unusual Roman myth of Vertumnus and Pomona. Which, at least according to David Littlefield, shows the Roman mindset turning away from rape and/or servitude as the only forms of adult male and female relationships (for reference see any myth involving Zeus getting his rocks off) and moving toward something more healthy.

The myth, as related by Ovid, tells how Vertumnus, the shape-shifting god of seasonal change, plant growth and gardens, finds himself in love with the nymph Pomona who wants nothing to do with him and so seals herself up in her orchard refusing to even speak with him.

Vertumnus gains entrance to the orchard by changing himself into a crone and telling Pomona stories which, along with giving Ovid a reason to relate other myths, lets her warm to the person telling the tales and later to Vertumnus himself on his revealing his true form.

Whatever the case, the Crone, in whichever form she was imagined, was the sacred mythic avatar for women who could live their own lives without the need or approval of others, practically men.

Which explains why with the coming of the new male centered philosophies and mind-sets, the image of the Crone Goddess became darker and darker, until with the coming to supremacy of Judeo-Christian, she is kicked completely out of Heaven and left to make do as best she could in the dark recesses of the mind as the wicked witch.

Which brings us to the situation we find ourselve in now. These myths come from the same Collective Mind we run our our lives with, whether we acknowledge it or not, so for the mental health of society I strongly suggest we once again become comfortable with the various forms of the Crone Goddess.


 
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