Wishing you a blooming, blossoming, beautiful Beltaine/Beltane/Beltene.

Now in Modern Irish Bealtaine can mean the month of may and La Bealtaine is May Day. I will for now use the anglicized spelling Beltane. What the name means of comes from is up for debate. Some say it means ‘bright fire’, the fire of the Celtic god Bel, or Belenus, a.k.a. Bile or Belinos. Some say the holiday refers to the fire of the Semitci god Ba’al, whose name means ‘lord’. Beltain and Beltene are older forms of the word. -taine is widely accepted as meaning ‘fire’ as in Modern Irish ‘tine’.

@jxk

Beltane is opposite to Samhain in the Wheel of the Year but there are many similarities. While Samhain celebrates and honors death and ancestors, Beltane celebrates and honors the union of the Lovers and life. At both Beltane and Samhain the veils between our world and the Otherworld are thin and it is easier to contact the Fae. In doing so tread wisely and do some research, because fairies are not all the cute Flower kind we learned about as children. This is a good time to leave gifts for them, to make sure you stay on their good side and avoid important items disappearing without explanation.

Ragwort Fairy

Beltane honors life. On the evening of April 30 and May 1 we celebrate May Day. This festival was called Beltane by the Celts and was the beginning of summer for them. Earth energies are at their strongest and most active. All of life is bursting with potent fertility and at this point in the Wheel of the Year, the potential becomes conception. In our region, the festival was also known as Walpurgisnacht, but it was usually called May Feast. The festival is famous and notorious for its erotic symbolism and sexual debauchery. It was the time when the winter fires were extinguished and the “tein eigin” the purifying “emergency fire” was made by rubbing with a wooden staff in a wooden bowl. This ritual alone can be seen as loaded with sexual symbolism. By inserting and rubbing the male staff into the female bowl, a purifying fire is born! On the basis of some Celtic stories and May customs, I want to consider the meaning of the Beltane as a feast of the Sacred Marriage (or Heiros Gamos).

Beltane can be seen as the feast of the Sacred Marriage or otherwise as the feast of conception in nature. On May Eve the sexuality of life and the earth is at its peak. Abundant fertility, on all levels, is the central theme. The Maiden goddess has reached her fullness in an array of blossoms and flowers.. She is the manifestation of growth and renewal, Flora, the Goddess of Spring, the May Queen, the May Bride. The Horned Young Oak King, as Jack-In-The-Green, as the Green Man, falls in love with her and wins her hand. The union is consummated and the May Queen becomes pregnant. Together the May Queen and the May King are symbols of the Sacred Marriage , the union of Earth and Sky, and this union has merrily been re-enacted by humans throughout the centuries. For this is the night of the Greenwood Marriage.

This marriage takes place in nature around us, it takes place between the God and the Goddess, between man and woman, but it is also an inner marriage of the male and female energies within you. This is the feast of the real cosmic orgasm, which is achieved only in complete disregard or in complete unification. It is the mixing of the red flow of the Goddess with the white flow of the god. At its most plastic, this is (menstruation) blood and sperm. But it is also the downward and ascending, the incoming and outgoing energy flow. When these streams are in harmony with each other, unification and thus fertility and creativity arise.

As part of pastoral calendars and activities. Beltane was the time that the cows and sheep were taken to the pastures and the driving wish of the festival was to have a fertile summer ahead.

So this time is about sexuality and sensuality, passion, vitality and joy. And it is about conception, ideas, hopes and putting dreams into action. Creative inspiration, increasing energy, for optimism and self-confidence, for abundance in every way. For freedom of speech, action and beliefs everywhere and it is a time to have some fun…..

Celebrating alone?

Some people celebrate the pagan festivals in groups and other have always chosen to practice more solitary. This year most people will celebrate Beltane alone.

Now I can speak for myself, but I feel many of you are with me on this, Beltane isn’t about sex and orgies in the woods. For some it is, but I feel for the most of us Beltane is the honoring of fertility, passion and creation in nature and in ourselves. If you want to have sex, please enjoy and always be wise, use protection and always always make sure it it consensual! But don’t ever ever feel you have to have sex on Beltane. If you feel horned, eh horny, and you are social distancing, you can also have a Sacred Union with yourself, through sex or other means. And if you don’t feel sexy or are asexual, this doesn’t mean that Beltane isn’t for you. The craft is there to be crafted, the way it fits and represents you. I have been single for so long, but I am celebrating Beltane, I am even handfasting myself today, more on that later in this post.

Some of us are spending these weeks home alone. Yesterday I wrote about loneliness and skin hunger, but please feel that we never exist in a vacuum. And in our practice we are never alone because we work with the elementals, spirits, deities, gods and goddesses and above all the forces of the elements; fire, water, air, earth and ether or spirit. When we practice magick, we are fusing energy with our intent to achieve a desired outcome. We are applying our needs to a natural force that would otherwise not have an agenda. Magick by its very nature is an act of joining. Intent alone is not enough, it is building a relationship with forces of nature and we have to tend to this relationship.

Today I will be doing the The Ritual: The Magick of Joining by Jason Mankey, from this book:

Ideas for celebrating Beltane at home

Perhaps you have no idea where to start with celebrating (alone) at home. Search the interwebs and books for ideas, but here are some suggestions you may like:

  • Go “a-Maying”, a May Day custom where hawthorn blossoms and other flowers were gathered at night and brought to the village in the morning. Food and drink was expected in return, like Trick or Treat. If you are allowed to go outside, seek out nature, I prefer the night/evening and make contact with the Hawthorn. If the tree allows, hang a small piece of it by your door: Hawthorn is a deeply magical tree and traditionally Beltane began when the Hawthorn, the May, blossomed. It is the tree of sexuality and fertility and is the classic flower to decorate a Maypole with. It was both worn and used to decorate the home at Beltane. I always add one of my favorite herbs/plants to my Beltane flower gathering as it is so abundant at this time; Ragwort. It reminds me of my youth, the scent immediately takes me back to a very magickal time when I would play outside with the faeries. But this is a personal preference. Online you can find so much about herba, flowerl and tree associations with Beltane. Also which woods to use for a bonfire. However I don’t think there will be many bonfires this year, unless you have your own piece of land. I will make do with a green candle this year.
  • This is a celebration so if it lights you up, please dress up, especially in green. Wear what makes you feel happy and beautiful.
My favorite green dress – photo by Hans Glaudemans (taken at Yule).
  • Make and wear a flower crown or make a garland and for each flower make a wish for something that will need all your power and optimism to fulfill.
  • Decorate your altar space for Beltane. Clear, clean and consecrate for a new cycle with new intentions. Use hawthorn, rowan and birch branches and always ask permission from the tree before you take anything.
  • Make a Maypole, small or large.
  • Conceive a new project, and start taking action.
  • Offer food for the spirits and faeries. Cream and whiskey are traditional offerings, and food offerings are usually well-received.
  • Perform divination. The Veil Between the Worlds is at its thinnest and it’s easier to hear from the Otherworld. That makes divination easier than normal. So take out your Tarot cards, runes, or other divination tool. Remember that divination can’t make decisions for you. It shows you what’s coming and you have to decide if that’s a good thing or not. Also remember that divination shows what will be, not what must be. If you don’t like what you see, it’s up to you to make the changes necessary to create a more favorable outcome. If you can’t read for yourself then contact a professional diviner, such as myself or someone else.
  • Dance, Sing, practice a ritual..such as the ritual above by Jason Mankey or this one by Cassandra Eason, or of course any ritual of your choosing or making:
    Use a large green candle and three incense sticks or loose incense in fragrances of the festival (angelica, frankincense, rose or any light flower fragrance) and scatter those ashes in nature, to the winds, calling out your wishes for future creativity and fertility in any way. Leave the candle to burn through and look for images in the area around the flame. Ask questions, look in the flames to predict the months ahead.
  • Light a large green candle and burn pieces of wood to signify what you wish to grow in your life. Also burn dead wood to signify what stands in the way of your future success and happiness. The correspondences of the Nine Sacred Woods are: Alder – Shielding, clearing & protection, Ash – Abundance, prosperity, health & transformation, Birch – New beginnings, renewal, change & feminine energy, Hawthorn – Happiness, nature, faeries & Druid magick, Hazel – Wisdom, dreams, prosperity, Holly – Protection, healing, good luck, Oak – Abundance, success, confidence, masculine energy, Rowen – Success, power, protection & life energy and Willow – Intuition, divination, & mastery.
  • Or if perhaps this is more your cup of Mead, watch the 1973 The Wicker Man on Netflix.

Handfasting

As Beltane is the Great Wedding of the Goddess and the God, it is a popular time for Handfastings, a traditional betrothal for ‘a year and a day’ after which the couple would either choose to stay together or part without recrimination. The act of handfasting always involves tying the hands (‘tying the knot’) of the two people involved, in a figure of eight and later unbinding. This is done with a red cord or ribbon. Tying the hands together symbolizes that the two people have come together and the untying means that they remain together of their own free will.

Yvonne of Heks en Kruid shared this beautiful solo handfasting ritual and I am doing this today, it so resonated and is something I always yearned to do, so no better day than the present.

Yesterday I looked all over the neighborhood to find red yarn and I almost gave up until I finally found red wool. Also finding a green candle was a challenge but I found this moss green beauty that will be perfect for today’s celebration. Normally is easier to travel about and find things needed for ritual. Ofcourse there is the internet, but well I was a bit late preparing this year.

Handfasting is a great way to promise loyalty to yourself. If you can fully embrace yourself and feel love for your body, mind and soul, you can also give this love to another.

  • Make a fire for yourself with Beltane and make sure you have 12 (red) threads of about 1.5 meters ready. Start the ritual by braiding the cords into a nice braid (4 strands per cord). During the braiding you have time to say or sing a mantra eg: With this cord I connect myself with my soul.
  • When you are done braiding, seal the cord by loosely fastening it around your wrists and tying it in a knot (this will require some mouth and footwork).
  • Then look at your hands how they are intertwined and close your eyes. Say the following text out loud (or find your own words):

I AM faithful to my SOUL.
My SOUL promises to be faithful to my I AM
This is how I will act from inspiration.
That way my heart will open completely.
In this way I can make the world a better place
My soul and my I AM are grateful

  • Stay in this feeling for a moment and be open to signs and/or signals that confirm this handfasting.

May this unusual Beltane be merry & joyous, no matter how you choose to celebrate it. And remember you are never alone.

Sources:

https://www.goddessandgreenman.co.uk/
https://www.abedeverteller.nl/
https://www.heksenkruid.info/
A Year and A Day in Magick by Cassandra Eason
Witches’ Wheel of the Year by Jason Mankey