PDA

View Full Version : The shamanic origins of christmas



Highland1
21st December 2013, 20:48
231
Modern Christmas traditions are based on ancient mushroom-using shamans
by: Dana Larsen

Although most people see Christmas as a Christian holiday, most of the symbols and icons we associate with Christmas celebrations are actually derived from the shamanistic traditions of the tribal peoples of pre-Christian Northern Europe. The sacred mushroom of these people was the red and white amanita muscaria mushroom, also known as “fly agaric.” These mushrooms are now commonly seen in books of fairy tales, and are usually associated with magic and fairies. This is because they contain potent hallucinogenic compounds, and were used by ancient peoples for insight and transcendental experiences. Most of the major elements of the modern Christmas celebration, such as Santa Claus, Christmas trees, magical reindeer and the giving of gifts, are originally based upon the traditions surrounding the harvest and consumption of these most sacred mushrooms.

The world tree: These ancient peoples, including the Lapps of modern-day Finland, and the Koyak tribes of the central Russian steppes, believed in the idea of a World Tree. The World Tree was seen as a kind of cosmic axis, onto which the planes of the universe are fixed. The roots of the World Tree stretch down into the underworld, its trunk is the “middle earth” of everyday existence, and its branches reach upwards into the heavenly realm. The amanita muscaria mushrooms grow only under certain types of trees, mostly firs and evergreens. The mushroom caps are the fruit of the larger mycelium beneath the soil which exists in a symbiotic relationship with the roots of the tree. To ancient people, these mushrooms were literally “the fruit of the tree.” The North Star was also considered sacred, since all other stars in the sky revolved around its fixed point. They associated this “Pole Star” with the World Tree and the central axis of the universe. The top of the World Tree touched the North Star, and the spirit of the shaman would climb the metaphorical tree, thereby passing into the realm of the gods. This is the true meaning of the star on top of the modern Christmas tree, and also the reason that the super-shaman Santa makes his home at the North Pole. Ancient peoples were amazed at how these magical mushrooms sprang from the earth without any visible seed. They considered this “virgin birth” to have been the result of the morning dew, which was seen as the semen of the deity. The silver tinsel we drape onto our modern Christmas tree represents this divine fluid.

Reindeer games: The active ingredients of the amanita mushrooms are not metabolized by the body, and so they remain active in the urine. In fact, it is safer to drink the urine of one who has consumed the mushrooms than to eat the mushrooms directly, as many of the toxic compounds are processed and eliminated on the first pass through the body. It was common practice among ancient people to recycle the potent effects of the mushroom by drinking each other’s urine. The amanita’s ingredients can remain potent even after six passes through the human body. Some scholars argue that this is the origin of the phrase “to get ****ed,” as this urine-drinking activity preceded alcohol by thousands of years. Reindeer were the sacred animals of these semi-nomadic people, as the reindeer provided food, shelter, clothing and other necessities. Reindeer are also fond of eating the amanita mushrooms; they will seek them out, then prance about while under their influence. Often the urine of tripped-out reindeer would be consumed for its psychedelic effects. This effect goes the other way too, as reindeer also enjoy the urine of a human, especially one who has consumed the mushrooms. In fact, reindeer will seek out human urine to drink, and some tribesmen carry sealskin containers of their own collected ****, which they use to attract stray reindeer back into the herd. The effects of the amanita mushroom usually include sensations of size distortion and flying. The feeling of flying could account for the legends of flying reindeer, and legends of shamanic journeys included stories of winged reindeer, transporting their riders up to the highest branches of the World Tree.

Santa Claus, super shaman: Although the modern image of Santa Claus was created at least in part by the advertising department of Coca-Cola, in truth his appearance, clothing, mannerisms and companions all mark him as the reincarnation of these ancient mushroom-gathering shamans. One of the side effects of eating amanita mushrooms is that the skin and facial features take on a flushed, ruddy glow. This is why Santa is always shown with glowing red cheeks and nose. Even Santa’s jolly “Ho, ho, ho!” is the euphoric laugh of one who has indulged in the magic fungus. Santa also dresses like a mushroom gatherer. When it was time to go out and harvest the magical mushrooms, the ancient shamans would dress much like Santa, wearing red and white fur-trimmed coats and long black boots. These peoples lived in dwellings made of birch and reindeer hide, called “yurts.” Somewhat similar to a teepee, the yurt’s central smokehole is often also used as an entrance. After gathering the mushrooms from under the sacred trees where they appeared, the shamans would fill their sacks and return home. Climbing down the chimney-entrances, they would share out the mushroom’s gifts with those within. The amanita mushroom needs to be dried before being consumed; the drying process reduces the mushroom’s toxicity while increasing its potency. The shaman would guide the group in stringing the mushrooms and hanging them around the hearth-fire to dry. This tradition is echoed in the modern stringing of popcorn and other items. The psychedelic journeys taken under the influence of the amanita were also symbolized by a stick reaching up through the smokehole in the top of the yurt. The smokehole was the portal where the spirit of the shaman exited the physical plane. Santa’s famous magical journey, where his sleigh takes him around the whole planet in a single night, is developed from the “heavenly chariot,” used by the gods from whom Santa and other shamanic figures are descended. The chariot of Odin, Thor and even the Egyptian god Osiris is now known as the Big Dipper, which circles around the North Star in a 24-hour period. In different versions of the ancient story, the chariot was pulled by reindeer or horses. As the animals grow exhausted, their mingled spit and blood falls to the ground, forming the amanita mushrooms.

St Nicholas and Old Nick: Saint Nicholas is a legendary figure who supposedly lived during the fourth Century. His cult spread quickly and Nicholas became the patron saint of many varied groups, including judges, pawnbrokers, criminals, merchants, sailors, bakers, travelers, the poor, and children. Most religious historians agree that St Nicholas did not actually exist as a real person, and was instead a Christianized version of earlier Pagan gods. Nicholas’ legends were mainly created out of stories about the Teutonic god called Hold Nickar, known as Poseidon to the Greeks. This powerful sea god was known to gallop through the sky during the winter solstice, granting boons to his worshippers below. When the Catholic Church created the character of St Nicholas, they took his name from “Nickar” and gave him Poseidon’s title of “the Sailor.” There are thousands of churches named in St Nicholas’ honor, most of which were converted from temples to Poseidon and Hold Nickar. (As the ancient pagan deities were demonized by the Christian church, Hold Nickar’s name also became associated with Satan, known as “Old Nick!”) Local traditions were incorporated into the new Christian holidays to make them more acceptable to the new converts. To these early Christians, Saint Nicholas became a sort of “super-shaman” who was overlaid upon their own shamanic cultural practices. Many images of Saint Nicholas from these early times show him wearing red and white, or standing in front of a red background with white spots, the design of the amanita mushroom. St Nicholas also adopted some of the qualities of the legendary “Grandmother Befana” from Italy, who filled children’s stockings with gifts. Her shrine at Bari, Italy, became a shrine to St Nicholas.

Modern world, ancient traditions: Some psychologists have discussed the “cognitive dissonance” which occurs when children are encouraged to believe in the literal existence of Santa Claus, only to have their parents’ lie revealed when they are older. By so deceiving our children we rob them of a richer heritage, for the actual origin of these ancient rituals is rooted deep in our history and our collective unconscious. By better understanding the truths within these popular celebrations, we can better understand the modern world, and our place in it. Many people in the modern world have rejected Christmas as being too commercial, claiming that this ritual of giving is actually a celebration of materialism and greed. Yet the true spirit of this winter festival lies not in the exchange of plastic toys, but in celebrating a gift from the earth: the fruiting top of a magical mushroom, and the revelatory experiences it can provide. Instead of perpetuating outdated and confusing holiday myths, it might be more fulfilling to return to the original source of these seasonal celebrations. How about getting back to basics and enjoying some magical mushrooms with your loved ones this solstice? What better gift can a family share than a little piece of love and enlightenment?


http://www.seventhswami.com/2009/12/the-shamanic-origins-of-christmas/

Russ

Wolf Khan
22nd December 2013, 07:50
So its not just an archeoastronomy either, thank you for showing this. Racial customs change as times and people change. This is how we loose the most important realities our cultures were originally built on. The shamanic customs are our greatest loss to date there are many others of equal value, however. Trying to dig them back into common usage is like pushing water uphill. Human nature is the major stumbling block in reviving older traditions.

In any event All, Merry Christmas once again. ;)

Black Panther
23rd December 2013, 11:25
Nice one Russ!

As I experienced Ayahuasca this year I'm looking more and more at
Shamanism. We can learn a lot from the indigenous people. Instead of
trying to fit in in this unnatural world we better can go 'back' to nature.
Shamanism is all about nature, animals and the use of psychedelics to
remember who we really are. It all resonates a lot with me.

232

233

234

Fred Steeves
23rd December 2013, 13:22
Instead of perpetuating outdated and confusing holiday myths, it might be more fulfilling to return to the original source of these seasonal celebrations. How about getting back to basics and enjoying some magical mushrooms with your loved ones this solstice? What better gift can a family share than a little piece of love and enlightenment?


Now we're talking, how cool would THAT be? Hell man, I may even reconsider my abstention from at least this one holiday were that to come to fruition. Of course there would still be no manger babies in the mix to confuse this *sol*ar event. :rolleyes:

Cheers,

Fred

shamanseeker
23rd December 2013, 15:36
I've been reading about indigenous cultures for months now. I am now concentrating on Celtic traditional culture which also comes under the 'heading' of shamanism. I would say that shamanism is our greatest loss. It is not for nothing that the PTW have committed physical and cultural genocide against all of these cultures and shamans throughout history. There are still leaders of these indigenous groups who are hidden up in the high mountains and in the deserts to protect the truths and wisdom that they have received by word of mouth through the centuries and I believe the millennia. If they are discovered the PTW milked them as Credo Mutwa said of their knowledge and then killed them. This has happened to the genuine Incan curanderos or shamans, the Australian aborigines, the Native Americans and others. I'm sure that the Druidic knowledge of the Celtic peoples is still kept safe by people who are 'who knows where'.

Black Panther
23rd December 2013, 17:39
There are still leaders of these indigenous groups who are hidden up in the high mountains and in the deserts to protect the truths and wisdom

Shaman Seeker you are ;)

Seikou-Kishi
23rd December 2013, 17:58
Germanic cultures had their own brand of Shamanism, too. Magic was divided into two main categories. The more widely known branch of magic was called Galdor, which was concerned with incantations and the runes. It was a magic of vibration and intoning. It was to the runes what the Qabbalah is to the Hebrew Alephbet. The other form of magic was called Seiğr and this branch of magic was the magic of trance and altered states of consciousness. It relates to the English word "seethe", and connotations of a bubbling up from the depths are fitting. Now of course, there is much overlap. Galdor involved altered consciousness as does any form of magic, but in Galdor the consciousness expands and becomes grand, while in Seiğr the consciousness delves deep and becomes profound. Additionally, incantation was often used to induce or help induce trance in Seiğr in just the same way that trance was used in Galdor.

In any case, these two forms of magic mostly co-existed. For all their similarities, they were very different. A Gealdorcræftiga (a person skill in Galdor) is akin to a wizard in sumptuous robes surrounded by artefacts of his art in a brightly-lit office-cum-study, while a Seiğmann or Seiğkona (meaning "seeth-woman") was akin to a hedge-witch sitting cross-legged on the floor surrounded by a gentle darkness and the pungent fumes of burning herbs, or else dancing around in ecstatic circles.

The two magics had greatly different demographics. Galdor was the realm of the Goğar, the class of person who combined in themselves the role of chieftain and priest, while Seiğr was much less prestigious (though at least as well revered). In men, it was considered "womanly" and brought upon them the taboo of "ergi", or femininity, which had the sense of being passive where a man should be active, if you know what I mean. Anyway, the two branches of magic had distinct origins, too; Seiğr was the magic of the Vanir while Galdor was the magic of the Aesir.

The Vanir were the gods of fertility, wisdom and all that was otherworldly. The Aesir were the gods of — well, if you take a cursory look you'll find they're the gods of everything from poetry to war. In actuality, the Aesir and the Vanir represented two separate but unified parts of the human whole. The Vanir were the gods of the subconscious and everything which spoke of the soul, while the Aesir were the gods of the superconscious and the spirit. One was light and fire, the other the dark depths of the ocean.

To understand the difference between the Aesir and the Vanir, and how this plays into the difference between their magic (i.e., the forms of magic which activate and utilise those parts of the human whole), it is necessary to take a cursory look at a few gods from each tribe.

The first gods are Vili, Ve and Oğinn. These three were said to be the first among the gods. Born to the Jötunns Bor and Bestla (in much the same way as the first Greek gods were born to Titans). Each name encodes a simple idea. The god Vili literally means "will" and is the spirit of the human superconscious, the will which causes a human life to be authored in the first place. Ve's name means "the sacred" (as distinct from "the holy"). It means set apart. It's Anglo-Saxon equivalent was spelled both "Weoh" and "wig" (pronounced roughly "way-oh" and "wish" (the 'g' like a German G, though). It was found in the word "Weofod", meaning altar as a "table set aside". Finally, Oğinn refers to fury. It's a compounding of the root Oğ, which refers to an all-pervading energy field (compare Latn æthyr and Greek αἰθήρ).

The other gods are Njörğ, Frey and Freyja. If you think genderqueer is a modern phenomenon, you probably haven't heard of these three gods. They're gods of the Vanir. The "names" Frey and Freyja are actually titles, meaning Lord and Lady. The two originally were not considered distinct gods, but were rather the male and female aspects of one god, the god of nature. When nature was personifed as male, it was the god Frey, and when nature was thought of as female, it was the goddess Freyja. Finally, Njörğ may have ended up the god of the sea (and, more particularly, the god of the sea's bounty) but he actually began his existence as the deity of the fields, as the goddess Nerthus (this being the Latin name as given by Tacitus). Njörğ, then, was the transexual god who began as the goddess of the land's bounty (remember that the Vanir are concerned with fertility and bounty) and, when Scandinavian culture moved from the fields to the coastlines, she morphed into the God of the sea's bounty, becoming male along the way too.

The vanir are the gods of yin, the nurturing darkness of the womb or the earth. The Aesir are the gods of yang, the inspiring brilliance of the sky. Norse mythology records a "war" between the tribes of gods, ending when an exchange of hostages (a common practice employed by kings in those days to ensure peace) brought the war to an end. To me, the war symbolises an intial conflict in a person between that which is shamanic and that which is "wizardly", or that which is subconscious and that which is superconscious. The exchange of hostages I see as an acknowledgement that even though most people will prefer one over the other, it is not possible to pursue one in isolation, but rather some of the other is necessary.

The reason I say it is necessary to understand the natures of these two distinct classes of gods is because Galdor was the magic of the Aesir and Seiğr was the magic of the Vanir.

When many people consider the idea that Oğinn is the god of magic, they will think back to how he was nailed to Yggdrasil ("nine whole days and nights, stabbed with a spear, offered to Oğinn, myself to my own self offered") and how he sacrificed an eye into the well of wisdom at the root of the world tree and, due to his sacrifice (it was said that never was wisdom gained without cost) he reached into the well and withdrew the runes.

This is the mythological origin of the magic of the Aesir, of Galdor and the wizardly magic of incantation and ritual. The origin myth of the magic of the Vanir, of Seiğr, is not actually recorded. The closest we get to it is when this magic is revealed to the Aesir (in other words, the magic was so ancient that it had no beginning. It was brought into the world by one of those Vanir gods sent to live with the Aesir in Asgard: Freyja.1

Freyja taught Oğinn the magic of the vanir. Oğinn alone of all the gods knew both forms of magic, and it is for this reason that he was the god of magic long before he was ever the god of war or the king of the gods. And while Loki taunted him and called him Ergi2 for practicing "woman's magic", he was also said to practice it ocassionally (though he wasn't actually a god but a giant).

For all men who practiced Seiğr were considered effeminate, practitioners of the craft essentially had a well-respected role in Germanic society. They were in some senses taboo; they were called upon for their services and brought into the gathering when they were needed, but they seem to have lived somewhat apart from the rest of society. That they had to be "brought in" when needed implies that their ordinary place was outside the bounds of civilisation, or at least on the threshold3. They were in some senses the "sacred" people of the folks: they were to be kept separate and devoted only to their craft. It is the Seiğmenn and Seiğkonnur who are responsible for the existence of the magic wand: it was they who promoted the simple distaff into a tool for magic.

Many people will have noticed, however, that the acquisition of the runes by Oğinn also speaks strongly of shamanistic magic. It involves intense and prolonged exertion and a reaching down into the depths to uncover higher truths. In this sense, all Germanic magic was shamanistic in origin if not in form. In this way, the world tree, yggdrasil, becomes not just the world tree, but the tree of the self. Are, then, the worlds of the world tree really depictions of different parts or functions of the soul?

— Are Muspellsheimr and Niflheimr, home of fire and light and ice and darkness, really just expressions of the soul's electric and magnetic principles? When the energies of both realms meet in the Yawning Gap ("Ginungagap"), a proliferation of new energy occurs and all that is needed to create the world is generated thereby. Is this the union of spiritual light of the crown and worldly darkness of the root in the unending fathom of the heart and the map for creating and recreating the world anew? If the tree is not the world, but the human spirit as the world, then is the generation of new energy from the intermingling of complimentary opposites a schematic for the way to gain greater spiritual understanding in the world?

— And what of Alfheimr? The land of the Light Elves? It is Alfheimr, and neither of the two lands of the gods that is the highest of all the worlds on the world tree. I have spoken before about how the elves were the memory of ancestral spirits to Germanic cultures. Is it possible that Alfheimr is the world to which human spirits return when their reasons for incarnating here have ended? When we think of the elves of Alfheimr, are we, perhaps, thinking of those who dwell within that highest spiritual state? Are we seeing a reflection of ourselves, shining back down towards us?

— And Jötunheimr, the land of the giants. The king of that land is called Şrymr, a word which in Old Norse meant "uproar" and which in Old English meant "Glory" — could this be the mythologising of our bestial impulses? The seat of the ego which is forever in uproar against our attempts to be more selfless, which calls us to pride in our achievements? The giants were said to be a threat to man and god both. Could this suggest that our spiritual life and our physical life were both equally susceptible to the temptations of glory and vanity?

I firmly believe that careful analysis of the Germanic myths and legends will reveal a much deeper understanding of human spirituality than it is commonly accepted the Germanic peoples could have had. It seems likely to me that much of this knowledge, like Seiğr itself which likely delivered it, is of an origin in a time beyond counting.



http://img42.imageshack.us/img42/2152/i6c.png

1 This role is sometimes given to a goddess called Frigg. It is usually said Freyja married the obscure god Oğ and Oğinn the obscure goddess Frigg. Actually, the name Oğinn means "he of the Oğ", while "Frigg" (even in the modern sense as a euphemism for "f**k") actually is the same word as Freyja, another reference to fertility. Freyja is Frigg and Oğinn is Oğ.

2 Actually, we only have two sources which make any mention of Seiğr being unmanly. The first is Loki in the Lokasenna, in which he accuses Oğinn of being unmanly for employing the art. The second is Snorri Sturlsson, the Icelandic poet, who merely asserts that it was so. Snorri Sturlsson wrote his poetry on Scandinavian myth in the previous millenium and was a Christian and so his judgements on such matters, while probably the best we have, can't be considered infallible both for the reason of the time between the days of those myths and the days in which he worked, and also because he spoke from a Christian perspective (vehemently so, at times).

3 "Thresholds" are a very important concept for shamanism, and also for the concept of sacredness. Every threshold is the separating of one world from another, whether it be the threshold of a house or a town or the threshold of another world inhabited by supernatural entities. This is the essence of sacredness.

Highland1
23rd December 2013, 23:54
Well, this little Tree Of Truth might have been a little "freyed" in recent times but it appears its roots are much stronger than the sum of many of its branches and refuses to wilt.

Welcome back Seikhu and what a deep and knowledgable post!

Russ