Sunday, September 18, 2016

The Mysteries of Mariam

The Handless Maiden
Eight of Holy Rood


Reclaiming, re-membering, revisioning and reweaving our Soulstory 
and our spiritual mystical heart as seen in the archetypal stories of the god and goddess.  
We follow the story from Isis and Horus, through to the Greek stories of Ariadne and Athene;  


Our Lady of Glastonbury carrying the hawthorn branch
Nine of Holy Rood



We collect the red thread in the Hebrew Goddess Ashera, 



Asherah
Seven of Holy Rood


the Shekinah of the Kabbalah.  


The journey takes us through fairy tales of The Handless Maiden 
and Rumpelstilskin and ultimately to the 
Three Marys and Jesus as embodiment of the two equal streams of Light. 
The Higher Mysteries is a sacred guide to inner alchemy culminating 
in the Hieros Gamos between Soul and the Beloved. 
The sacred threads of our lives weave the Great Tapestry 
and the red thread of Isis-Maria-Sophia lead us to the heart of the matter, 
beyond the dogma and distortion of religion. 

Today Mary, the Virgin, Beloved and Lover and Mother is the composite of the 
feminine archetypes as they developed in Western consciousness. 

May this deck inspire you to go within and to dive deep into the  Mysteries of Maryam within your own consciousness and the soft light of the impersonal unconscious. 


Water into wine
God of Vessels


You must give birth to your images. 
They are the future waiting to be born ....
fear not the strangeness you feel.
Just wait for the birth .....
for the hour of new clarity - Rainer Maria Rilke

My quest is, and has been, to give expression to
the mystical vision that is alive in my inner world,
both in a way that will add beauty and meaning to my own life
and to the world of which I am an active
participant, and to, very importantly,
understand that mystical vision.
And then to go out and share my understanding
with others so that we may all benefit
from the fruits of the Tree of Sophia.



Queen Esther
Handmaiden of Vessels


Blessedly we are living in a time of
religious freedom, and if we have the courage
to break away from our mechanistic following of
our religious traditions and heritage
and our familial conditioning, we can read
and study the many religions of the world.
Even more powerfully, and importantly, we
have the freedom and option to heed the
Inner Voice which is without sound,
and to craft our own Religion of the Soul.


I have a strong sense of the inner world
and see it reflected in fairy tales, myths, legend
and religion.
Some of these inner visions have stayed with 
me for all my life and they have acted as my
Guide and Guardian Angel, as well as Daemon.
Sometimes they have guided me into very difficult
places of great challenge and loss but always,
eventually, to greater understanding and meaning.


Soulcollage card

Probably because of the belief, in Western patriarchal religion,
in separation and the original sin and fall
of humanity from their existence in Eden,
there is a deep-seated belief in personal
unworthiness. Or maybe this is a deep-seated
stream in the human psyche, a basic duality
as seen as the other side
of the double-headed face of Janus,
symbolising our dualistic understanding and beliefs.
On the flip side of this coin, there is the also deep-seated
knowing that we are indeed the Holy Sons and
Daughters of God, holistically one and whole,
no separation and no distinction between good and
bad, dark and light : both the light and its shadows
praising the Creatrix.


This deep seated belief in personal unworthiness
gives rise to a need and yearning for
perfection and purity. As an artist I am privy
to this need for perfection and it really spells
death for all creativity and art.
Creating art, as does life, demands great courage and risk taking.
Our Western way of thinking and striving for material
success, negates all creativity and art-making
and denies the beauty of Creation, both in its
light and dark aspects.


Snow White and the Saints in their incorruptible bodies,
spell death. Yes, that is obvious, you are saying.
But they are resurrected in various ways.
So it is a form of a living death; 
a suspended state of neither being awake nor
being asleep, but outwardly perfectly beautiful,
staying forever young.
And as we know, our society values eternal youth
beyond gold and jewels.


I see in these images the desire for perfection.
The glass encased face of eternal beauty.
She is not ravaged by the demands of life;
she does not create nor make art, nor participates in life
and the living. 

The Black Madonna
Major Arcana Card XV

A perfect mask that will be acceptable
to the mind of the self. A role that is to be enacted
under the maestro of the archetype of the ego.
And the opposite for this perfection
is messy living with its huge emotions and conflict.
So in that belief system, it follows that soul and body
are in conflict with each other : that the earth
is not paradise and that humanity is doomed
by its own mortal flesh and blood, its senses and
sensuality, its primal instinct and wayward nature.
Humanity is stuck in a glass coffin of perfectionistic
and purist ideals as God, the All, is only present 
in the Light.


In this bright blinding light, 
the mind blocks the consciousness from
understanding and awakening to the tremendous
and awesome meaning of God equals 'Good'.

I see that many have moved away from the
patriarchal religion and are desperately looking
for a new way. A way of wholeness.
A path that is based on Beauty, Compassion,
Truth and Wisdom.
But, alas, unless you do your own soul-searching and
your own wild-crafting, you will in no time find
yourself walking a well-trodden path leading
to the same places of separation and division,
of transcendence as opposed to participation,
now merely parading new names and banners.
Now these places are often called Light Spirituality,
Enlightenment, self-improvement and
mostly Light and Love and once again, there is
an attitude of either-or.


In trying to bring balance to a Western patriarchal
system by only focusing on the matriarchal, a new imbalance
is being created. 
Can you see how the opponent serves your transformation?
How the ever-happening imbalance brings
growth and new birth and new life:

Mary Magdalen
Card XVI in the Major Arcana
(The Tower)


Balance equals perfection.
Perfection equals stagnation and death.
In trying to control conflict, in denying
tension and differences, no new life
can be created.


If one only looks at the cruficixion and you forget
about the resurrection, then you miss the entire
message of suffering.

Three daughters of Anna
Three of Vessels 

One plus one equals three :
new life is born from struggling and discord.
Living with the tension of the opposites,
allowing disagreement and another's
voice that differ from yours, to be heard,
brings awareness to the glassy mind,
of the awesome beauty of creating a life
that has meaning.
Unity and a wholistic understanding of
God and Its Kingdom, which is Us,
is a paradoxical approach of both/as well as.
A sacred trinity of one plus one equals three.


There is a place where all the rivers converge
and that place is the Sacred Heart of humanity.


The Mysteries of Maryam Tarot Deck is in production phase. yay!

A culmination of many years of understanding and not understanding.

Each of the 78 shrines is being photographed and then off to the
printers.  The deck with an accompanying pocketbook, all packaged
and presented in a unique manner, will be available towards
November 2016 here on this site and on my Etsy shop.
(link is in the sidebar)

I am currently working on the full book
The Mysteries of Maryam based on my research for the cards
and a more in-depth interpretation of the metaphorical
as well as mystical meaning of each card.

Look out for news on its publication in 2017 on this blog
and on my Facebook pages.

blessings
Hettienne

1 comment:

  1. What a rich range of experience and wisdoms. I especially appreciate likening the mind to a mirror of glass that needs to be shattered/gone through.

    ReplyDelete