Samhain.
(The Night of Veles. Sauin).
November 1st. Waning of the Earth element.
Starting with this day the Earth element falls asleep for six months. The force of the elements is becoming quieter and quieter, and it can no longer exercise its will on what is happening to all its children. It can no longer help the weak, call to order the strong, therefore, all humans and non-humans, spirits and half-spirits, inhabitants of all worlds become as if left to themselves, to their own will. They are no longer under the rule of law, and the only thing that matters is their good desire to live in peace with people and with each other.
At the moment of transition, on the night of Samhain, the veil between the human world and the dark world of the dead rises, and our worlds approach each other to the point that a mutual influence becomes possible with no restrictions. On that night the dead may call to account the living, and the living may call to account the dead; it’s the only night of the year when it is possible to claim debts from those who have gone to other worlds. But they too, by the rule of reciprocity, have every reason to do the same. That is why, on the eve of Samhain, it was customary to remember the dead, to summon the ancestors. It helped not only to appease the anger of the dead but also to summon the power of your kin to help on this fateful day for everyone.
Help and support were necessary since from this night, a person was no longer supported by the Earth’s power. So, the connection with the roots and the kin was getting weaker, the support seemed to be disappearing from under the feet. If someone didn’t achieve anything in his life on his own, if all his power and significance were based only on ancestral accomplishments, then the Night of the Spirits revealed it immediately. The Dark Forces are cruel and unmerciful teachers. Thus, the night of Samhain became the night of the final exam for everyone – through the doors open during Samhain, the dark energies shatter any illusion that was created earlier.
The young god had gone into the world of Darkness, into the world of the Nine Ancient Mothers, air and water had fallen asleep. A period of timelessness has begun, and nothing makes a man stronger as an independent personality- neither the power of the kin nor the force of time given to him by his Orlog. Will he be able to resist? At this moment, the Vird of a person himself is subjected to evaluation, a personal destiny as a measure, and the right to influence it with his mind and will.
On the night of Samhain, the doors that not only led to the worlds of Death and Darkness became open. It is the time when the power of the Earth no longer has its full freedom of action, it is very vulnerable to the arrival of “a foreign fire.” Fire gods from different worlds can enter the Mother’s world through the open gates in order to find the conduits for themselves – those who are ‘assembled’ from the four elements, those who can perceive the element of Fire and transmit it to the Earth, those who live in the current of time of Air and Water elements. A human is such a being.
A foreign Fire can be very powerful. So powerful that a weak being of the human world may find it difficult to resist the will of new fiery alien gods. They are brought by the foreign soldiers on their spears, they are dragged by the “weak” immigrants with all their belongings, and they are carried by merchant ships while being thoroughly hidden in the piles of silk and gold. They may suddenly appear together with the smiling missionaries in white shirts. They can appear anywhere and in any form. How can one recognize them? There is no way, but they will be powerless if instead of the slave’s friable consciousness, they meet the strength and steadfastness of a warrior; if a person himself, while cut off from his roots by the magical power of the Samhain Spirits, shows that his power didn’t decrease, that he is just as strong, faithful, steadfast, and free in the presence of his ancestors and his gods as well as without them. And then he is no longer afraid of any new “light bearer,” akin to a son standing in the bedchamber of his Mother, he will keep watch and will not allow an alien intruder to touch her.
This is a magic parable. But in the old times volhvs and druids attributed the greatest importance to what was happening on that day. The crucial and vital rituals of the invocation of power (not just its veneration) were performed exactly on the Night of the Spirits. Mages of the former time synchronously performed the action of “holding the fire.” To perform this ritual, the mage-druid and mage-volhv had to rely not only on the strength of the toughest and most faithful of the human tribe. Next to them, shoulder to shoulder, the other children of Mother would rise up,- the forces of the world of the Dark and Light, as well as the spirits of the forest, the spirits of the river, all the forces of nature that are still awake, all the ancient forces that are no longer asleep. He summoned the Ancient Gods from other Worlds and the Guardians of the Paths whose duty is not to interfere in human affairs but to guard the borders of the worlds. In spite of all the previous opposition, on this night the old childish quarrels had to be forgotten,- in the face of a common threat, all the Mother’s children had to remember their kinship through her, and recognize the presence of a completely different enemy.
This is why, on that night the fire-lighting ritual was so important. No one had the right to light a fire before the druid did until the mage had read all his spells and built a channel of communication with the primordial Fire, until all the forces willing to protect the sleeping Mother Earth stood side by side with the human, back to back, and not against each other.
The Druid, by lightning the magical Fire, attracted it in its original form that does not exist for humans. This is the fire of Zeus-Jupiter, the fire of Simargl, the fire of Dagda, the fire of Fomoires, the flame of Surtr, it’s the power and essence of the Titans-firstborn. Only the Original Ones could stand up to an outsider. But it is important that all Mother’s children, while preparing for the night of the Battle of Ragnarok, stayed together today, in peace, and there should not be any confrontation between them. Not to ‘please’ but to make an agreement, not to ask but to listen to requests; not to invoke but to be called upon.
It is not the Light and the Dark ones that enter the battle on the night of Samhain, but all of them together against those who divide them into the “Light” and the “Dark,” separating brothers, and pulling them away from Mother Earth. For this reason, later on, the time of Samhain became known as “the time of reconciliation” or the “time of agreement.” Today its meaning has been forgotten but the name remains and is even revived in an unexpected place and in an unexpected form.
The Celtic tradition revolved around the date of Samhain. It was the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the point of reference and the moment of paying off debts. The principle “from Samhain to Samhain” pertained mainly to those whose life was not devoted to earth labor. This is the principle of the higher castes: warriors, rulers, nobles, and, of course, mages-druids.
“All significant mythological-epic events are concentrated around it (Samhain), they acquire their harbingers and their own epilogue, it seems as if the entire time gets condensed in it’.” (Françoise Le Roux, “Druids”)
Of course, during that epoch, it was considered perfectly normal that a foreign force would absorb the weak consciousnesses of people who failed to pass the final test of the dark spirits and proved themselves unworthy of neither the power of Mother nor that of the ancestors. But how difficult it turned out to assume that very soon everybody would turn out to be the weakest and betray their gods, would leave their Mother for a dubious right of acquiring the “kingdom of heaven,” conceding without a fight the kingdom of earth. But the law of Samhain is inexorable, you can only win together.
The Slavs called Samhain the Night of Veles. Veles is the god of the common world order, the god-shapeshifter, the master of magic and the sacred, the ruler of crossroads, the God of Nav, and his dominions are the world of Yav, and the world of Nav, and the world of Prav. He opens a gateway between the worlds, also helping the living receive the blessing (power) of the ancestors who have gone into the world of Nav. The volhvs, just like their fellow druids, on this night, called upon the “pure” fire of the god Simargl and made contact with the forefather Svarog. The purpose was the same,- the upcoming great battle on the Kalinov Bridge. Our Fire Gods against the gods of the alien barren fire.
Every mage on this night is trying to contribute to the unity of the worlds, to reconciliation between all the Old Gods, and to reestablish the ancient bond between all the Mother’s children. A difficult period is approaching, a period when Fire is against Fire, us against them. As soon as the white Aesir Heimdall, the son of Nine Mothers, blows his golden horn, Gjallarhorn, and until the days of Yule’s gathering of the volhvs, this battle will continue, and the strongest must win. After Samhain, the force of the Fire element reigns supreme in the world. Fire absorbs biomass, and a person cannot bear this time if he is a part of a biomass. But Fire can not absorb the Earth and is not able to melt a strong stone. It will only make it stronger, it will only temper it. Here, everyone will be rewarded for their merit.
Excerpt from the book “Health through the Power of the Elements” by Ksenia Menshikova.
************************************************************
Other pagan holidays of the Weel of the Year:
1 Imbolc 2 Ostara 3 Beltane 4 Litha (Kupala) 5 Lughnasadh (Lammas) 6 Mabon 7 Samhain 8 Yule
************************************************************