The SOLAR APOSTASY

GREAT, GLORIOUS, GOLDEN SUN…

So obvious it’s

as if invisible.

This most brilliant blind spot

in human experience,

this most profoundly absurd

irony in all of our lives…

The Sun,

upon which are we

utterly dependent

for our sustenance

and very existence

yet to which, 
somehow,

we remain

utterly unthankful.

After all,

it’s only

“a thing.”

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- e.o.p.

POSTULATE:

“The Sun is worthy of our veneration.”

Right?

Oh? Perhaps you personally don’t venerate “things”?

You only venerate “spirits” – beings with whom you can interact?

That’s your choice.

Regardless though, many of us who are inspired to the point of worship by the Natural World actually become comfortable with worshiping* “things” too and not just spirits… Things like places, mountains, springs, rivers, trees, The Sun, The Earth, The Moon, etc.

[ * “worshiping” / “venerating” / “ritually giving honor-to” (-whatever) ]

When you think about it, the Sun is at least as-worthy, if not more-worthy, of our veneration than is the The Mother (a.k.a. the Earth Mother / Mother Nature). Without the Sun, the Earth would be utterly irrelevant and, of course, there would be no “people” to perceive it anyway. Astronomers’ origins-theories posit the Sun as parent of the Earth; or at the least, related to the Earth as a vastly superior sibling. How is it that we modern pagans are so easily worshipful of the Earth as being "more than just a thing", yet not-so with the Sun?

Hmm… Is The Mother Herself a spirit (a being), or a “thing”? It could very legitimately be said that everything that exists, from subatomic particles to beings themselves, are processes rather than "objects"… Object; thing; spirit; being? Where does “you” fall on that spectrum? Are you really “you” to anyone else in the world than you? Even unto yourself, are you anything more than a selectively groomed set of memories and idiosyncratic reflexes? It seems, my notion of “you” is simply a representation; a model I’ve constructed of you through which I filter new perceptions, which I attribute to my sustained model of “you”. In that sense, outside of yourself, you are mainly composed of me; yeah, over here: you exist over here…

Well, back now to that most astonishing thing in our world which we spend 99% of our lives managing to not even notice (the ADF "Two Powers" convention not withstanding), it remains that there -are- two great poles of existence for humans and other living creatures:

--THE SUN ABOVE --

and

-- the EARTH BELOW--

---------------------------------------------

But why then is the SUN continually excluded from

any sense of primacy in our Neopagan symbol systems ?

The roots of our apostasy *

Don’t you dare start reaching for Reconstructionist “scholarship” at this point; the REAL reasons afoot are more modern, psychological and illogical than anything to do with our understanding of the ancient world. 

Unfortunately, getting Neopagans to admit to their true motivations can be like nailing jelly to a tree... and yet, from my point of view, it requires no psychic ability to read their patterns of reflex and cultural conditioning. 

Yes, yes; of course, you are not like them. You are not driven by such transparent and trivial patterns of reasoning. Androphobia, patriphobia and deeply conflicted familial relationships have no bearing on the formation of your system of spiritual symbolism whatsoever? Ok…

And so concludes the current preamble to the actual essay;  
the essay itself is linked HERE...

Sun salutation by Earrach / photo by Lassair