The Incense Path (Incense Ritual)

1 Comment | January 1, 2009 at 1:47 pm by mahud
Filed under Daoism, Tarot, Divination, Cosmic-Lunar Cycles, Cernunnos, Cosmogonic Myth, Blogging, Buddhism, Buddhist Mythology, Mystery Religions, Sprituality, Paganism, The Cosmic Mysteries

Happy New Year!

As you can see I’ve given the blog an overall, changed the title (formally known as ‘Between Old and New Moons’) to “Cernunnos’ Path” and have created a logo to represent my religious path through Pagan-Mythic symbolism.

The idea for the logo was largely the by-product of ritual I created and performed by passing an incense stick over the objects on my altar. This cyclic ritual represents the elusive sacred-creative element of the universe that works through all manifest reality in an unending pattern of death to life to death. Below I’ve provided both the ritual verse and a picture of my altar to give a step by step representation of the ritual.

The Incense Path

From [a]life to [b]death.
To [c]death from [d]life.
From [e]life to [f]death.

[g]Cernunnos, [lift incense stick up]manifest and re-create,
through the mystery of death.

In [f]darkness and in [e]light,
[e]give freedom to my footsteps[f]
and guide me into your secret place[h].

[h]There, grant me rest[place incense stick in holder]in your
abundant peace.

The Logo is comprised of waxing and waning moons, symbolic of manifest sacred reality. Between them is a red spot, symbolic of the sun and the divine-sacred principle of the cosmos. Springing from the red dot is a plant, the cosmic tree of all things, with nine thorns, symbolic of the cosmic ALL. The tree spirals upward into another identical dot, again representing the indescribable divine ’sundoor.’ The tree represents our journey through life of time and space and our spiritual ascendency that rises upward into a state of divine ‘knowing,’ as we pass from the cradle to the coffin (or from womb to tomb).

“The tree represents our journey through life of time and space and our spiritual ascendency that rises upward into a state of divine ‘knowing,’”

This is Cernunnos’ Path. It is also the Fool’s Journey of the 22 cards that make up the Major Arcana of the Tarot. Cernunnos is the first person (and aspect of self) that the fool encounters in the guise of The Magician. The one who views the cosmos in its totality (the four mythic elements upon the magician’s table, represented by cups, wands, pentacles and swords) and can weave this complete knowledge into our lives, teaching us how to weave the magic ourselves. The beginning of this journey is also represented by the Two of Wands. The Magician symbolises universal divine power, whereas the Two of Wands represents personal power. The fool’s journey eventually comes full circle in the final Major Arcana card The World, then mysteriously passes through the sundoor before the lunar gateway reopens and the cyclic journey recommences. The cycle of life and death is forever operating without and within. Existence from birth to death is comprised of countless cycles.

The pattern of the ritual reminded me of the symbol of three interconnecting circles called Borromean rings. Using these three interconnecting circles in conjunction with the symbolic objects found on my altar, I began to work on the new logo. although, it wasn’t until later that I decided to use the symbol as a logo for the blog.

I’ll save the detailed description of my altar for another post. For now I want to focus on step ‘g’ of the ritual. At this point in the ritual I raise the burning incense stick above the altar and recite, “Cernunnos, manifest and re-create, through the mystery of death.”

According to Hippolytus in Refutatio omnium haeresium (Refutation of All Heresies: 5.8.39), at the climax of the rites performed at Eleusis, the priest (hierophant), revealed to the initiates (mystai) under an awe of sacred silence, a single gain of wheat. This symbolic act is taken to represent the inexpressible (or secret, that is, revealed symbolically only to those ‘in the know’) core of the Eleusinian Mysteries, and is the basis for step ‘g’ of my incense ritual.

Some time ago I made the connection between the symbolic ear of wheat revealed at the climax of the Mysteries (regardless of whether or not it was truly part of the Eleusinian mythic drama) and the story of the Buddha who taught a silent lesson by revealing a single lotus flower to his followers. I’m not the first person to make this connection however…

The experiences of the initiates in Eleusis had a rich mythological content, expressed, for instance, by dazzling and sensuous image of Anadyomene [mine: Venus Anadyomene: literally ‘Venus rising from the sea’] rising from the waves. On the other hand, it could also be expressed in the plainest and simplest way. From the sacred records of a religion totally different in style—Buddhism—we learn of a remarkable “sermon” preached by its founder. One day the Buddha silently held up a flower “Flower Sermon.” Formally speaking, much the same thing happened in Eleusis when a mown ear of grain was silently shown. Even if our interpretation of this symbol is erroneous, the fact remains that a mown ear was shown in the course of the mysteries and that this kind of “wordless sermon” was the sole form of instruction in Eleusis which we may assume with certainty.

Jung, C. G & Kerenyi, C., 2002, ‘The Science of Mythology: Essays on the Myth of the Divine Child and the Mysteries of Eleusis’, p.179 (Routledge)

Anyone with a basic understanding of Buddhism (such as myself) can tell you that attainment of the Nirvanic condition cannot be taught. Buddhist teaching can point an individual in the right direction, but it cannot reveal the target. And so, a helpful way to get the message-less message across is via mythic metaphor (and, of course, a great deal of meditation) in an attempt to circumvent teachings blanketed in illusory reality.

Buddhist cosmology is based on the empirical observation that everything is suffering (dukkha). Even joy is suffering. Joy is one of many fleeting states that cannot be pinned down. Everything is in a unending state of flux. This is impermanence (anicca). Nothing truly exists because where in a thing (such as a TV) is its essential nature? This is anatta, or ‘no self.’ The parts that make a thing are not the thing, therefore the thing doesn’t really exist:

In a Buddhist text known as Milinda’s Questions the body is likened to a chariot. Here, the monk Nagasena demonstrates for the benefit of the inquiring King Milinda that as the individual parts of the ‘self’ do not contain the ‘self’ within themselves, then “How can there be a self?”, when the individual parts are viewed collectively? Likewise, the separate parts of a chariot have no ‘chariot’ within them, so how is it that a chariot exists when the parts are connected? The answer is “there is no chariot” and similarly neither is there a self. The ‘self’ is merely a convenient label of no real substance (…). And so, the individual is seen as anatta.

Cernunnos’ Path: The Middle Way of the Buddha

In Daoist philosophy this cosmic flux is represented by the transmutation of yin into yang into yin and so on, and a third principle known as chi (qi), which flows through all things. The Chinese character for chi is steam rising from cooked rice. Admittedly I haven’t researched this (my knowledge of Daoist thought is pretty minimal), but again we have a metaphoric representation for something revealed (ie., the steam rising from the hot rice) that can be worked with but cannot be grasped or understood in ultimate terms. This cosmic flow in magical Daoist practice is performed as a nine step dance known as the Pace of Yu. It is this ritual dance and other comparable mythologies that are the basis for Cernunnos’ Path. It is a dance of the cosmos and the dance of the individual from beginning to end, life and death, etc., constantly manifesting in the present moment. It is a cosmogonic myth (being eternally OHM) binding together all things and producing something magical, something that transcends the sum of its cosmic parts (Synergy). It is Shiva’s magical dance, but magic, not in its religiously understood sense as maya (illusion), but maya in its mythical sense. This magic is something that inexplicably exists without any discernible reality other than reality itself. Magic is both the working as well as the end result of a creative act. The biggest work of creation being the universe itself which is alchemically the template (cosmic map/magician’s table) for all magical transformation, via the philosopher’s stone, which is another mythic metaphor that both represents the elusive magical component of existence, and simultaneously points the way beyond word and form.

I looked up the word synergy at Wikipedia, and the author of the article provided quite an insightful example of synergy at work from the New Testament: “The Apostle Paul used the word in his Epistles (Romans 8:28; 1 Corinthians 3:9) to illustrate a dynamic conception of human, divine and cosmic cooperation: ‘I did the planting, Apollos the watering, but God made things grow…We are fellow workers (synergoi) with God; you are God’s cultivation, God’s building.’” The three interlocking rings can also be understood in this way. They stand for this principle of synergy of our individual and collective efforts to be and make manifest the magic of divinity.