Welcome to "The Gods Are Bored," champagne celebrations on a beer budget! Ask us how it's done! We charge a nominal fee for the advice.
Week before last, my daughter The Heir and I walked down to the dinosaur site where we work our magic. Near the site we saw several houses with carpets of little purple crocuses on the lawns. It was the kind of heart-warming springtime beauty that is quite difficult to photograph, but quite easy to rhapsodize.
Many praise and worship teams celebrate spring by recognizing a deity who has died but come back to life. Some well-known deities have done this, but also many who are now bored and overlooked.
On Spring Equinox, which we call Alban Eiler, Druids celebrate Arthur.
You might know Arthur as the dude with the round table and unfaithful wife. Some scholars have taken pains to establish his historical existence. Truth is, King Arthur is a deity sacred to the ancient peoples of the British Isles. Like so many other deities, he's used different names at different times. Also like so many other deities, he has sneaked into modern times under the guise of legend and fable.
"Legend and fable" is another way of saying "someone else's religion."
Among the "legends" surrounding Arthur's death are those that declare he's not dead at all but merely away. He will return some day to claim his people ... those who believe in him.
Wow. Sound familiar?
I believe in Arthur because he is one of the gods of my forgotten ancestors. If other deity dudes and princesses can return from the dead, why not King Arthur?
Let me put it another way. If one God or Goddess can die and return, then more than one God or Goddess can die and return. Human history is very long indeed, much longer than what is recorded in writing. We could possibly have oodles and oodles of deities who died and returned, after varied periods of being away.
We at "The Gods Are Bored," at this time of equality between daylight and darkness, this earliest sprouting of spring, salute all deities who died and returned. Arthur. Jesus. Persephone. Osiris. Odysseus.
But especially Arthur, just because he's ours.
4 comments:
yes, arthur- the once and future king- bravo anne, a beautiful post xx
Anne, it was so nice to read some blog time about my namesake, the once and future King of ALL the Britains.........even if Authur was no more than an idea, it's an idea, a concept, I think all of us could live with. I live my life wishing I could live up to the ideals expoused by this "legend".
Now you insist he's diety......I could wrap my head around that to........
Your friend and Master of all I survey (and blind as a bat), Alex Michael Pendragon
I'd never heard about him being a deity before! But, you know, the Lady of the Lake recently showed up in my life (ok, she's been around for a while, but I only recently realized who she was...) so I guess it would make sense for Arthur to also be a deity. :)
By the way, your post reminded me of a book for some reason: "Avalon High" by Meg Cabot. Great book. :D In it King Arthur and a bunch others get reincarnated...oh, and, they happen to be attending a high school called Avalon High. lol It's an amazing retelling of the ancient story in a modern setting, with a different twist to it.
Sorry, just had to share that book. I am a total book nut. :P
the Goddess say's he's hung like a horse
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