Kathleen O'Grady, University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada;
and Ida Sitompul, Purdue University, Indiana, U.S.A.; and others, corresponded
about the positions of the Bible and the Koran on
menstruation on the main religion and menstruation
page.
The Celtic religion, women and menstruation: a letter from a site visitor
(Another reader objected to several of these
points; her letter follows)
A visitor noted the lack of information about Celtic belief
on this site and e-mailed me the following letter, summarizing some of her
research. I re-arranged the information somewhat, putting introductory material
at the beginning.
The Celts were an Indo-European people now represented chiefly by the Irish,
Gaels, Welsh and Bretons, and the Druids were a pre-Christian order of priests
[and priestesses?] among the Celts of Gaul, Britain and Ireland (definitions
from The Random House College Dictionary, 1984).
[February 2003]
Dear Harry,
Continuing my browsing of your fascinating site, I came across your
page with the Celtic religion letters, and would like to add my two cents.
I agree with Ms. Nicholson [below] that Joanne's commentary [below]
(though I believe is largely quoting D.J. Conway) is not substantially
accurate. I am a long time follower of Wicca, and readily acknowledge that
it is a modern religion.
What neither Joanne nor Ms. Nicholson comment on is that Wiccan practices
today (particularly among Dianic Wiccans) include a focus on menstruation.
A woman's menstrual cycle is considered to echo the cycle of the moon,
tying women's energy closely to the Maiden/Mother/Crone cycle of the Goddess.
A wide of variety of practices have sprung up around this connection, to
celebrate and honor it.
For example, some Wiccan women practice a voluntary seclusion at the
time of menses, seeing it as a time for inward contemplation and self focus,
to focus on renewal for the coming month. Others mark the occasion with
special rituals, often including releasing regrets of the past month or
workings for what one wishes to see born in one's life in the next cycle.
A girl's first menses is celebrated in many traditions, often with
the presentation of a bracelet or necklace with beads that can be moved
to track her cycle. Some of these pieces of jewelry are quite remarkable,
with crimson crystals to mark the days of menses, and often a blue or green
bead to mark the likely time of ovulation. Depending on the tradition,
ritual tools may be gifted at first menses, such as chalices and cauldrons,
which represent the woman's genitals and womb.
Menopause is similarly honored, seen as marking a woman's ascent to
Crone-hood, the age of wisdom from experience. The Crone aspect of the
Goddess is seen as the keeper of knowledge, the guardian of secrets and
the bringer of the death without which there could be no rebirth. Depending
on the woman, Cronings may range from symbolic funerals for one's fertility
to ecstatic celebrations of the freedom that experience brings from social
and mental bonds.
In addition, there are many beliefs regarding menses that Wiccans consider
on a regular basis - a woman on her Moondays is often thought to be better
at magicks of divination and closure, while at the time of ovulation women
have a greater power for the energies of creation and summoning. Wiccan
women who garden will often take their cycle into account when planning
planting and harvesting, or may consider it inappropriate to harvest certain
plants thought to have magickal properties at the opposing point in their
cycle.
Indeed, one of the challenges faced by Wicca today is how to develop
traditions and practices of coming of age for men, since the cycle of a
man's life is so less clearly defined and tied to the Goddess and God.
Anna Ault
Dear Harry,
I have gone through most of your Web site, and of course the more amusing
sections are the silly old fears associated with men and blood and menstruation.
As a contrast to the Jews, who thought that that blood and menstruating
women were somehow "unclean" (as if one could catch a deadly
illness from it) [but they also felt that semen
was unclean], perhaps a page dedicated to ancient Celtic traditions, including
the wiccans, would balance the subject out.
I thought that this Celtic/Druidic concept deserved a better play on
your Web site because it is menstruation/women friendly, which is something
we seem to have lost on this earth for the past 2,000 years with the advent
of the "modern" Church and "modern" Judaism. Time to
get a little of that "old-time religion" and I mean really
old-time.
Most of the information below is taken from Chapter 8, Introduction
to the Celts, from D.J. Conway's book on Celtic Magic.
Take care and good luck on your permanent museum project.
Joanne
Celtic women were not weak, demure women who were left out of the church
and worship. To the contrary, they were as feared as the men and often
in early society fought fearlessly beside them.
Celts in pagan worship believed in the female as well as male aspect
of divinity, until the early Church burned their religious texts (in fact,
St. Patrick burned at least 180 ogham-lettered [an Old Irish alphabet from
the 5th to 10th centuries A.D.] sacred books and drove out and murdered
the old wiccan and druidic worshipers.
They were not sorcerers, nor did they engage in devil worship, as the
Church later wrongfully accused them of. They worshiped a male deity, similar
to Pan, who was not the judgmental, wrathful God of the Old Testament,
but instead a joyous, flute-playing, helpful fellow who cared for all of
mankind and who could be easily called upon for knowledge and wisdom to
be successful in life.
The female deity, on the other hand, was extremely powerful and connected
with worship during moon phases where power from the other side could easily
be collected and used on earth.
The Celts were extremely religious, extremely spiritual and could easily
meditate into the other world and ask talking people, mythical characters,
plants, trees and rocks for answers to issues on earth. It is believed
that their powerful religion helped keep out the French, Romans and Huns,
unlike the rest of Europe which fared far less better in battle.
In any case, Wiccans and Druids existed well before the modern Church,
and their religion was strong and complicated (they had stages of religious
development lasting up to 20 years to advance to high priest or priestess,
which involved feats of healing and psychic abilities which had to be proven
in order to advance).
Well prior to the Church, the Druids and Wiccans had established large
groups of men and women (monks and nuns) who dedicated their life to their
religion in set-apart communities.
What does this mean to menstruating women? Well, for one, Celtic women
were treated with very high regard in the community since Priestess was
a most powerful position. Women could own property and fight in battle.
Virginity was not prized because it did not result in children, which were
regarded highly for their spirituality and the ability to allow spirits
to enter into the world and gain soul development.
Family was also highly prized and anything to increase the amount of
children was greatly encouraged. Menstruation was quite prized and it was
women, not men, who controlled marriage and divorce. In fact, red was a
highly regarded color due to its association with menstruation. Still today,
we use holly and mistletoe during Christmas; the original significance
of this symbolism was the drops of blood of menstruation (holly) and drops
of semen (ivy), all of which was greatly prized by the Celts and Druids.
Also, it was believed that red-headed women had specialized religious
gifts and thus were quickly advanced through the ranks to High Priestess,
it being noted that they gained special abilities of healing, astral travel
and psychic abilities quicker. Again, the red hair was associated with
menstruation and therefore family.
This is an interesting contrast to the Church and the Jewish religion
wherein menstruation is to be abhorred and not welcomed as a gift to the
earth. That mother god (also highly worshiped in other cultures as Mother
Nature, Isis and Athena, etc., etc.) is just as important as a father god
deity, which is the only deity that the modern Jewish religion has retained,
although earlier sects, including the Essenes, recognized and worshiped
a Mother God as well as Father God. (Note that there are far more reported
religious visions of Mother Mary or Mother God or Pele, the Hawaiian goddess,
than there are of a Father God, and Father God is never directly seen by
anyone in the Bible).
Also, although the old Jewish God was one of fear, wrath, jealousy
and judgment, the Wiccans and Druids believed in a helpful, nurturing,
caring Mother and Father God, which is more akin to a woman's emotions
and abilities.
An e-mailer (January 2002, below) has
objected to many points made in the above mail:
Harry:
Your correspondent, "Joanne," is mistaken on several points.
I do not know to what extent she is directly quoting D.J. Conway, so I am
not sure to what extent the book is the source of the errors. However, please
consider the following:
There were no Wiccans in pre-Christian Celtic areas. Wicca is a modern
religion, largely the creation of Gerald Gardner, based on folk traditions
from many cultures as well as a large dose of his own imagination/inspiration.
Gardner drew on some Celtic traditions, especially in forming his calendar,
but Wicca and pre-Christian Celtic religion are not synonymous.
Other errors, on a paragraph by paragraph basis, are as follows:
1. A single classical writer wrote that Gaulish women were as feared
as the men and fought beside them. No other writer claims this, which makes
the claim suspect. This classical writer also claimed that the Gaulish women
were physically as large as the men. Grave evidence indicates that Gaulish
women were the same size as women from neighboring peoples, about 2/3 the
size of the males.
2. There is absolutely no evidence that non-Christians were murdered
by Christians in Ireland. The notion that St. Patrick burned "pagan"
books depends on a single comment in a "life" of Patrick written
hundreds of years after his death. That "life" is not considered
historical. The general consensus is that ogham was used for short inscriptions
on standing stones and sticks, not for books. Generally, scholars believe
that what Julius Caesar wrote on this point is correct: religious tradition
was passed on orally, from teacher to student. It is correct that pre-Christian
Celts venerated both male and female deities, but not in the way that many
Wiccans do (seeing all deities as "aspects" of a single pair,
god and goddess).
3. I'm not sure what "Joanne" means in saying that "They
were not sorcerers." Pre-Christian Celtic religious leaders certainly
did perform magic, though there's no evidence that they venerated deities
who were completely evil. However, they did almost certainly perform rituals
of offering and warding to appease and guard against the wrath of unfriendly
powers. Pre-Christian Celts did venerate a number of male horned and antlered
deities, and some female ones, but none seem to correspond to Pan in more
than superficial respects.
4. There were a number of female deities, not a single one. Some were
depicted with crescent moon symbols; so were some male deities. the ability
to control the "elements" seems to have been characteristic of
many Celtic deities.
5. We don't know whether "The Celts were extremely religious, extremely
spiritual and could easily meditate into the other world." The fact
that religious leaders trained, according to some sources, for 20 or more
years suggests that it wasn't that easy to interact with the Otherworld.
There's no evidence of these people asking "rocks for answers to issues
on earth." Joanne wrote, "It is believed that their powerful religion
helped keep out the French, Romans and Huns, unlike the rest of Europe which
fared far less better in battle." The French are an amalgam of earlier
Gauls (Celts) and Franks (a Germanic people who conquered Gaul after the
fall of the Roman Empire, so Celtic religion didn't keep out the French.
Romans conquered all Celtic areas except Ireland. The Huns didn't appear
in Europe until after Celtic peoples had been absorbed or conquered by other
groups.
6. Wiccans did not exist before "the modern Church." Druids
were one of several grades of religious leaders. They were called by different
names in different traditions. There is no evidence that anyone was ever
called high priest or priestess. We don't know what they had to do to advance
to the next grades, although we do know that they were expected to acquire
a great deal of knowledge about the law and myths.
7. Classical sources mention communities of women religious living apart,
but whether they lived like nuns is not known. They were not Wiccans. The
groups were not large. It is not known whether male religious lived apart.
8. Celtic society was highly stratified. Men in the highest class had
many more rights and privileges than men in the lowest. Women's rights were
dictated by the status of their nearest living male relative (husband, father,
son, brother, uncle). A woman always had fewer rights and privileges than
the men in the same class. Moreover, a woman had no status in court, except
in certain extreme circumstances. If her rights were violated, she had to
persuade a male relative to act for her in court. If none of her male relatives
would support her in court, she had no legal recourse. Until a certain age
(29, I believe), marriages were arranged and approved by the leaders (male)
of the extended family. Polygamy was common. A chief wife could divorce
her husband without penalty if he brought home an additional wife, but she
could not veto the additional marriages. Therefore, I don't see how women
could be said to "control marriage."
9. Women of certain classes could own property, within limits. There
is no evidence that women fought in battle as a rule. Children were prized
because they continued the blood lines and contributed needed forces, not
because of "soul development."
10. There are various, sometimes contradictory notions in Celtic folklore
about whether red-headed people are "lucky" or unlucky. None of
this has anything to do with menstruation, holly, mistletoe, or ivy. Red
was the color of blood, and blood had significance, wherever and whenever
it occurred, as necessary for life. We know nothing today about whether
red-haired women were considered prime candidates or especially gifted for
"high priestess."
Information about menstruation among Celts is in short supply. One image
in the mythic tale called "The Ta/in" depicts a goddess figure,
Medbh, creating lakes and pools with her body fluids. I'm inclined to think
she was using menstrual blood because later medical texts set up a correspondence
between water in the cosmos and blood in people. However, this is not certain.
(See two books by Bruce Lincoln,"Myth, Cosmos, and Society" and
"Death, war, and Sacrifice.")
A good on-line source for general information about pre-Christian Celtic
law is http://www.unet.univie.ac.at/~a8700035/celtlaw.html,
authored by Raimund Karl, an archaeologist and specialist in Celtic law.
I also recommend his essay on Celtic religion as a reasonable view of things,
though I don't agree with everything he has written: http://www.unet.univie.ac.at/~a8700035/celtreli.html.
Another reliable source is the e-journal I help edit. That's at: http://www.geocities.com/celticwell/.
I hope this gives you alternate ideas to consider.
Best wishes,
Francine Nicholson, M.A.
Kathleen O'Grady, University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada;
and Ida Sitompul, Purdue University, Indiana, U.S.A.; and others, corresponded
about the positions of the Bible and the Koran on
menstruation on the main religion and menstruation
page.
© 2001, 2002 Harry Finley. It
is illegal to reproduce or distribute work on this Web site in any manner
or medium without written permission of the author. Please report suspected
violations to hfinley@mum.org