Paganistan: Notes from the Secret Commonwealth

In Which One Midwest Man-in-Black Confers, Converses & Otherwise Hob-Nobs with his Fellow Hob-Men (& -Women) Concerning the Sundry Ways of the Famed but Ill-Starred Tribe of Witches.

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Coincidence

 

This is a drabsha.

Unrelated to the Christian cross (but is it?), the drabsha is an important symbol of the Mandaeans, called the Last Gnostics, an ethno-religious minority originally from the southeastern Middle East, now dispersed throughout the world.

A wooden cross draped with a white silk cloth and decked with branches of laurel, it symbolizes the light of the supreme god Hayyi Rabbi, “the Great Life,” covering the four quarters of the world.

This is a stang.

Unrelated to the Christian cross (but is it?), the stang is an important symbol of the Witches, called the Last Pagans, an ethno-religious minority originally from northwestern Europe, now dispersed throughout the world.

A wooden cross hung with a white linen sark and crowned with the skull of a horned animal, it symbolizes the Horned God of the Witches, lighber (enlightener) of his people.

 

Coincidence? Probably, though some students have linked the medieval Witch cult to Catharism, European Gnosticism's final flowering.

Interesting coincidence, though.

 

 

Hail to the Great Life, giver of life,

who wear light as a garment,

who cloth your People in wisdom.

 

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Poet, scholar and storyteller Steven Posch was raised in the hardwood forests of western Pennsylvania by white-tailed deer. (That's the story, anyway.) He emigrated to Paganistan in 1979 and by sheer dint of personality has become one of Lake Country's foremost men-in-black. He is current keeper of the Minnesota Ooser.

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