The Feri current is natural and does not stand above any other current but it is distinctive. The current is formed by the distinctive secret names of the Gods, distinctive core practices and specific lore. It is this distinctiveness that marks the Feri current as different from the current of other traditions. Practitioners of Feri generate mana for the current, and the current returns it in kind and form. The more powerful the mana, the greater you tap into the current, the more powerful your craft.
This current is passed nominally through these tools, practices and lore. But the greatest and fullest transmission and connection to this current is through receiving The Names during the initiation. Not much can be said of this, it is sacred and not to be lightly discussed.
The Feri current is wild or better put untamed. The current stands beside the domestic conventions of expectation. Feri is fiercely independent in that regard. The Great Star Goddess is a Virgin because she needed no other to create. Creation is self-evident, approval is not necessary.
Ecstatic and sensual, the Feri current holds a great respect for the physical world. When the Feri current courses through the body, it makes clear how wondrous and pleasurable life is. Life wills itself from the sheer desire to do so. Desire and will make manifest the physical.
The current possesses an excitatory nature, regarded as sexual. It excites the senses and, in a purely energetic form, the frequency is both high and slow. Feri is deep yet quick.
Often described as wiry in nature, the current is difficult to grasp and even more difficult to hold. Practitioners of Feri develop a comfort with the nature of paradox. Feri is clean and crisp but also dark and musky. Feri is both studied and experiential.
Well, I could write several more paragraphs on my musings on the nature of this current. The point I want to make here is that this current is distinctive from the other currents one might walk through, and that it is specific to a certain cultural set. This set is defined by the lore, The Names, and a specific set of working tools.
As distinctive as this current is, it cannot be described in a linear fashion but can be defined through poesy. There must be a period of exposure and experience to fully understand the subtle and rich nature of this current. Finally to make full and true use of this current requires a singular devotion to the unique nature of the Feri tradition.
Strong deviation from the cultural set is a deviation from the current. Change The Names and you change the current. Change the tools of practice and you change the current. Change the central mysteries as embodied in our lore and you change the current. Change the current and the mana just tastes different.
Very thought provoking!!!
ReplyDeleteWonderful! Thank you!!!
ReplyDeleteThis is really well thought-out. Thanks for posting this.
ReplyDeleteI have often thought that the energetic differences that are felt from the different lines of Feri reflect this thought; that the particular lore and tools used changes the flavor of the current. Different lines of the tradition can feel very different in energetic form, but yet they also share that same energetic core that is distinctive and identifiable as Feri. Not linear indeed!
More cool stuff. Thank you!
ReplyDeleteCurious (including whether this question even makes sense withing the context you set here).
Is it the Names themselves which contribute to the flavor of the current? Is there an aspect where it is the act of agreement among those who share the Names which cause those Names to add to the flavor? (Sort of like the unification of each person's individual flavor to create the shared flavor).
Thank you. So well put!
ReplyDeleteJ'té
Hey Storm,
ReplyDeleteI have an analogy: lasagne. The Feri current is like lasagne...all initiates make it in slightly different ways with different flavours, but as long as they have the core ingredients, you still know it's lasagne!
Can you tell it's almost time for dinner?
Mikey
I'm not sure I understand what you mean here, seagull42. Let me try another angle. Think about a gestalt. It's an entirety, a complete form. So, imo, if you add or subtract from this form, you change it.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of food, Mikey, I have a question for you. When does soup become stew? And when does stew become a pot roast? :-D
ReplyDeleteI'm not really suggesting an "It's all good." approach here. Sometimes the change is so significant that the current becomes unrecognizable to others of the same tradition.
Diversity is not a problem, it's an asset. But at some point the diversity becomes so profound, it's no longer a diverse culture, but a different culture.
Much to discuss!
I really agree with what you say here, particularly the last paragraph! Well worth the wait!-Edge
ReplyDeleteLike water it must always flow,lest it stagnate.
ReplyDeleteThat's why it is called a 'current'.
;-)
Outstanding, Anaar...But, I'm currious...is the current "formed by" or "attracted to" or "carried on" or "held by...the distinctive secret names of the Gods, distinctive core practices and specific lore."
ReplyDeleteJust trying to get a clearer picture: By "formed", I see an artist using a media to sculpt. By "attracted", I mean like a magnet attracts electron current. By "carried", I mean like electricity is carried over a wire. And, by "held", I mean, like in a vacuum...
Blue
Blue, you are thinking waaaay too hard!!! :-D
ReplyDeleteYeah...I can do that at times, we know. But, clarification is thinking waaaaay too hard? Well, then I guess it is. I'll see if I can get a "feeling" of what you are saying there. I'm a feeling sort of guy, eh? ;-)
ReplyDeleteOh hey Blue, I wasn't trying to be dismissive. Feri is best described through poetry, unfortunately I'm a painter and a dancer, lol!!!
ReplyDeleteBeautifully said Anaar. Thank you for another great post.
ReplyDeleteAnne-Marie
Anaar, that is very true! Obviously you can change a recipe so much that it is unrecognisable.
ReplyDeleteDiana, didn't Victor say that in this life he taught Qabala? And isn't there a bit of Qabala from Cora in Fifty Years? ;) My Qabala and Feri practices are very much intertwined...so I'm playing Devil's advocate!
Anaar: Dismissive? That was my first reaction, yes. However, you reminded me that the Blue God is teaching me to dance in my work. My natural instinct is to go to Him (like you) trying to get mental pictures ... Instead, He keeps teaching me to dance...For which I tend to be stepping on my own toes. He is quite a "fetch-ing" one, that Boy...And, I keep talking/thinking, which doesn't work well when one is learning to dance...OUCH!
ReplyDeleteAnaar said>I'm not sure I understand what you mean here, seagull42. Let me try another angle. Think about a gestalt.
ReplyDeleteThat's OK - I'm not sure I always understand what I mean, either. And similar to what you say of blue, I sometimes think too hard...
Gestalt is what I was reaching for, I think. Ideas I was trying to wrap my head around to see if they fit: There are different Names for the guardians to use in different contexts - but the guardians who come are similar enough to still be Feri guardians, yes?
Regarding the "split" - perhaps much of the names and form are the same. Does it remain to be seen if the gestalt remains (possibly making the split illusory), or the flavor has changed enough to make it something different. (I believe there are already many different lines of Feri which share the gestalt, yet seem appear quite different on the surface?)
Playing with the idea of lasagne some more. There are many families that each have their own recipe, passed from parent to child. Yet each person in that family might have their own variation of that recipe as well, and there may even be some swapping and trading of ideas with other families. All of these recipes are close enough to still be recognized as lasagne, but there is something that will eventually differentiate it and start moving it closer to cheese-noodle stew.
Still playing with my food - I don't know I could tell you the difference between jiǎozi, gyōza and pot stickers... But given the relationships between the cultures at times, it might be heresy for me to think they are the same.
@Mikey: Part of the problem is that with all the different lines (and new ones popping up), not all are in agreement about what is "core", because students have added, changed, and subtracted lore. And attempts to define what is core have not been altogether successful.
ReplyDeleteAnaar said, "I have a question for you. When does soup become stew? And when does stew become a pot roast? :-D
"I'm not really suggesting an 'It's all good.' approach here. Sometimes the change is so significant that the current becomes unrecognizable to others of the same tradition.
"Diversity is not a problem, it's an asset. But at some point the diversity becomes so profound, it's no longer a diverse culture, but a different culture."
@Anaar: I agree. Thank you for that. Before she passed, Cora even told some students that Feri was no longer recognizable to her.
Your question echoes something Cora wrote in her book (asterisks mine): "… Just as the poet and musician can create great works through inspiration, so we of the Old Religion can make new rituals and services to our Gods. This religion is not a dead fossil, but a living growing human experience. *I do not mean to say that anybody can throw any old thing into the cauldron and call it Witchcraft.* … We do not want to quarrel with other traditions or their rituals, but we are trying to keep ours authentic." I interpret her last sentence to mean that they tried to maintain the integrity of their tradition.
I like your soup analogy. If Cora teaches a recipe for soup, and everybody adds to--and subtracts from--it, eventually it may not taste the same. You might have a Faery "mulligan stew". It may taste yummy (or not), but it wouldn't be "Anderson Soup" any longer. You can call it that till you are blue in the face, but that won't make it so. Just because all the variants contain blue potatoes, for example, does not make it the same (Anderson) recipe. Why not just call it something else? It doesn't honor the Andersons by calling it a "Feri" recipe if it isn't.
I think the point Anaar and Soulfire are trying to get across is how one approaches the knowledge and practices from other schools, as it were. Thelema, Kabbalah, Buddhism, Vedanta, etc.
ReplyDeleteThough it might be said all roads lead to Rome, not all roads are the same in experience or provide the same vista. Ha! Feri is a different road and 'Rome', may not be where it leads.
To add or subtract too much, is akin to making a 'superhighway'.
It becomes a matter of viewing other systems through a 'Feri filter', or viewing Feri through a different filter.
There is a specific Feri cosmology, cosmogenesis, theology, theogenesis, anthropogenesis. It may share some certain views with other systems, but only due to the same "thing" being veiwed.
Having been a student of the above mentioned approaches, my Feri practice informs them. I interpret them through a Feri filter. I interpret them through a specific set of lore and tools.
Maintaining real diversity, is maintianing the many roads to Rome, rather than creating the superhigway.