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My thoughts about Traditional Witchcraft, Wicca, cooking, gardening, and anything else that catches my fancy.

Tuesday, March 1, 2011

Book of the Week: "Horns of Power: Manifestations of the Horned God" edited by Sorita d'Este

I got loads of new books in, but the first one I'm tackling is called "Horns of Power: Manifestations of the Horned God." I'm really ill at the moment (I developed a terrible migraine in the middle of the night, and I'm very medicated and run down) so I can't read as quickly as I'd like to, but so far the book is amazing.

Not merely a dry, academic study of half-forgotten Gods of the past, this book is more about people's personal feelings on, views of, and interactions with the Horned God in His many guises. Too many NeoPagan books put the God into corner, or even discard Him as unnecessary, and prefer to focus on Goddess worship (sometimes, I'm afraid to say, deliberately as a way to "get back at" men or male Deity.) However, you cannot right past wrongs by creating a new one, and to ignore the male aspect of divinity is as incredibly unbalanced as ignoring the female half would be. The various authors presented here discuss their own particular Pagan path, and their own particular conception of the male Deity, whether through the guise of Veles, Cernunnos, Pan, etc. I'm very pleased to see, too, that they have a much more balanced perspective and don't fall into the trap of focusing solely on the God's "lighter" aspects, while ignoring the more Earthy, sexual traits.

I'm not even halfway done with the book yet, so when I'm finished I'll write my final report. Right now, though, I'm very excited to have found such a promising work, and I suspect that it's one I'll be referring to (and recommending) for a long time to come.

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