17 Abalon/Sept. 21st- Feast of Matralia

Also known as the Feast of the Divine Trinity

Hello everyone! Joyous Matralia!

This holiday is celebrated near the Fall Equinox (in the northern hemisphere, the southern hemisphere uses the southern calendar), and is itself a three-fold celebration.

First, we celebrate the Trinity of Dea, a pure celebration of Her supernal three-as-one existence, and the final of what might be informally considered the ‘Three Festivals of Dea’- the Spring Equinox for the Holy Daughter, the Summer Solstice for the Celestial Mother, and the Fall Equinox for the Great Mother.

Second, we celebrate the harvest, the culmination of all of our efforts. This should not be interpreted as only a physical harvest of crops or income, but a harvesting of the spiritual blessings that have come to us through our devotion since the beginning of the Holy Season of Spring.

Third, we celebrate a new turn of the Sun Wheel, as the ‘light-half’ of the year culminates in the Autumn Equinox, heralding the start of the ‘dark-half’ of the year.

This pattern of threes-in-threes draws the Soul and Spirit inward, directing our inner eye to an yin-yang interplay of endings and beginnings. One can visualize the Holy Daughter overseeing the harvest celebrations as Queen of Earth in Her guise as the ‘Grain Goddess’, while Her Holy Mother oversees the turning of the suntides in the eternal heavens, and the Great Mother walks silently through the fields, reaping their bounties with Her holy sickle even as the fodder is left behind to fertilize the soil in preparation for new life.

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At this same time of year, yet centuries ago, the Greater Eleusinian Mysteries- the later half of a Feminine Mystery cult that persisted for over 2000 years -were celebrated by countless peoples through history. Devotees came from all over the ancient world, and the Mysteries were open to all- man and woman, citizen and slave. The Lesser Mysteries were held in Spring, and the Greater Mysteries were held in Autumn (1). Devotees were sworn to secrecy, so we know little of what happened during the dual multi-day celebrations, but several ancient sources claim with certainty that all those who participated completely lost their fear of death. It’s theorized that the Eleusinian Mysteries proved to their devotees that, just as the power of Demeter and Her Holy Daughter Persephone was eternal in its cycle through the seasons and the realms of life and death, so too would the Souls of the devotees be eternal in their journey through life, death, and new life again.

One ancient source potentially shared one of the highest secrets of the Greater Mysteries, though we have no context for the ritual pageantry or holy trappings that would surround it- after seven days of ritual feasting, fasting, sacrifice, myth-plays, and ceremonies, everything would culminate in a single ear of corn (wheat), ‘reaped in silence’, potentially after blooming in or being drawn forth from a sacred or symbolic basket (2). This phrasing, and the truly mysterious and evocative nature of what it hints at, has maddened historians and inspired artists since the Eleusinian Mysteries were lost at the hands of the Christians.

This is the great, hidden Mystery of Matralia. Dea Filia is the Corn Reaped In Silence, as She tells us in the Rite of Sacrifice. She is the promise of death defeated and life renewed, of harvest and planting and harvest again. She is the Daughter who dies, the Daughter who lives… the Daughter who lives forever. And through Her, through Her sacrifice and endless faith and mercy in us, we know that we too are a harvest worth reaping, planting, and reaping again.

Amadea.

Blessed is She.

1. Walter Burkert. (1985)Greek Religion. Harvard University Press. p. 285
2. https://www2.classics.upenn.edu/myth/php/hymns/index.php?page=eleusis