This was terrific, thanks! I've wandered in my woods and wondered from time to time if there might be fairies still around. Plenty of deer, a few bears, and the occasional cougar still show up in this part of the Kitsap Peninsula. I would like there to still be fairies, but I think not. I imagine they went west long ago, across Hood Canal, to the wild places that still exist in the Olympic mountains. Their homes around here, if they were ever truly here, were devastated years ago. All the ancient trees in this area were clear cut 100 years ago or more. Trees that were hundreds of years old...gone. You can wander the woods and still come across huge stumps decaying away, covered in moss. They remind me of tombstones in an old graveyard.
The premise that belief in something over the millennia constitutes a record of proof of something is faulty at best. There are no flying fire breathing dragons in the archeological record, that has been proven, but there are large and scary lizards on the earth, which can easily be extrapolated in the minds of people and in storytelling. Tolkien's assertion that the movement of human beings away from the places of their ancestral land, cutting off that deep generational connection to the earth, has had profound effects on the minds and perceptions of people, though. I see that as true. The interesting thing is, the use of powerful natural psychedelics - mushrooms, large amounts of cannabis, ayahuasca etc. has often gone hand in hand with experiences of encounters with fairies, or other beings of another realm, who in other cultures have the same fairy 'trickster' element. Dismissed as hallucinatory, such substances may be in fact our best windows into this mysterious aspect of life. These entities are either existent or not in the aspect of universal life. Terrance McKenna's record of his DMT experiences points to a parallel realm where something profound is going on behind the scenes, that we don't really know about. To discount that realm as silly, because of the word fairies, is silly. We're constantly discovering new things. Oddly, science makes great new groundbreaking statements like 'consciousness might be everywhere in the universe.' Going back to the Buddha, or the Upanishads before that, this has been delved into in extensive detail, thank you, science. What we don't know constitutes the lion's share of our knowledge. Not knowing is good, it means there's something else to explore. I applaud the fact that within the confines of Christianity, you're seeking a wide-open mind approach in examining these things.
Thanks for these responses. Reading a rich set of meandering thoughts always brings to mine a favorite phrase from Beowulf: "unlock’d he the word-hoard" (within lines 258 to 260 as translated by William Morris and Alfred John Wyatt).
While the idea of believing in fairies always makes me a little uncomfortable I truly enjoy your argument for a seeing a greater magic in the world and wish to further consider how this might look in my personal faith. Another aspect of ancient cosmology that always fascinated me is the idea of stars as angels or gods, the belief of which is my little rebellion against mechanism
As Lewis says, "Even in your world, my son, that is not what a star is but only what it is made of..." You may enjoy the book *Origen and the Life of the Stars: A History of an Idea* by Alan Scott (Oxford UP).
This was terrific, thanks! I've wandered in my woods and wondered from time to time if there might be fairies still around. Plenty of deer, a few bears, and the occasional cougar still show up in this part of the Kitsap Peninsula. I would like there to still be fairies, but I think not. I imagine they went west long ago, across Hood Canal, to the wild places that still exist in the Olympic mountains. Their homes around here, if they were ever truly here, were devastated years ago. All the ancient trees in this area were clear cut 100 years ago or more. Trees that were hundreds of years old...gone. You can wander the woods and still come across huge stumps decaying away, covered in moss. They remind me of tombstones in an old graveyard.
This comment was such a joy to read. Thank you!
The premise that belief in something over the millennia constitutes a record of proof of something is faulty at best. There are no flying fire breathing dragons in the archeological record, that has been proven, but there are large and scary lizards on the earth, which can easily be extrapolated in the minds of people and in storytelling. Tolkien's assertion that the movement of human beings away from the places of their ancestral land, cutting off that deep generational connection to the earth, has had profound effects on the minds and perceptions of people, though. I see that as true. The interesting thing is, the use of powerful natural psychedelics - mushrooms, large amounts of cannabis, ayahuasca etc. has often gone hand in hand with experiences of encounters with fairies, or other beings of another realm, who in other cultures have the same fairy 'trickster' element. Dismissed as hallucinatory, such substances may be in fact our best windows into this mysterious aspect of life. These entities are either existent or not in the aspect of universal life. Terrance McKenna's record of his DMT experiences points to a parallel realm where something profound is going on behind the scenes, that we don't really know about. To discount that realm as silly, because of the word fairies, is silly. We're constantly discovering new things. Oddly, science makes great new groundbreaking statements like 'consciousness might be everywhere in the universe.' Going back to the Buddha, or the Upanishads before that, this has been delved into in extensive detail, thank you, science. What we don't know constitutes the lion's share of our knowledge. Not knowing is good, it means there's something else to explore. I applaud the fact that within the confines of Christianity, you're seeking a wide-open mind approach in examining these things.
Thanks for these responses. Reading a rich set of meandering thoughts always brings to mine a favorite phrase from Beowulf: "unlock’d he the word-hoard" (within lines 258 to 260 as translated by William Morris and Alfred John Wyatt).
While the idea of believing in fairies always makes me a little uncomfortable I truly enjoy your argument for a seeing a greater magic in the world and wish to further consider how this might look in my personal faith. Another aspect of ancient cosmology that always fascinated me is the idea of stars as angels or gods, the belief of which is my little rebellion against mechanism
As Lewis says, "Even in your world, my son, that is not what a star is but only what it is made of..." You may enjoy the book *Origen and the Life of the Stars: A History of an Idea* by Alan Scott (Oxford UP).
I love that quote, I will check out that book thank you for the recommendation