covenrochester

There used to be a sanctuary to the Great Mother in the town of Paphos on the island of Cyprus. The sanctuary was built by pre-Greek Myceneans in 1200 B.C., but it is likely that the area was a center of worship for a much longer period of time. The Greeks usually had a statue of some kind as a cult image for the temple of a God or Goddess. The sanctuary of the Great Mother on Paphos was so old, however, that a great rock of basalt or volcanic material was the symbolic image of the Great Mother. It was constantly anointed with offering oils, touched by worshippers, etc. Such a rock is called a baitylos -- which contains semitic language roots for "house of a deity". This ancient Rock of the Great Mother STILL SURVIVES. You can go visit Her, if you are of a mind to, at the Kouklia Archaeological Museum in southwest Cyprus.




When the ancient Greeks, themselves, arrived on Cyprus, they brought with them the cult of Aphrodite, which was merged into the above local Great Mother cult of Paphos. And thus we get Aphrodite Paphia appearing. As you may recall, Aphrodite was born out of sea foam ("aphros" in Greek) that gathered around the genitals of Uranus when they fell into the sea after Uranus was castrated by Chronus. The locals of Cyprus say that they know where this is:




That is a beach on Cyprus. The two big rock formations---the bigger to the right on land, the smaller to the left at sea---are said to be ossified chunks of the flesh of Uranus. The smaller rock is known as Aphrodite's Rock. When the sea and currents are churning, that place between the bigger and smaller rocks produces a lot of foam and spray. So, this is the very place where Aphrodite first touched land. Local legend has it that if one swims three times around the smaller rock, the Goddess will grant you eternal youth, beauty, good luck, and true love. The waters are very choppy, however, with strong undercurrents, so even strong swimmers decide NOT to take up the challenge.

So, if you want to take a pilgrimage to honor the Great Mother . . . Cyprus is one good option.

*** Blessed be to those who serve the Great Mother and the Horned Father.

* Copyright to Coven Rochester

The question was whether XYZ will be able to make the desired job shift soon.

I had never tried before to cast the dice twice. But I did so here because I felt I had not given sufficient thought to defining the time frame.

( The Casts and the Oracle )

That's sufficiently clear and detailed.

*** Blessed be to those who serve the Great Mother and the Horned Father.

* Copyright to Coven Rochester

I was at a meeting of Druids within the last couple of years where the hostess had boxes upon boxes upon boxes of stones and crystals free for anyone to take. They were not hers, but had belonged to a friend of hers who had died. She was trying to pass them along to others. There were many beautiful pieces. I did not take anything, but others did. Still, when each was done with taking what he or she would, there were still boxes upon boxes of stones/crystals left over. A Druid present eventually took custody of them, telling us that she would distribute them to people over the coming years, or perhaps use them in classes that she taught. My astonishment at the sheer quantity of crystals and rocks and stones that this woman had purchased over the years of her life has stayed with me from that day to this. There also seems to have been quite an explosion of rocks and crystals and what not at new age and occult bookstores. I even see mail order businesses for them.

This has been an exploding market over the past 40 years. At the time when I was initiated into the Old Religion---about 40 years ago---stones and crystals and such were never a topic of discussion. No one in my Coven collected them. A Witch might have a ring or two, of course, or a necklace, or a brooch, an armlet, wrist cuff, bracelet, circlet, bandeau, diadem, and so on, with jewels set in them. But as far as collecting a chunk of serpentine or jasper or onyx or moonstone or lapis or whatever, no way. Never saw it. Never heard of it. I remember exactly one time in the first 10 years I practiced the Craft that I used crystals. A Canadian Witch had taught me how to make a sleepstone . . . a charm that would put a troubled person to sleep if placed under his pillow. He told me that he liked to use small rounded pieces of rose quartz to make sleep stones. I wanted to see if I could duplicate his magic, so I obtained small pieces of rose quartz, and cast the spell on six of them. They worked marvelously. They could knock someone into slumberland within 1-2 minutes. I can't think of a single other time when I have used some kind of new age crystal in magic.

One occasionally sees old Witches marking out a Circle with common forest or river or mountain stones. There are some Witches who work with Healing Stones or Pain Stones or Attracting Stones or Banishing Stones. But I've never seen one that wasn't a common, nondescript stone. Such a stone might be half-a-hand to a hand large, and the Witch strokes it as she focuses on a person, perhaps reciting a short spell, to heal someone or remove someone's pain, or to bring good fortune to some person. And, of course, there stones or rocks used in some traditional spells, like The Charm of the Seven Secret Stones (a wishing spell), or the Stone Sentries (protection for a house). And some old Covens have a special Stone on the Altar to represent the Stone of Destiny, which came from the old magical city of Falias.

I have it on good authority from people that I trust that stones/crystals/rocks are worth working with, magically, and for spiritual communication and teachings. It may very well be so. And perhaps the crystals are so magical that they have been able to thrust themselves powerfully into human consciousness and spread themselves throughout the world through our marketplaces.

But let us draw a line at reasonable limits. No one needs 1000 crystals. No one needs 100 tarot decks. There comes a time when this stops being magical and spiritual and becomes crass materialism and consumerism.

"It called to me," you say. "Don't answer," I respond.

I'll probably have more musings in a similar vein over what's changed in the last 40 years. Essential oils (topical or ingestible plant drugs) is on the list. Anglo-Saxon names for the Earth Sabbats is on the list. Varying Esbat rituals is on the list. And, stars and comets, "patron deities" is on the list. The Morrighan, Brighid, and Hekate have been very busy in that arena. For Gods' sake, if you are going to enter a culutral deity's narrow service, at least drive a hard bargain and get something out of it. I remember a fairly rabid young woman telling me she was a high priestess of Hekate. "What did you get out of it, love? This small shit-hole studio in a bad part of Brooklyn?" (no patience; does not suffer fools). Think things through. Life is complex, but it is not perplexing.

*** Blessed be to those who serve the Great Mother and the Horned Father.

* Copyright to Coven Rochester

In his Palm Sunday homily, the Roman Catholic Pope, Leo XIV, said near the end: "Brothers and sisters, this is our God: Jesus, King of Peace, who rejects war, whom no one can use to justify war. He does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war, but rejects them, saying: 'Even though you make many prayers, I will not listen: your hands are full of blood' (Is 1:15)." This in the context of trading barbs with the President of the United States over the War in Iran.

I find it astonishing that no one publicly calls out the Roman Catholic Pope for hypocrisy.

Let's take a look at how peaceful this "God" is in the Old Testament.

1. Exodus 17:14-16: God to Moses: I'm going to destroy the tribe of Amalek and wipe memory of it even from heaven.

2. 1 Samuel 15:2–3: God to Saul: Take vengeance on Amalek for what they did to Israel. Destroy them all, and all that they have.

3. Deuteronomy 7:1–2: God commands the Israelites to utterly destroy, without mercy, seven city-states/tribes: Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, etc.

4. Deuteronomy 20:16–17: The same as #3. God promises the Israelites these cities as their "inheritance," but they must make sure that they kill everything. Nothing that breathes must be spared. God commands it.

5. Joshua 6:2-21: God tells Joshua that he is delivering Jericho and its king to him. Joshua besieges the city for 6-7 days and then, with God's help, brings down the walls, and the Israelites kill everything in the city: "man and woman, young and old, and ox, and sheep, and ass, with the edge of a sword." The city is accursed, according to God . . . except for the silver, gold, and vessels of brass and iron. No . . . *those* are "consecrated unto the Lord," so the Israelites can take all that and put them "into the treasury of the Lord."

6. Joshua 8:1: After Jericho, God tells Joshua to go do the same thing to the city of Ai, which God will deliver into the hands of the Israelites. Here, however, God let them keep the cattle and any spoils. That's nice.

7. Joshua 10:8: Five kings of the Amorite tribes wage war against the city of Gibeon. God tells Joshua to intervene, for God will deliver them into his hand. The Israelites kill a lot of them, but God himself joins in the battle by sending "great stones" from the sky to crush and kill them. It is proudly recounted that God killed more with hailstones than the Israelites did with their swords.

8. Joshua 11:6: Another group of kings bands together to fight against the Israelites. But God says that he "deliver them up all slain before Israel." After killing everyone, God tells the Israelites to cut the tendons of the horses of the enemies, and burn their chariots. God doesn't say kill the horses. Just cut their tendons. Why? I don't know. I know that a horse so treated is immediately disabled, in pain, and will suffer until it dies. Again, Joshua and war band can keep the cattle and spoils.

9. Numbers 31:1–2: God tells Moses to wage war against the five kings of the region of Midian. They killed all the men, and took all the women and children captive. More horrors follow, although it is not clear from the passages whether God makes these decisions or Moses or both: kill all the women and male children, and keep all virgin females for yourself.

I could go on. And those are just the explicit commands of God to wage war. There are some areas of implicit or tacit approval.

And then, strangely, the quotation from Isaiah 1:15 . . . that the hands of the Israelites are full of blood. Full of blood from what, we are not told, which has led to a lot of speculative commentary on the passage. It isn't clear to me, though, that it has anything to do with war. So, I don't see why the Pope used it.

My observation here is, of course, that the God of the Catholic Church does not *reject* war.

He has justified it. He has commanded it. He has joined in on it.

To account for all this psychotic mental sewage, the Catholic Church has come up with the doctrine of "progressive revelation," i.e., that God revealed himself gradually over time, with a fuller revelation coming forth in the New Testament and Jesus. It sounds like pure cockamamie hogwash to me. How does revealing oneself gradually justify any of these horrendous commands to wage war, take sex slaves, torture animals? Progressive revelation is nonresponsive to the issue.

By all means, everyone should believe what he wants. If this is a point of "credo quia absurdum" (I believe it because it is absurd) for you, have at it. To me, this is a very weird and psychopathic set of writings on which to base a belief system.

In contrast to the Old Religion:

The Great Goddess: "I am the Mother of all living, and my love is poured out upon the Earth."

The Horned Father: "You are my children and I am your Father. On swift night-wings, it is I who lay you at the Mother’s feet to be reborn and to return again."

*** Blessed be to those who serve the Great Mother and the Horned Father.

* Copyright to Coven Rochester

I buy my tea from one of three places: Fortnum & Mason in London, Kusmi in Paris, or Le Palais des Thés in Paris. This tea is Russian Caravan from F&M. It is a mixture of black Keemun tea from China, and oolong tea, which is about halfway between green and black tea in appearance. Hence some of the lighter shading of the leaves here.



A Recent Tea-Leaf Reading

Pictures of tea-cups from above aren't really that useful for reading tea leaves, except those images on the bottom of the cup. The images on the sides are distorted by the angle. So, one must inevitably take 4 or 5 photographs to really capture a tea-leaf reading.



Up Close and Personal

Here, for instance, taking a close look at the rim, we see a very clear MICROSCOPE. Under that, we have a HEART, SOMEWHAT BROKEN. And who is peeking out from behind that heart? A WOLF, BODY HIDDEN, with his head above and bushy tail below. All clear here, whereas, in the first photograph, the angle obscures the images. This cluster is about 5/6 around, clockwise, from the handle of the cup. What should the Seeker watch out for in 4-6 weeks?

Sometimes you can read tea leaves psychologically. The same with Bones and Cards. But, you should more often strive to interpret things as real-world events coming.

( What's Going To Happen Here? )

*** Blessed be to those who serve the Great Mother and the Horned Father.

* Copyright to Coven Rochester

The 1864 Highlanders Poker Deck

More expansive than bone-reading is cards. As I noted before, a longish paragraph of about 5-7 predictions is all you can get from a cast of 23 Bones. Sometimes you can get just as much material from three cards. Here is part of a reading I did last night, and I was surprised how long I talked about just these three.

8 of Diamonds,
2 of Clubs,
7 of Spades

In general, this is a time of financial setback for the Seeker, but there is help available. More specifically, the Seeker is low on cash and needs to budget, which he doesn't want to do. It makes him feel like his life has come to a standstill socially. He's finding it difficult to sort out his finances on his own, but there is a person related to him that will help him write up a budget, and I advised him to accept that help. The relative, however, is a bit judgmental and thinks the Seeker drinks too much, and the Seeker doesn't want to have to deal with that judgment. The Seeker has other relatives, though, too, who are drinkers. In fact, they often give each other alcohol bottles as gifts. Anyway, some of the budgeting is owing to costs for prescribed medication, and the cards clearly show that there is financial help or benefits available to the Seeker which he has not investigated and which will help him defray such costs. He should ask his pharmacist about that.

*** Blessed be to those who serve the Great Mother and the Horned Father.

* Copyright to Coven Rochester

I have a small bone-reading set that I can take with me anywhere. It all fits into a repurposed and redecorated tin of mints. I even made a small instruction booklet that fits inside the tin. With a tray or just a flat surface, one can give a fairly detailed reading.




In the above cast, the Female Shell, the Mouth Shell, and the Claw fell outside of the Circle. So, they are not read.

What predictions can we make from it? I see five matters right away:

1. The Seeker will be spending money on books and travel (Coin, tails, in East).
2. The Seeker will be starting a new exercise program that will improve health (Key, White Rose, Star, in North).
3. The Seeker's current job or project will be ending (Amethyst, Small Skull, in the North). Another job, opportunity or project is just on the horizon though (Key pointing upward).
4. A weakening or cutting off of certain friendships after an argument or conflict. It is clearly shown that this will result in positive benefits for the Seeker. We can assume that there is currently a friendship or two that is draining the Seeker, and it will be a blessing to be done with them (Button, 5 on Die, Green Stone). They are friendships and not family relationships. Had the three items been clustered together more closely, it would be cutting off a family relationship.
5. Reading for a woman, I would be very concerned about marital infidelity. The bones in the South very clearly show to be on the alert for tricks, lies, and deception, perpetrated by a man, involving sex, and disrupting the home life (Sparkle Stone, Infinity Sign, Male Shell, Snake Vertebra, Green House).

Those are the main predictions. But one can dig a bit further by looking at the bones roughly 180 degrees from another bone. In the diagram above, for instance:

a. The Coin Tails across from the Green Stone/Die with 5/Button: Spending money in this way is a source of joy to the Seeker, but she is spending too much. She should tighten up her discretionary spending.
b. The Small Skull/Key across from the Snake Vertebra: This is a cyclical pattern that repeats. She takes on one job, finishes it, moves on to another job. She must be a consultant or writer/artist of some type, with discreet projects that begin and end.
c. The Button across from the Key/White Rose/Star: She will commence this new exercise program, but she will stagnate with it. There will be fits and starts. She will maintain it, but inconsistently.
d. The Key across from the Sparkle Stone/Infinity: The infidelity will be uncovered/revealed.
e. Green Stone across from Green House: news of a pregnancy in the family (not a pregnancy of the Seeker).

And so on.

*** Blessed be those who serve the Great Mother and the Horned Father

* Copyright to Coven Rochester

Where the watching Eye shines, evil cannot abide.

What is sealed in red is sealed in power.

Choose the lucky day, and good fortune will choose you back.

What an animal warns, the Wise do not ignore.

Fire remembers nothing, and so it makes all things new.

The voice that calls must be ready for reply.

Love is the oldest magic, and the hardest to unmake.

About 15 years ago or so, I studied the Futhark Runes very intensively. I could read the future with them, answer questions with them, induce oracles with them, use them to speak with spirits, and so on. I kept track of many of my readings, but not all of them. In time to come, I think it would be a good idea to collect them all and put them in an entry, to give interested persons some examples of interpretation. One particularly outstanding reading was for a woman who had lost a ring.

This was my runecast:




This was my oracle:

I see a bed with a canopy,
In a room adorned with sea and shore.
I see a sapphire in silver set,
Under the carpet, behind the door.

If you know a little about the Runes, you will see where I was coming from. Although not completely. I literally had a vision after the runecast, and so the resulting was really half-Rune half-clairvoyance. It was found just where I had seen it, in a room with a canopy bed and beachy decor.

I used to have a picture of the ring where it was found, but I don't know where that is anymore.

*** Blessed be those who serve the Great Mother and the Horned Father

* Copyright to Coven Rochester

The Greater Book of Spells (385 pages) to include:

The Standard Book of General Purpose Spells and Lore
Ancient Spells (I and II)
Spells, Chants, and Charms For Better Living
The Veil of Miranda
The Healing Grimoire
The Seven Mystic Seals

I was thinking of binding The Hexopedia, but I need to count the pages. My current bookbinder does not go over 400 pages, and I suspect The Hexopedia is over that.

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My dental hygienist had a Native American grandmother who used to keep a handwritten book of medicines that she could make from plants in her yard and environs. When the grandmother died (many years ago), no one knew what happened to her book. My DH has lamented this to me several times. Although at significant expense and trouble, I decided to surprise her by binding a copy of my own Greenbook. I added in a parchment dedication page at the back:

To My Friend, [-------],
and Her Descendants and/or Heirs:
What Your Native Grandmothers Knew,
But the Years Carried Away,
I Call Back and Restore
With the Gift of This Greenbook,
A Faithful Copy of My Own.

Blesséd Be,

etc., etc.

Given at the Time of New Moon, December 2025

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I have an old Romanian spellbook that I have been translating, but I haven't worked on it for a while.