ELEMENTS
Our modern-day scholars identify four "elements" as what the Ancients used to define the Universe. While this may be true to a point, it drastically oversimplifies the total picture. These four elements - Earth, Air, Fire and Water, while they certainly describe the manifest world as we see it around us, fall short of describing cosmology beyond that.
Even the addition of a fifth element, known as Aether, Ether, "spirit" or "consciousness" still only deals with the elements of this manifest universe, bounded by both time and space. These five elements can be described as parts of the nine-fold Kerridwen the Great, Kerridwen the Great Herself representing Ether, Her Bright Self (the Manifest Universe) as Earth, and the three aspect D'Anna - Air, Bridget - Fire, and Nimué - Water. The Five Fold pattern describing the whole of Human/Anima existence from the perspective of this universe. It describes the meaning of Anu's apple which, when cut in half, displays this "seren am pump" or star of five. The Four Fold pattern describes the "inanimate" or environmental universe or seasons to which the aspects of the Consort - "Bright" Kernunnos are said to be fixed - the four "fire festivals" of Oimelc, Beltane, Lughnasadd, and Samhain and the Fifth "element" representing our collective consciousness or Energy - Kerridwen the Great.
But Kerridwen is "the Nine-Fold One", "All Things", and not limited by time, space, or this Manifest Universe. "She"
also can be described by the "Apples of the Otherworld" and exhibits four aspects of the Otherworld or Unmanifest Universe whose names are Kerridwen the Dark - Earth, whose three aspects are Gabba - Air, Morgana - Fire, and Vivian - Water. If it is reasonable that these elemental correlations hold the same for
both "Universes" then here too Kerridwen the Great would the collective consciousness or the pure energy that "animates" both. When one were physically within either universe one would feel no difference, they both being bounded by space and time, each containing their own unique laws of nature - although when we view "fire" of the Otherworld from this universe we see clouds, or more likely smoke or steam as we associate the Otherworld as the depths of the sea, hence we call the mother Morgana the Sea Goddess despite Her fiery nature. "Dark" Kernunnos there is also "fixed" to the seasons of that universe which we define as the solstices and equinoxes - this can be seen from the "out of season" Otherworld Apples Rhiannon offers the "Bright Lord" Tarvos at the summer solstice to entice Him to Her "Land of Rest, in the Land of the Blest". Here the Consort has four aspects as well, therefore eight in all between the two, the Eight Spoked Wheel or Rota Taranis - the Wheel of Time. Each of the eight Goddesses or Mothers associated with these eight Gods or Fathers form a wheel whose hub is Kerridwen the Great. Unbound by time and space, neither "bright" nor "dark", positive nor negative, male nor female, manifest nor unmanifest, matter nor antimatter.
Our individual consciousnesses are capable of not only comprehending but also transcending these concepts as they are all a part of this "oneness" which makes up that which we call Kerridwen the Great - All Things - from which we define our individuality and uniqueness of the Universes, Manifest and Unmanifest as we know them. The Sameness of which all is a part, and the uniqueness which we are to experience and this add to the total consciousness of that which we are a part. Kerridwen, ever expanding, ever growing, learning from what has passed before - we each a microcosm of "Her".
The macrocosm which of us replicate (as individual strands of DNA replicate the "body" they inhabit and also Create) could be defined by the "cosmic elements" of our Celtic ancestors and described as the Nine-Fold aspects of Kerridwen - the nine-rayed "cosmic" star - outside of space and time.
| # |
Goddess |
Element - Macrocosm |
Body Part - Microcosm |
| 1 | D'Anna | Plant life - Air | Hair |
| 2 | Bridget | Sun - Fire | Eyes or Face |
| 3 | Nimué | Sea - Water | Blood/Body Fluids |
| 4 | Vivian | Moon - Water | Mind |
| 5 | Morgana | Clouds/Smoke/Steam - Fire | Brain |
| 6 | Gabba | Wind - Air | Breath |
| 7 | "Bright Kerridwen" | Earth - Manifest/Physical | Flesh |
| 8 | Kerridwen the Great | "Anima" - Heavenly Realm | Head or Skull |
| 9 | "Dark Kerridwen" | Stone - Earth | Bone |
"Colors", too, may be associated with these:
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