Death and Decay
Linda Stern and the Convocation of the Divine Feminine
Cycles of Being: Death and Decay
Divine Feminine and the Power of Death and Rebirth.
October 2006
In Alchemy, the Divine Feminine is a part of all cycles and within everything in a holy balance with the Divine Masculine, including decay and death. In most spiritual traditions it is acknowledged that dying to oneself and walking through the darkness is necessary to be reborn in Her Womb.
Decay and death are part of a never-ending cycle of regeneration in the multiverse. In my sense of knowing, there have been many Outbreaths and Inbreaths of our universe and multiverse, both microcosmically and macrocosmically. Opportunities for regrouping and growth in a cycle of all the cosmic seasons.
When the cosmos was young and moving ever outward, spinning and dancing forward in her youth; ebbing, flowing into a coming fruition of maturity. Then the Multiverses slowed to a still point. The point in which motion stops, stagnation is felt, the yearning for growth is felt, and an examination of what Is, occurs. Sometimes painful actions accompany this step of the dance. A squirming, a twisting, a denial. Because death and decay can be painful, death and decay can be fearful. Sometimes we feel that if we only do this or that we can continue on this path, this lifetime, towards the perfection of pure Light. And yet, if we pay attention with all our senses at this moment of still point, we can feel the stench, the stagnation, the decay of no growth, no movement, and perhaps know what is coming, what is the next step.
So, we have disintegration and decay, whether it be personal evolvement or galactic involvement. No matter the scale, it is a part of the process and Holy. In my way of feeling, the most wonderful thing occurs. There is a mixing together and a heating up of elements, of ingredients, of actions, of inactions, for transmutation by the Divine Cook, our Holy Mother who is continuously nurturing and feeding us with Joy and Love so we can grow. Even if the step is being simmered or broiled to a char, unrecognizable to ourselves. We can realize that in an Alchemical way .... we are all feeding ourselves, cooking ourselves, eating ourselves.
Holy Mother offers a creative opportunity to recreate ourselves into a higher state of being so we can eventually drop the illusion of separation from the Holy One and dance again with pure Light and Love and Unity. Without the occurrences of decay and eventual death we simply stay at the same position that we have always been. This decay and eventual death, takes everything to bring about divine form. This happens with everything: be it thoughtforms, body cells, galaxies or multiverses.
Death of something is not to be feared. It can be welcomed as a purifier for our thoughts, actions and energies and a necessary step for birth and regrowth. It is the natural rhythm and balance of the cosmos. It is the natural incubator for the coming growth. Without the examination of gross materials, without the redistribution through decay and death, new growth is not as potent. In Alchemy, an understanding of the precise chemical steps that transform base unripe metals into gold shows an understanding of philosophical and spiritual steps required to transforms our soul and our energy bodies into the gold of perfect union with the mystical reality of the Holy One.
For Alchemists, our vessel is both male and female, and is something truly beautiful and marvelous.
The Divine Feminine, from which comes the Philosopher's Stone, births us. As a place of containment, our vessel is both womb and tomb , a precious vial, with death being an integral part. Death and Decay is an essential reality in the womb of the Divine Mother. And an essential reality inside of us where millions and trillions of cells are destroyed and birthed each day, just as millions and trillions of galaxies are birthed and die in our universe. Within our sacred physical vessel, memories, imagination events and fantasies can be subjected to the heat of thoughts and reflections. In this process, events of life lose their literal form. A good cook of the psyche knows the best combinations of temperature and timing; when to let things simmer in us and when to stir them and when to bring them to a boil. In an enduring form of the Divine Feminine, we nurture and cook and boil and tend to our own metamorphosis, no matter how long the baking and cooking takes.
Alchemical operations were principally designed to liberate the soul. As Heraclitus in 520 BCE observed, fixations of certain earthbound problems stop a souls’ movement. What kills the flow and buries the soul needs to be dissolved and stirred and heated in order to loosen up an awareness of memories, images, and feelings. Things that are no longer needed or that stand in the way of our progression on our path of Enlightenment, are released.
The purpose of process of decay and death is to dissolve away from ourselves- all that is base or inferior so that all that is superior or golden will be remembered, will be elevated in our higher selves. In an Alchemical text, the Dictionary of Symbols, it is stated, “analyze all the elements in yourself , dissolve through decay all that is inferior in you even though you may break you in doing so into your death. The strength acquired from this operation will remake you into your new best substance.”
Alchemy views decay and death in nature as parallel to decay and death of man's soul on the path towards perfection. All of the pain and effort poured into the attempts at transmuting tin into gold by Alchemists, were allegorical to the pain and suffering they thought required to achieve spiritual growth revolution.
Death and decay present itself in the initial Alchemical steps of calcination, where death of the profane and the material world happen. And then in the steps of putrification, it segregates what is decayed. And then in solution, the purification of matter through primal Divine Feminine waters, wash away what is no longer desired.
Another Alchemical thought is “Perform no operation till all be made Water.” This refers to the state of decay where primal mercurial waters are broken down and then cleansed. The base metal of Mercury symbolizes the female principle in alchemy and its fluidity allows for release where we have become stuck so we can regenerate our soul. This operation was often symbolized as a regression to the amnionic fluid of the mother's womb, to our Holy Mother's Womb. Without the death of the soul through primeval waters- be they mercury or another substance or a state of Being, how can there be new insights or renewal of consciousness?
It is often a crisis or an issue or a wound that forces us to begin to question our nature or examine life or explore deeper meanings. Washing away decayed matter is a metaphor for breaking down old habits and attitudes and beliefs so we can begin to challenge the ideas we carry about ourselves in the world and to question the truths we think are our reality.
In Ancient Alchemy, Divine Mother and Divine Father are present in all the stages including those that symbolize death and decay. It honors all elements, both light and dark, that have brought us to our present evolution. Without all of these issues or challenges, our growth may not be as deep with the process of illumination of our being. For myself, I always know with every cell of my being, that Holy Mother is a part of everything I do which includes decay and death on physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual levels. She lovingly guides me through the multitudes of opportunities for decay and death that lead from tomb to womb and onto my journey of the Soul. With that Knowing, there is no fear, no regrets, no hesitation, just surrender to the process and to Her Love.