A Village Deity

' I am the wisdom in the Wise '

They call her …  Atha  … in the Indic … which translates as Grandma … but her origins are more mysterious. She was featured … oddly enough … in the movie version … Pocahontas … as the spirit of the trees and woods … who advises the couple in love … to create an initiative for change … for a native American gal … to marry a white foreigner. Its a deity experience that continues to be popularly worshiped in the pastoral landscapes of India … but her significance may well extend to many other cultures.

 

She is the primordial nature of the passions … identifying herself with each and every individual … as the universal aspect of their being. She was there before we had institutionalized worship … and is viewed as supporting the institutionalized practice in many ways. By today's perceptions … she is most likely to be perceived as Wiccan … and can be traced to pagan practices of the past. Of particular note may be her relation to Cybele … as the mother goddess … or the Venus of Willendorf.

 

She's expected to have birthed her personality … in the human psyche … in response to human needs for child-birth and nurturing. Its the natural maternal instinct of women … to provide for and safeguard the young. In time it grew into a phenomenon in human society … and came to occupy a cognitive sense in man. Her advent after the … animistic worship of the sun … moon … and sky …signaled the dawn of a new age … in which man began to look at himself … in a primary role in the creation process.

 

Her worship exalted the passions … and in the case of Cybele … the reports describe her practices as … bloody and orgiastic. No doubt it raised the nature of the personal in the man … and brought an item of value to the perception of man about himself. It was the growth of knowledge … the use of basic tools … hunting prowess … and perhaps starting the practice of cooking food. In subsequent periods … men wore skirts … like the Indic … Scots and Romans … and created a powerful attachment … in the passions … to her qualities as care giver.

 

Dressing that resembles … women's dressing … continues to play a big role in the official cultural identities of the male population in Asia. This includes the Indics … Burmese … Thai … Cambodian … Malay … Indonesian … Polynesian … Samoan and the Maori. Referred to in various ways as the lunggi … veshti … and sarong … it comprises a one piece cloth … that's tied at the waist … and extends to the ankles. It minimizes the difference between the sexes … and creates the effect of unity … in the expression of the passions.

 

One wonders whether the practice of circumcision … was not in some way … begun to re-shape the experience of the prick to resemble the clitoris. In all … our social practices have emphasized the experience of unity … and minimized the differences. This has tremendous significance for the development of mind in the individual … and the conflicts we observe in respect of the two … are not without a firm base of unity in its fundamental natures.

 

That unity … serves to ensure a mental stability … in our affairs when we are working at development of the mind … but its also the bane of interference and influence by the passions. Each man … when he strives for the cultivation of mind … finds the need to stay in accord with the principles of objectivity in his views. It is the basic premise of the mind … that it takes into account all factors … and is not inadvertently … causing a bias in his views.

 

 The term … unity in diversity … is an oft repeated phrase in social circles … and refers to the unity of all things … in a scheme of organization … that may be dependent on time … space … and the experience of the specie. Its a matter of perception … a point of view … and does not on its own accord … profess to be one. As a matter of fact … it contradicts itself on occasion … conflicts with others … and is sometimes prone to be similar. It is the view … man cultivates of his experience … that defines the nature of the unity.

 

In the Bhagavad Gita … the Vasudeva says … 'I am in all things … I am the wisdom of the wise … I am the right in the righteous … I am the sacred verses of the vedas ' … and so on. On closer view … a man can only say that … he is reporting on the experience of the feminine … as viewed by the male in unity with her. He has positioned himself as purely observer …  at the risk of denial of his physical natures … his identity in society … his personality as man … friend … husband … and father. And that is the way … the Indics have evolved the identity of Atha … and brought it into modern context. They defer to her as the source of who they are … and how they ought to conduct their lives.

 

In Indic text attributed to the Vasudeva … he reports on the companionship of a … Mohini … female ghost … who is a part of his being … and is in support of his being. In relation to what we know of the experience today … it illustrates a part of the male/female relations … that may be taken at value … as representing in a sense … created man's relations with the entire universe. Its a matter of how … human insight … scholarship and academic pursuit … constructs the view … and its continued utility … to human society.

 

The human … as an individual has no doubt the need to relate … both socially and universally … so as to identify with a sense of  ' I ' … about himself. It wouldn't surprise me to find that Western societies … relate on the same basis of the male/female quotient as the Indic … expressed in a different social style and manner. It provides the opportunity for an individual … disenchanted with his own … to find a new friend in the other. I did … and it brought me back to understanding the two schemes … as being similar. And there in the context of the world's experience … I found my unity in diversity.

 

Max Weber … the political scientist … makes us aware that … in everything that man undertakes as mind … knowledge … and thesis … we are dependent on the nature of the man … at the center as observer of his life's phenomenon. Hence the accuracy of any view or theory brought into human society … is dependent on man … and his growth as human. We have certainly advanced from the days of the science of the reformation … to that of today. That advancement has come about because of a greater rigor in the way … we manage the commonality and linkage … between mind and passion. And the endeavor will no doubt continue.