Root

Things get old. Devotion gets old. Commitment gets old. Waiting gets old. We become tired or depressed or simply walk away. We can forget why we came to wherever we came, lose the hunger and the sense of profundity we once felt. Having traveled on one way so long it is easy to forget just what the hell we are doing. Every tree, everything worth having, has roots. This time of the year is not simply about nostalgia, but about an actual return to the root of who we are, a fuller commitment in a time when, quite frankly, is so easy to lose sight of things and give up hope.

Latin:

O Radix Jesse, qui stas in signum populorum,
super quem continebunt reges os suum,
quem Gentes deprecabuntur:
veni ad liberandum nos, jam noli tardare.
English:

O Root of Jesse, standing as a sign among the peoples;
before you kings will shut their mouths,
to you the nations will make their prayer:
Come and deliver us, and delay no longer.

I sing it every year, but I've never really asked exactly what the root of Jesse is. There is a Bible verse about the Root of Jesse and one about the Shoot and often people just say they are the same, that the shoot means the Jesus of Christmas being descended from David. Leaving aside the matter that we do not really know if Jesus was descended from David, let's think about the simple fact that a root is not a shoot.  A root is the source. Often in the Craft, and n Advent we have spoken of the Tree, but now we are called to go deeper, to the root of the Tree, to the Source of Things. Tonight the avatar of the Divine we look at is the Root of things,  the tough system that sustains us though no one can see. The Roots of the Tree are the Underworld, Mimir's Well, the internal country so close to death and suffering where we find rebirth and redemption. In Norse myth there is a dragon that threatens to nibble at that tree. We feel it some time. But this is a time to address that dragon. Now at Midwinter, under many names, we move past sentiment and even bad memory to go to our core, and remember out commitments, to dare to be terrified, and meet the underground dragon.

*Yule is bright and sunny, almost too warm for all I have on. Someone silly could be forgiven for thinking spring was on its way. The water is low and one pool to the side is swirling like a cauldron. On the island I am consecrated to, where the Nemeton is, I cut the berries and thorns and pray that, as Saturn once cut Uranos so that an old tyrannical reign might end, so might the same be done with these berries and twigs (pun intended) Then I prayed, as the Uranos was castrated and life sprang from his genitals, so might life spring from this cutting. Processing back home from the Nemeton, I realize that this cutting is the time when a shoot can indeed be a root. The Shoot of Jesse is the shoot of that which was cut and might be dead, but which became something new and fostered life. With that knowledge I carried the thorny branch home, and there was nothing else to say.




O Radix

rad•i•cal | \ ˈra-di-kəl  \
Definition of radical
 (Entry 1 of 2)
1: of, relating to, or proceeding from a root: such as
a(1): of or growing from the root of a plant: radical tubers
(2): growing from the base of a stem, from a rootlike stem, or from a stem that does not rise above the ground: radical leaves

Radical, not farsical
Simple, not quoting the quotable
Stand there in the small breeze
The sand washed up, black and soaked to show
a thick root from a distant tree
It said be like me
Small, and tough as stone,
Slender and lyrical
it rose from the sand alone
such is the mystery and meaning of being radical.