Saturday, March 20, 2010

blessed ostara!

Long ago, the Germanic goddess Ostara (or Eostre) was honored in the month of April each year with festivals honoring rebirth and renewal. Nowadays we recognize her festival as Easter. The name Easter evolved from the Goddess's name, which means "movement towards the rising sun" or "east." Ostara is the living symbol for air and the life force of spring. East is representative of the element of air and our mental powers. Air is about new beginnings and allowing our spirit to soar. Ostara is still one of the most powerful goddesses today; so much so that she has made herself right at home within Christianity and modern medicine, and egg decorating is still a fine art in Germany!
Easter, like most pagan festivals, evolved into a Christian holiday, focusing not on the Goddess but on the Biblical Jesus and his "rebirth" or "resurrection." Even so, Easter somehow managed to retain the fertility symbols and the Easter basket. Ostara, the Goddess of fertility, has managed to infiltrate our society with the well-known "rabbit test" to find out if a woman is pregnant and also the hormone estrogen, both said to be named for her. Ostara is the perfect doddess to call on when dealing with women's health issues, especially when related to the reproductive system.
Ostara is the goddess of joy, new beginnings and fertility. That is where Easter eggs and Easter bunnies come in. Eggs are an obvious symbol for fertility and the rabbit (Ostara's power animal) has a rather well-known propensity for reproducing. Ostara presides over our personal renewal and fertility issues. She is the goddess of dawn and new beginnings.
Eggs were (and still are) dyed or painted bright colors as an offering to Ostara. Dawn is the best time to invoke her. In days of old, fires were lit at dawn in her honor.

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1 comments:

Unknown said...

Yay for fertility goddesses