In tribal shamanism and forms of more traditional Witchcraft, we have similar concepts with fewer psychological implications and a stronger sense of spiritual partnership. Rather than viewing such entities as part of the mystic’s psyche, these traditions see sacred marriage as a partnership with the otherworld and would most likely be highly offended if it were suggested their spirit love or spouse was a part of them in a psychological sense. Shamans often “marry” their tutelary spirit, having a spirit wife or husband in the otherworld. In some traditions, it’s not a marriage, but there is a psychosexual spiritual exchange with a spirit in a temporary alliance, entered into for the mutual benefit of both beings, human and spirit.
figures } Top, the Lovers; bottom, Temperance
Today, such practices are sometimes referred to as the Fetch Wife/Husband or Fetch Spouse, as well as the Faery Marriage. I believe this lore was corrupted into the Christian mythology of the male incubus and the female succubus, demons feeding on the sexual energy and fluid of sleeping mortals. It only becomes an involuntary or terrifying process when the old ways are forgotten and misunderstood. Those Witches and shamans today who undergo this type of alliance report many of the same effects and benefits the alchemist or psychologist receives, including more balanced awareness and decision making, expanded consciousness, and great capacity for self-knowledge and self-love through the knowledge and love of the spirit ally.
Temperance
The second of the major arcana cards to deal with this theme is the fourteenth trump, traditionally called Temperance. Other tarot innovators have renamed it Art or Alchemy, as the card deals not with the previous partnership crafted between the inner male and inner female, as found in the Lovers card, but with their more sublime union. The alchemical marriage, as depicted in the old engravings of the spiritual scientists, results in a hermaphroditic being of both male and female qualities. The Temperance card depicts the process of that union, which is an art, an alchemical process much like the tempering of steel on an anvil. The traditional image is one of a fairly androgynous angel usually named Michael for the elemental fire triangle in the chest, representing the alchemical fire or forge, mixing various substances, pouring liquids from one chalice to another, with one foot in water and one foot on land. This is a card of transition, of betweenness, and it is that state the mystic ultimately aims for in the quests for love and self-love. Those who attain this sense of inner balance and union become closer to liminal mythic creatures, not truly belonging to the “ordinary” world of humans with its sharp divisions. This level of spiritual initiation sets the individual apart and gives them traits more in common with the faery folk, angels, and deified ancestors, who stand apart from most of humanity. Those seeking this mystery journey beyond the confines of human society for a time, to the forest, cave, or mountaintop, to create the necessary conditions. Even the artist, alchemist, and blacksmith spend hours in solitude, away from conventional society, among their own creative powers and the primal elements.
The Divine Marriage
One of the first steps in the quest for love, to create the divine drama within us rather than in our daily lives, is to intellectually understand the forces. The next step—in fact, the next several steps—is to work with these inner-world forces directly. As we make changes in our consciousness, beneficial changes in our daily life will occur also.
Doing inner work through visionary images might not be the initiation of the divine alchemical marriage or the union with the fetch mate that occurs on the path of the serious practitioner of the art of magick, but it does help us understand our inner king and queen, and work with them closely to fulfill the inner quest for love so we too can be prepared for the outer quest.
exercise} The Divine Marriage
1.Perform steps 1–5 from the mirror affirmations exercise on page 10.
2.Imagine yourself in your own inner sacred space. I call it the Inner Temple, but it is known by many other names—the soul shrine, the interior castle, or even just your “happy place.” It can appear as a place you know in the world or as a fantastic amalgam of otherworldly places. It can be a sacred temple, a building, or an outdoor scene. In this inner landscape you are sovereign, safe, and protected.
3.In this sacred space, you will find two gateways. They could be doorways to other rooms or, if outside, simply the opening between two trees, rocks, or a hole in the ground. They will act as magickal portals. When you open the first gateway, out steps your inner king, your animus and male side. Take a look at your king. What does he look like? How does he act? What is your first impression? Do you like your king-self? Is your king even a king at all, or is he manifesting as something less mature and less powerful? Introduce yourself if this is the first time you are meeting. Although he knows you, you do not yet know him. Ask him any questions you have.
4.Go to the second gateway. Open it, and out steps your inner queen, your anima and female side. Take a look at your queen. What does she look like? How does she act? What is your first impression? Do you like your queen-self? Is your queen even a queen at all, or is she manifesting as something less mature and less powerful? Introduce yourself if this if the first time you are meeting. Although she knows you, you do not yet know her. Ask her any questions you have.
5.As if you were hosting a party, bring your divine couple together, making introductions. Observe their behavior. How do they react to one another? Do they know each other? Are they long-lost friends, long-lost lovers, or antagonistic? Do you have to smooth over their interaction, acting as intermediary? Bring the two together as best you can, and learn from their relationship.
6.When done, thank both the king and queen, and, unless they have gotten along spectacularly, bring each to their separate doorway and close the gate. If they have gotten along, you can leave them in the inner temple area alone together for their alchemical relationship to grow.
7.Perform steps 8–10 from the mirror affirmations exercise.
The ideal of this exercise is to get the two into a good working relationship, a love or friendship with partnership and balance. They may eventually merge into one alchemical composite, like the old Hermetic engravings. This particular exercise is simply an introduction to the concepts and the forces within you. The work of uniting the two is part of the lifelong Great Work of the alchemist and magician.
Many people think of the alchemical marriage concept as heterosexist. Gay men, lesbians, bisexuals, and transgendered people often ask if it has to be a king and queen. Can it be two queens or two kings? The concept of the alchemical marriage is an inner working, an inner balance of male and female energies, so it is not inherently heterosexist, in the sense that both most modern occultists and most psychologists will agree we all have a unique blend of male and female energies in all of us, regardless of sexual orientation and gender identity. In practical purpose as a teacher, I tell my students to go with whatever the image is that first comes to them. So, when doing this meditation, if you have two kings, two queens, or two beings who defy gender orientation, go with it. If you expected the traditional images and get something else entirely, also go with it. What the meditation reveals is more illuminating and healing than following the images you are “supposed” to see.
Regardless of what you see in your inner vision, work with the beings you encounter. Develop their relationship with your facilitation, knowing that you are really developing an inner-world relationship to change your outer-world life. The more you balance, harmonize, and join together the opposing and complementary natures of your inner self, your king and queen, refining their qualities as you develop and evolve yourself, the more you will have fulfilled the inner quest for love and undergone a level of true initiation with the Lovers card. Be prepared for a healthy, happy, harmonious relationship to manifest in your waking life.
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The Patrons of Love an
d Romance
Many gods and goddesses have been associated with the powers of love, romance, sensuality, and sexuality. Out of all the forces humans have viewed as divine, the first and foremost—beyond the tangible immanent forms of natural divinity such as the earth, moon, sky, or sea—is love. Love, in all its forms, is seen as divine.
Love is the power of connection. On its most cosmic level, it’s a primal force. Eros was seen by some ancient philosophers as one of the major creative principles, much like scientists today look at gravity or electromagnetism. Without this power, the world as we know it would not exist. On a personal and human scale, it keeps the human race going, and not just biologically; its higher impulse inspires us to create community and aspire to our more noble urges. On a global scale, it keeps all the races of animals and plants procreating. We might not think of the biological cooperation of minerals, seeds, flowers, and bees as love, but Eros is the connective power drawing these things together. The urge of the Divine to create is based in love. In the atomic and sub-atomic microcosm, the attraction of positive and negative binds particles together to make matter. While that doesn’t seem like personal love to us, again, it’s the love between subatomic particles.
On some level, we know how important the powers of love are to our happiness and to our continued existence, so we have given a lot of time and attention to the gods and goddesses of love and romance. They have consumed more of our collective psyche and inspired more art, song, music, and poetry than practically any other gods, as love, and perhaps death, are the most common denominators of the human experience. We all seek companionship. We all seek love and contact of some sort. We all desire to intimately connect in some fashion. Through this desire, the goddesses and gods of love move through us.
In terms of ceremonial magick, most deities (often referred to as godforms in ceremonial magick) are categorized by their archetypal quality and how they would relate to the various points of the Tree of Life or one of the planets. While most Witches see deities as more complicated and personal than “godforms,” as independent and divine entities, it’s important to understand what certain gods, who are culturally different, have in common magickally, particularly when looked at from the view of a modern magician or Witch. The correspondences of astrology or the Tree of Life are simply one method to organize those similarities.
Most of the gods that are associated with love and romance would also loosely fit into the Venus archetype of godforms. In astrological and planetary magick, Venus plays several different roles. It is the planet of attraction, associated with magnetic forces just as natural lodestones are associated with Venus. The power of beauty, of being the brightest “star” of the morning and evening sky, and the power of beauty to attract are linked. In magick, such power is used to attract whatever you desire, whatever you value or want. Mostly it is used in love, lust, and money magick to get what you want. We say that it attracts what you “love” in a romantic or simply personal sense. We know today that as a planet, Venus’s shine is due to the reflective nature of the greenhouse gases creating her beauty. What light and heat that does penetrate the surface is held tight. Once she gets something, she doesn’t let go.
Venus’s orbit is the closest of the planets to being perfectly circular, associating the beauty of perfection, along with brilliant light, with this planet. Due to the general size and orbit of Venus, it is considered a sister planet to Earth. Venus/Aphrodite is also a goddess of nature as well as love, linking her with Gaia. Many other myths link life on Earth to life on Venus. Lucifer is associated with Venus, and some Italian and Gnostic Witchcraft traditions look at Lucifer as the brother-consort of the Witch goddess Diana and father of Aradia. In Arthurian lore, Lucifer’s fallen crown is said to be an emerald from Venus that later becomes the Holy Grail of the knight’s quest. The Theosophists have a myth of the earthly lord Sanat Kumara descending from Venus to spark life and consciousness on Earth, echoing some of the Lucifer myths found in Gnostic and Gnostic Faery traditions.
Through our mythology, we intuitively know that we have a strong link to the planet Venus. All of these myths link the light of Venus to starting the cycle of life and procreation on Earth and point to a deeper mystery regarding the goddess Venus, her consorts, and the origin of humanity and our quest for love and union. The powers of Venus are not just for personal love but for the spiritual quest where love is an integral part. Notice how these themes are connected to our love archetypes, including the “fall” of Uranus to create Aphrodite, reminiscent of the fall of Lucifer; Aradia, the daughter of Diana and Lucifer; the faery kings and queens; and the Holy Grail association with Arthurian myths, Merlin, and the various chivalrous knights.
We also know that Venus has a strange rotation, being the slowest of the planets. One “day” on Venus lasts 243 Earth days, as compared to one orbit of the planet around the Sun, which occurs in 224.7 Earth days. Because of this, as an archetypal force Venus is considered slow moving, and some would say lazy. Imagine this goddess lounging, allowing her lovers to come to her. When doing Venusian love magick, it can sometimes appear to be slow moving and slow to manifest, as its power is in the slow and steady work.
Magickally, Venus is the planet of vital magnetism. While we now know that all planets have an electromagnetic field (Earth included), Venus magickally rules over all forms of magnetism and attraction, from the literal power of a natural magnet to animal magnetism, the vital life force that pushes and pulls, used by Witches and magicians to manifest our desires. Vital life force, or personal magnetic energy, is associated with sexual power and charisma, the power to entrance. Venus is the planet of desire and naturally draws to her whatever she wants, like a magnet drawing iron to it. While the Mars godforms are about going out and getting what you want, the Venus godforms are all about attracting what you want to you. That is the true power of Venus as the enchantress, enticing others with sweet songs, smells, and sights. The manipulation of magickal magnetism through poetry and song, perfumery and geomantic talismans is at the heart of how and why Venus magick works.
The following deities either have a strong association with the planet Venus or are considered to be patrons of love, romance, sexuality, and relationship. It is by no means a complete list, as deities are multifaceted and have many attributes over many time periods and cultures, but this gives you a great place to begin in terms of the deities modern Neopagans and Witches have called upon for aid in love magick. If you find an affinity for one, begin cultivating a relationship with that deity, doing your own research on the god’s myths, offerings, cultural context, and symbols.
Angus Mac Og—Angus Mac Og, the “Young Son,” is of the Irish pantheon of the Tuatha de Danann, the children of the goddess Danu. He is the son of the powerful god Dagda and the goddess Boann. To hide his affair with the married Boann, the Dagda was said to use his magick to stop the sun from moving for nine months, technically allowing Angus to be conceived, gestated, and born all in one day. Being born out of time is said to make him eternally young. Angus was associated with many love affairs and became known as the god of love, youth, and poetic inspiration. He is also associated with the god Mabon, another “young son” god of the Celtic traditions.
Aphrodite—Aphrodite is the first among deities of love, being the goddess of love, romance, sexuality, and fertility. Her tales in Greek mythology are filled with her exploits and machinations to entwine gods and mortals alike. Sadly, if we go solely by her myths, while she is the force of love personified, she is not always successful in procuring the “happily ever after” scenario most of us desire. While she has steamy affairs with many gods, including her brother Ares, the war god, she is trapped in a loveless marriage with Hephaestus. Those who receive her blessings, such as Paris and Helen, don’t always end up happy. Perhaps it is because of the manner in which she was born, rising from an act of violence against a Titan. Her strange myth betrays a foreign origin in culture, most li
kely coming from the East and linked to Astarte and Ishtar. Despite these factors, many modern Witches have successfully petitioned Aphrodite for aid in love magick, being very specific about their wants, and have had their prayers fulfilled without any harsh and unforeseen consequences.
Astarte—Astarte is a Semitic goddess bearing strong correspondences to the Mesopotamian Ishtar. She is a goddess of love, sexuality, fertility, and war. She was later equated with Aphrodite amongst the Greeks. She is also a goddess associated with the planet Venus.
Bast—Bast is the Egyptian cat goddess. Originally a solar and war goddess, she was later identified with the Moon, perfumes, and ointments. The Greeks equated her with their goddess Artemis, the huntress of the Moon. Later still, due to popular literature and role-playing games, Bast has become regarded as a sensual goddess of pleasure and love akin to the Egyptian Hathor, yet such depictions were not part of her classical attributes. Strangely, many modern Neopagans are far more familiar with her popular attributes as a more Venusian figure than her classical associations with the sun, war, and hunting. She responds quite lovingly in rituals of relationship and romance, demonstrating how deities can change and evolve as their myths and understandings change among humans, even if those changes appear outside the context of religious material and in the domain of pop culture.
Eros—Eros is the Greek god of love. In some myths, he is a primordial god of creation, ushering forth from Chaos with Gaia, Tartarus, and Uranus. His power is the power of love, attraction, and intercourse, giving birth to the universe. In a later version of his myth, he is the son of Aphrodite and either Ares, Hermes, or Hephaestus. In the more familiar image of a winged youth, Eros became the attendant of Aphrodite, working together to inspire love and attraction. That image, particularly of an infant with wings and a bow and arrows, evolved into the Roman Cupid and later into the popular image of Valentine’s Day cards. In some myths, Eros is depicted as sober and knowing the power he holds in the lives of god and mortals; other times, he is depicted as childish and ill tempered. Eros’s love for Psyche is celebrated in a legendary story, and both are associated with the Eleusinian Mysteries.
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