Themes in TIW: The Great Queen – Creatrix and Destroyer
Traditional Initiatory Witchcraft, or TIW, is an umbrella term that describes a sector of
modern, mystery tradition witchcraft, including such note-worthies as The Clan of Tubal
Cain of Robert Cochrane, Joe Wilson’s 1734: The Living Myth, and Andrew Chumbley’s
Cultus Sabbati, as well as a host of lesser-known lines and groups. It expresses itself in a
distinctive manner, using tales, songs, poetry, rhymes, riddles and images to convey
traditional information. It also uses the experiences of exploring and journeying through
these media as a large part of its training and growth process. It works, as Cochrane
explains, “…to teach by poetic inference …” forcing the student to divorce the
literalistic, praxis-oriented approach and thought patterns learned from personal
background and upbringing and adopt a mythically oriented, metaphoric approach
instead. This is not to say that the “real world” function or behavior of a symbol cannot
influence, reinforce, or add to its magical-symbolic function, but rather that these features
become a part of the mythic language of these symbols.
A fine example of this can be found in the Cochrane Letters where the word “Lucet” is
used to indicate the ruler of the eastern – or sunrise – domain that we associate with
knowledge. The fact that a lucet is a two-tined tool used for cord-making hurts the value
of the word as a diminutive for “Lucifer” not at all. The cord symbolism enhances the
richness of the content rather than detracting.
Each image or symbol likewise carries a body of associated, referential meaning. It is a
common error to find a single association and decide that one has all that is needed. A
literary analogy would be to imagine a person who decides that they understand an entire
chapter from Leo Tolstoy because they have managed to translate the first word. Each
association asks its own questions, leading eventually to further associations and images
that eventually build into a living vocabulary of associated meaning behind a given
symbol.
Enter the Tarot. In 1398 the Milanese artist, Bonfazio Bembo executed the earliest
example of what would become the modern tarot as a commemorative commission
celebrating the Visconti – Savoy wedding. He followed this with a second, and betterknown,
commission commemorating the Visconti – Sforza wedding. Bembo was heavily
influenced by the Neo-Platonist philosophies of Gemistos Pletho, if not Neo-Platonist
himself, and incorporated these influences into his trumps along with biblical, classically
mythological, folkloric, and contemporary cultural imagery. The information expressed
in the pips and courts, is sparer contrasted with the richness of the trump imagery. The
Visconti family gave these hand-painted miniature masterpieces as wedding gifts to the
grooms.
The decks created since Bembo essentially followed the pattern of his creation. Some
occultists would be impressed with them. Some, like Court de Gebelin, would
romanticize them out of all proportion, while still grasping something of their intrinsic
value.
At the end of the 19th Century, English occultist Aleister Crowley, studying the Tarot in
the course of his work with the Golden Dawn, was struck by certain patterns in Bembo’s
decks, and noted that they are repeated in every deck that succeeds them. He applied his
own occult background to the system, publishing his Thoth Tarot and the accompanying
Book of Thoth. Doing this, he effectively created a modern “Magician’s Picture Book”
that remains unsurpassed among teaching tools of its kind. Other occultists and
researchers – notably psychologists – rode Crowley’s coattails publishing either decks of
their own or examinations of Tarot symbolism in either mythic or psycho-symbolic
idioms. Often, the two sets of terms overlap and may be put to use in a complimentary
manner.
At the end of 2006, a friend of mine from another TIW Tradition was discussing with me
a project of his. He suggested that the best ongoing training a Second Admission holder
could work is a Tarot expressing the cosmology, mystery, and theological lore of the
given tradition in its own dialect. A month later, a mutual acquaintance put South African
Pagan artist Diana Fegen in touch with me. On impulse, I asked if she would be
interested in executing a complete TIW oriented Tarot, in my Tradition’s symbolic
dialect. She agreed and we set to work. The results speak, quite strongly, for themselves.
One of the ubiquitous concepts in modern Pagan and Witchcraft thought and work is the
role of Goddess or Goddesses. Understanding of, and relationship to, the female or “Left
Hand” deity varies as widely as do Traditions, Pagans, and Occultists. The Goddess role
includes such functions as Mother, Destroyer, Lightbringer, Nightbringer, Betrayer,
Opponent, Oppositional Twin, Cruel Mother, Prophetess, Sorceress, Queen of Plenty, and
so on.
In TIW, we call these roles “mantles.” Sometimes one God or Goddess can occupy more
than one mantle. This is well exemplified in the well known Gaelic/Brythonic deities
Lugh and Brigid, both of whom may be described as “many artful,” that is, able to
manifest anything and to (at least temporarily) occupy any mantle in a TIW cosmology.
Conversely, more than one God or Goddess may occupy a given mantle.
The principal Goddess mantle that we work with is that of the Great Creatrix and
Destroyer. She is our Great Queen and holds the unifying role in our “Tribes of the
Gods” (a more functional term for our case than “pantheon.”) The figure that my own
stream offers, wearing this complex mantle, is the Washer; who occupies Trump II or the
“Popess / High Priestess” position in this deck we call The Witches’ Picture Book.
Trump II, The Washer:
The Washer crouches atop her weir, apparently
intent upon her task of cleansing away the
detritus of mortal life from the mantles of
spirits. She ignores the tiny crane-skin coracle
with its precious cargo bumping against the
posts of the weir. It will have its due time.
Behind her, the sun sets in a fiery orange and
red sky. Silhouetted by this fading glory, the
swan ship plies its course across the seas of
time.
The dreadful and wonderful Washer at the Ford
stands at the point where time and the manifest
world intersect. It is she who mediates that
interaction. Behind her, the swan ship travels
further still.
In the Cauldron of Inspiration, the Washer is the
twin and counterpart of the Magician. He
presides over the coming of the light, so she the
harbinger of the night.
Even more than this, the Washer carries every
key held by the Priestess card of other decks,
although she has eschewed the Catholic
trappings of a tame, if subversive, Popess and presents her nature defiantly.
In her being meet day and night, order and chaos, death and birth. She is the gatekeeper between
the worlds of form and time, and again of time and the void. She is the keeper of the Mystery of
the Veils and she is a potent reminder of the perils inherent in approaching – even seeking - those
mysteries.
This is not a simple or a facile being. She bears little resemblance to the kindly laughing Goddess
of popular Pagan myth. She is the stern and tireless keeper of the Mystery of Creation. It is she
who hauls the unformed spirits of the void across her weir and imposes upon them the order of
the manifest. It is she who brings these beings to light, and it is she who releases the
Lightbringers into the world. It is to her that the double bloodlines, revealed in the mysteries of
Cauldron and Graal, are ultimately traced.
Likewise, she is the great Destroyer. She is the Raven Goddess of Lust and Death, whose hair is
washed in blood and whose appetite for destruction is never fully sated. Her hand is found in
every one of the daughter manifestations between Creatrix and Destroyer. As such, those seeking
to pass the other direction must also cross her weir as they seek the journey upon her husband’s
swan-prowed ship.
Cerridwen, Modron, and Morrigu all find expression in the form of the Washer. She is the
complex and paradoxical personification of all crossroads. The Washer is the Keeper of Mysteries
and the mistress of the unconscious and the super-conscious, as well as of the emotional. As such,
her planetary attribution is the Moon, and the moonlight reflected in the contents of the Graal, or
upon the deeps, is one key to her mystery. Thus does she tie into, and invoke, the great Mill of
Wyrd.
In the Gaelic An Duille system of cosmology, in which all directions and aspects of creation are
shown as interrelated and connected, the moon is tied to the mind of the Witch, and is said to
represent the inward path. In some Traditional Witchcraft systems, this association is not overtly
invoked and this is also a great and paradoxical key, for it may be said that its invocation is the
greatest part of many rites.
Aleister Crowley called the Priestess in his deck a “pure and gracious influence,” and her secrets
are often left at that. But what is meant by the mysteries of purity and grace? In her Cerridwen
role, as Creatrix, she brews the Awen from the “thirteen deadliest things” and herein we may find
a triple set of mysteries.
In alchemy, the Elixir of Life could be brewed only from the deadliest of all poisons, and was
then to be transmuted by the power of the Philosopher’s Stone. Indeed, those of us whose
children are fans of the wildly popular Harry Potter™ or who don’t mind taking a fantastic
journey into the fabric of myth and folklore ourselves, may recall the character Nicolas Flammel,
who is presented in the story as the only living creator of the Philosopher’s Stone.
The Cauldron of Annwfn will not cook the meat of a coward; can return the bodies of the
violently killed to a semblance of life.
The Graal can banish the Wasteland; heal the wounded Fisher King, and will poison anyone not
of the royal, half-breed blood of the Sacred King or Lightbringer who drinks from it.
These are called the Vessels of Grace in a variety of Traditions and from this we may deduce that
by “grace” is meant to indicate Virtue, that is the power of the Awen, that ignites the Witch
Kindred’s mind of fire.
The Washer also holds the key of Purity, although not in the sense of a Catholic nun. Her purity is
that of the eternal virgin who brings the Lightbringer, fatherless, into the world. It is she who
binds the three Kindreds of the Titans, the Bright Gods and the Witches together, and each of
them can trace its bloodline to her. This is true of the Cauldron Bloodline of the Elder Gods, the
Graal Bloodline of the Bright Gods, and the mixed lineage of the Witches. All are found in her.
The two skirts represent the twin veils of matter – this is to say, perceived order – and time that
serve to hide the mysteries she carries. We should note that the Washer’s breasts are bare and
unbound by any restraint. This shows her both as the Eternal Matrona/Creatrix and as the Eternal
Virgin free of the crippling artifice of guilt and shame, thus we can see that she recalls both
Artemis and Cerridwen.
The Washer is Queen of the Cauldron and represents the Great Matriarch of the Three Kindreds.
As the Titan Cerridwen, her husband is Lír, sometimes called Ludd, Nudd, or Nodens, and
associated with Tegid the Bald, that is to say “The Old Man.” Whatever spirit one chooses to
invoke into this mantle, he is the ruler and personification of time. He is Saturn, for whom the
Sabbats are named and under whose auspices they function. It is his swan ship that we see plying
the seas in the background. There, it carries the keys of Time and the tripartite Saturn Mystery.
The Washer is the gateway and gatekeeper to those mysteries, as well as of the deep meanings of
the Mysteries of the Sabbats, which reveal their connection to the Saturnine by their collective
name, derived from the Italian “Sabbado” or “Saturn’s Day.”
She carries the mysteries of Don/Dana or Rigantona as Matriarch of the Bright Gods of Men.
Here her consort is the Great Good God, Belenos, and the Dagda Mor, whose hidden mysteries
and connection to old Lír are well worth exploring.
As Rhiannon, whether we translate the name as, once again, Rigan – on (from Rigantona) or
Great Queen, or as Rigan – Annwfn (Queen of the Underworld,) she cements the three kindreds
together and brings their relationship full circle. As such, she is the queen of transformation,
bringing forth the Awen from the deadliest of poisons, birthing and reigning over the Kindred of
the Bright Gods, and marrying into the kindred of Men, giving birth again to the half-blood line
of the Witches. Thus she holds the gateway to the deep mysteries, as well as the knowledge of the
Arts.
The blood-drenched garments she holds out over the waters show the enfleshed double bloodlines
of the Witch kindred and serve to exemplify our relationship to the spirit world and the Gods. The
clothing itself represents the incarnate human Witch kindred, flesh surmounted by spirit. The
blood is the Lightbringer bloodline of the bright Gods. The seawater of time represents that of the
titanic Elder Gods.
The weir, itself, serves to mediate the interaction between matter and time that is between life and
death, and between the manifest and primordial. It is from the mystery of this interaction that the
salmon, carrying keys of Awen itself, is cast up and caught when the tides of time recede under
the influence of the moon. It works as a threshold or crossroads place much as does the
Magician’s dolmen arch.
The red and grey pilings in the weir’s structure again show the roles of pairs of opposites between
which, the Washer stands and works; as well as pointing to her position along the middle pillar of
the Qabalist Tree of Life. More importantly, they serve as references to the great World Tree,
where Taliesin, shown here in his crane skin coracle or Crane Bag, and later Lugh, will hang in
their respective apotheoses as Lightbringer and Sacred King. The weir itself also conceals the
form of a dolmen arch – the Ultimate Threshold – once again doubling the Washer’s twin, the
Magician.
About the weir, you can see clumps of rushes growing in the shallows. These are the “flags” of
the saying “Flags, flax, and fodder.” Although they are not shown in blossom in this sunset
depiction, they are sacred to Isis and serve to further expound the mystery of the Washer as she
stands athwart the thresholds of day and night, and the worlds of form and time.
The coracle – a crane-skin bag stretched over a wooden frame – is an early expression of the
vessel that would come to be realized as the Graal, which has its origins in the cauldron, and thus
with the mantle of the Washer as carried by Cerridwen. It ties also to the Roman story of Diana
and Dianus. As the Lightbringer is born of the titanic creatrix, so the cauldron is the wellspring of
the Crane-bag or Graal.
Throughout this image, we see the pairing of twin concepts: Cauldron and Graal, Creatrix and
Destroyer, manifest and unmanifest. The concept of the Great Goddess as creatrix and destroyer
is hardly new or unique. Nor is the concept of the Goddess who births or creates, pursues and
ultimately consumes her son/lover to have him reborn and apotheosed as Lightbringer. Pursuer
and Destroyer and even Sister/Nightbringer are part and parcel of many mythic traditions. The
concept of the three kindreds, the Giants or Old Gods, the Bright Ones or Gods of Men, and the
Children of the Gods is also well known. What is not widely understood then is TIW’s means of
fitting together the roles of the Great Creatrix/Destroyer and her daughters and “daughters-inlaw”
and their roles within what can be called the Tribe of the Gods. This is one concept that we
have sought to expound, using the tarot as our vehicle.
2007 Trystn M Branwynn and Diana Fegen
Authors’ Note” Trystn Branwynn and Diana Fegen would like to thank Pagan art model Lore Challis, of Ontario,
Canada: our Washer.
Bibliography
The Book of Thoth, 1944 Aleister Crowley, reprinted Samuel Weiser, Inc. 1969
The Visconti – Sforza Tarot, Bonifazio Bembo 1403, published in modern form by US Games.
Jung and the Tarot, 1980 Sallie Nichols
The Robert Cochrane Letters, 2002 Evan John Jones and Mike Howard, available in unedited form from the Clan of
Tubal Cain (US) at
http://www.cyberwitch.com/bowers/akc.htm
