High Holidays and Why They’re Important July 15, 2009

I haven’t yet decided if or when I’m going to separately address each of the eight high holidays (or Sabbats, as some Pagans call them.) If so, that will probably start happening around Yule, since the Winter Solstice marks the new year for many modern Pagans. However, I’ve been thinking about the function of celebratory events in a specifically monastic context, and this is what I have come up with.

I feel that it’s very important for monks and nuns to enjoy the high holidays with as much enthusiasm and revelry as seems fitting and as one is capable of showing. Some may not see much point to this — after all, aren’t monastics already striving for a constant state of reverence for holy things? In a sense, there is really no difference between the contemplative devotionalism of the monastic path and the pomp and circumstance, joy and fun of a celebration which may be broadened to include one’s family, religious community or even one’s community at large. The former does require a keen awareness of the interior life, while the latter largely emphasizes the world around us — plants and animals, stars and moon and sun, sky and weather, seas and wind and stones, trees and people. Both of these, however, seek to unite the seeker or the worshiper with the gods and spirits and with all that is sacred — which, for Pagans, includes the natural world, the body and all that goes with it.

Because we may be heavily influenced by other religious traditions where embodiment is seen as an obstacle to enlightenment, Pagan monastics might sometimes have a harder time honoring that immanent sacredness, especially if one is on a more ascetic path. It can be tempting to feel that one’s moral integrity rests on never deviating from one’s work routine or spiritual restrictions, even for ritual or celebratory purposes. That’s a matter for one’s own conscience (or perhaps one’s own gods) to determine, but remember, moderation is our friend — and after all, we’re only talking about eight times a year. Joyful acts like feasting, drinking, dancing, making love or other earthy, sensual activities force us to acknowledge before all the gods as well as our fellow mortals that embodied existence is quite a good thing, really.

I’m not saying here that less prosaic acts of spiritual devotion are inferior or that an individual cannot learn on his/her own to appreciate or honor the physical.  However, there is something special about coming together with like-minded folk to celebrate each of the turning points of the year, during which the seasons shift and the natural world undergoes its many spectacular changes. The energy raised during a good ritual is as much of a celebration as any prayer, offering or sacred drama, and the gods and spirits feel and savor that energy as much as we do — which is part of the point. But even if all you can manage is to share a special meal with people who are close to you, if you’re paying attention, you will sense the difference.

So I think that participating in household or community celebrations of the high holidays provides a useful and necessary counterpoint to the vast amounts of time a monk or nun may spend in solitary devotion and contemplation, even if that solitude only exists in the privacy of the mind. I also feel it’s important for us to acknowledge that we do not live in a vacuum, and that we are all part of something greater than ourselves whether we’ve donned a habit or not. Before the might of the gods, and in celebration of the powerful tides and forces that rule our planet, we humans might seem frail and even superfluous. Around the sacred fire or in the ritual circle, however, the divisions between us and everything else drop away, and we may see into the heart of the Mystery…even though it is staring us in the face every day.