We've been playing a game in our house where Avington is His Royal Majesty King Avington Fife, King of all Elfland! It's a really fun way to motivate the older boys. They will do something if king Avington tells them too (via the Queen Mum of course since his royal highness does not speak to commoners).
On the theme of Elfland and I wanted to share this with you. Some thought bumbling about my brain.
Jerusalem as Elfland
In the book “Circle Round; Raising Children in the Goddess Tradition”, the author Starhawk retells the thirteenth-century Scottish ballad of Thomas the Rhymer as a Beltane tale. In this tale we learn traditional, pagan European, held beliefs about the land of Elves and Fairies. It’s amazing how closely the description of Jerusalem sounds to Elfland in Revelation 21:10, 22-22:5.
In Revelation it says, “In the Spirit the angel carried me away to a great, high mountain and showed me the holy city Jerusalem…” Ancient legends about the world of the Elves and Fairies tells us that the Fairy and Elf spirits live in mounds (hills, mountains) reffered to as “Fairy Mounds.” These are not the little sprites of Peter Pan but are powerful nature energies who lay behind the physical world.
The reading goes on to say, “the city has no need of sun and moon to shine on it…” In the tale of “Thomas the Rymer” it is said of Elfland that the sun and moon do not need to shine there. Thomas is gifted with a tongue which can only speak the truth after he serves the Elfland Queen. In Revelations it is said that no unclean thing will enter Jerusalem nor any falsehoods will be practiced.
In some legends of the Celtic people the Tree of Life is held in the Fairy realm and blooms throughout the year. In Jerusalem there is said to be a tree of life with twelve kinds of fruit, producing its fruit each month; and the leaves of the tree are used for healing.
In the Episcopal tradition this passage of Revelation is read as the second reading the Sixth Sunday of Easter, placing it very near to Beltane, the ancient holiday celebrated by the Pagan peoples of Europe as the time when the world of the fairies and our world are most easily traveled between.
I invite those practicing Christo-Pagans or Nature Based Christian paths to look upon Biblical Jerusalem as the Christian Elfland and see the magick contained therein. It would also be a nice addition to any Beltane practice or celebration to include thoughts, prayers, reading, descriptions, poems or artwork of Jerusalem.
