beltane | Springwolf Reflections

“Arctic Wolf Fire”
By Tom-in-Silence

The Festival of Bel’s Fire

May You Have A Wonderful Holiday Celebration!

Region has a great deal of influence over early religious and/or spiritual celebrations. Especially in ancient times. While the Celts are generally seen as an individual group of people today, they were diverse and individual regional clans in their time.

They shared mythological stories, or perspectives, but they weren’t exactly the same. Different regions may hold a different set of deities on a higher level than others, or not include them at all.

Because of this, Bel has many names and many stories are attributed to him through out the old Celtic countries of Ireland, Scotland and Wales. Even Gaul was included in that region of Celtic culture (Gaul (Latin: Gallia) was a region of Western Europe during the Iron Age and Roman era, encompassing present day France, Luxembourg and Belgium, most of Switzerland, Northern Italy, as well as the parts of the Netherlands and Germany on the west bank of the Rhine. ~ Wikipedia:Gaul). Continue reading →

“Arctic Wolf Fire”
By Tom-in-Silence

The Festival of Bel’s Fire

May You Have A Wonderful Holiday Celebration!

By the Solar Calendar, the holiday is celebrated on May 1st. But by the Lunar Calendar it’s honored on May 6th.

The early Celts were very balanced in the way they scheduled their lives. One of the places this is seen most clearly are in the High Holy days.

Each festival fell in between a solstice or equinox. February 6 for Imbolg, May 6th for Beltaine and August 6th for Lughnasadh as examples.

With the advent of the modern calendar, the festivals were assigned to dates based on solar cycles. And most Pagan Metaphysical traditions follow this selection of dates for their holiday observances. To some degree this does throw off the balance intended for the cycle of the lunar year. This is also one reason varying traditions hold their festivals on different days. Wicca for instance recognizes May 1st as the date for Beltaine. Where as my tradition, Deborean, still recognizes May 6th as the date to honor Bel.

Learn more about Beltaine, or you might enjoy reading about the Celtic Lunar Tree Calendar to further your research.