Sphinx, Goddess Myths and Mysteries
Fellowship of Isis Liturgy
III. Mercury: Scota, The Heretic Princess
ORACLE OF THE WINGED ISIS
Invocation: Divine Goddess Isis whose outspread wings promise protection in spiritual flights, bring us through the starry spheres of being to our eternal home.
Oracle of the Winged Isis: You have wings yourself. Without spiritual growth you will never fly with the wings of another, even a Goddess. The fledgling bird is pushed from the nest by its mother, not from rejection but from love for its own individual being.
The time of change is at hand. Humanity is discovering wings of the divine spirit, enjoyed by angels. The fledgling soul learns to transcend not only the speed of light to distant galaxies, but to experience greater spheres of consciousness. But take heed. For perfect balance you need two wings - you attain your true being through heart and mind, Love and Truth. But to fly successfully, you need your home to spring from and your haven to return to after your soul's flight! Then my wings will enfold you to your deep content.
ORACLE OF HORUS THE GOLDEN EYE
Invocation: Horus of the Horizon, mighty hawk whose all-seeing Eye looks into our souls, save us from self-deception and delusions of grandeur. Help us to face ourselves.
Oracle of Horus the Golden Eye: Too frequently your problem is not self-pride but self-hatred. Yet these two go together. If you seek power, you need to learn submission. You search for the object of your love, yet forget to offer love! You may conquer great empires throughout the stars, yet omit to conquer your own passions. Your first essay in the flight of the hawk is to know your own limitations. Otherwise you will become confused and dispirited. Learn with the eye of discernment where you wish to travel to! Do not be guided by some teacher, some book, some tradition. Your soul's flight is too important to be dominated by anothers guidance, however noble. Your only true guide is yourself, that spark of which you inherit like Myself from the Divine Body of Nuit, Mother of All. My Golden Eye is within your own self. It is the eye of truth.
Priestesses wear gold crowns and carry gold wands; Priests, gold mitres and hold gold staffs, all wear turquoise and gold. All others wear gold circlets, blue robes and yellow sashes. On gold draped altar are 3 lighted candles, a silver bowl of water, a five pointed star, a small vessel of earth and burning incense. Music may be played throughout.
Priest Hierophant: Companions, we are assembled to deal with the unprecedented changes that are besetting our civilisation. Material sciences override religions, customs and values.
Priestess Hierophant: In this holy Temple let us return to myth that springs from the deepest soul of humanity. Facts are the sandalled feet of truth, but her head is in the stars.
Priest Hierophant: I invoke the Goddess Isis, Who incarnates in human form from the luminous realms of spirit. You who are seated upon the throne of earth yet spread out your wings of light, teach us flight and safe return.
Priestess Hierophant: I invoke the God Horus of the Horizon, with his all seeing Eye of the sun at dawn. You who are Osiris reborn through love of Isis, help us to know our divinity.
1st Priestess: To comprehend the marriage of heaven and earth, let us witness the mystery play, "Scota, The Heretic Princess."
MYSTERY PLAY: SCOTA, THE HERETIC PRINCESS
GENESIS. SCENE 1. AMENTI
Enter Egyptian Scribe holding scroll.
Scribe: In the Depths of Amenti behold three Goddess of creation.
Enter three Goddesses in gold masks and wearing Egyptian robes. Taur wears vulture headdress: Sekhmet a lion mask and Nuit, cow's horns headdress and starry robe. They seat themselves in Egyptian hierarchic pose, hands on knees before altar.
Taur: I am TA-UR, Queen of the Underworld the Law Giver, the Oracle, Great Creator of Forms. The religion of Egypt rests upon My words inscribed in stone: "As it is written, so it is." But now our land is destroyed by one heretic and his family. The only royal prince not infected by new ideas is Prince Amoses, son of our princess but with an Israelite father. Amon has commanded Amoses to leave this decadent Egypt, overrun with fanatics, demented artists and drug-bemused dreamers. His duty is to bring the stone tablets of the law, My Torah, to a distant land beyond the sea.
Sekhmet: I am Sekhmet of the Noon-day sun, whose Lion-Power animates all forms of existence. Before Akhenaton brought new life, Egypt was a school for walking Zombies, living by rote rather than by inspiration. Where there are fanatics, there is My power. Akhenaton has uprooted the population of your Muth-Amon city and transported it to his Sun City - My city. The violence, famine and the plagues that resulted are worth the sacrifice. So-called heresy brought vitality to a boring people. Akhenaton was the first eccentric: He will not be the last.
Nuit: I am Nuit, the Universal Mother, who brings each soul particular form. My body is the Milky Way and My cows' milk nourishes the children. I am She Who with My husband, the earth god Geb, sends messengers in times of change. To balance Law with Liberty, We shall send forth two leaders to Egypt, disguised in mortal flesh.
THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT
SCENE 2. THE MUTH-AMON TEMPLE
Scribe: We move from Amenti to the City of Muth Amon, falling into ruins. The High Priest of Amon Ra and the General in Command are in conclave. Enter High Priest and General.
High Priest: The girl is a heretic!
General: I do not blame her, The whole sacred family is mad. It is a sign of their divinity. We soldiers accept this. Gods and Goddesses are violent, passionate, compassionate, wise, childish, all at the same time.
High Priest: True. We wretched priests and scribes have to interpret and ameliorate their inconsistencies. What can we expect from oracles given in signs by holy crocodiles, divine cats and intellectual jackals? But divine humans are worse. Their ways are as vagrant as desert storms.
General: Brothers marrying sisters through generations may enhance these divine attributes. Such inbreeding produces madness or genius. The late Akhenaten was both. Luckily his successor is a quiet dreamer. We can handle him.
High Priest: We priests do not question the divinity of the sacred family. But Akhenaton by his heresy has undermined not only his own but our authority. The people are abandoning the worship of the Gods.
General: Oh, I believe in the Gods! They were swift to punish. This temple and city are in ruins. How can you build without the harvest straw? The sacred lake stinks and is infested with frogs. The people are dying in such number from plague that they are not burying the dead who contaminate the drinking water. The canals are silted up. Famine prevails. there was low inundation: now there is a plague of locusts.
High Priest: There is a greater danger - foreign invasion, which is why I summoned you here.
General: When our eastern frontiers were threatened, Akhenaton lover of peace - sent no reinforcements. Now my spies tell me that this Scythian son-in law of our pharaoh threatens to leave Egypt with our royal princess. Surely he plans to return with a foreign army and seize the throne, his wife's right.
High Priest: A worse threat comes from Amoses, Son of a royal princess, also with a right to Egypt's throne. He is a born leader. My spies inform me that he intends to leave Egypt with his Israelites. He will return with a foreign army and conquer Egypt!
General: The danger is obvious. My duty is clear: My army shall prevent any member of the sacred family leaving our country. Exeunt.
EXODUS
SCENE 3. MARKETPLACE. MUTH-AMON CITY
Scribe: The crowd in the marketplace of Muth- Amon city are rebellious. There is little to buy or sell. They are ill-nourished, many with painful boils and most are infested with lice. They also dread foreign invaders.
Enter angry crowd.
Woman: Who will feed us now locusts devour our corn?
Man: Surely the Pharoah's heresy has caused this - so say the priests. Yet they do not feed us with their hoarded grain. (angry murmurs).
Man: The priests of Amon Ra have not only cursed the Pharaoh but all of us who followed him! And the curse lasts from generation to generation. We get no help from priests and lawyers. (general assent). Let us call on the Goddesses and the Gods for forgiveness for our desertion!
Crowd: May the Gods and Goddesses forgive us and come to our aid!
Music. Enter Scota and Nel.
Scota: My people, I call you to a wondrous land beyond the sea! Set sail with us, you who long for freedom from priests and law-givers! You shall be your own deities, no man's creatures, but you shall instead follow the law of your open hearts. The Goddesses will nourish you with abundant food and drink and you shall have many healthy children. You artists and craftsmen shall create as you please, and not by measurement. Your laws will come from the life around you, not from hieroglyphs. And your lovers shall live as you choose, and not by birth-duty, in our beautiful land of beauty, love and everlasting happiness.
Woman: Surely the Gods have answered our prayers! My heart is filled with hope.
Nel: What do you do here, Egypt's people, circumscribed by just one straight river, with thin strips of vegetation, dependent on only one yearly inundation - which tailed this year! I know lands of rich pastures filled with cattle roaming at will. Corn abounds with rich harvests and orchards ripen with fruit from good rainfall and flowing rivers. High mountains reach the sky, promising jewels and gold within their caverns for those with strength to mine them. And mighty forests offer homes for you women and hunting for you men.
Man: Surely the Gods sent you. But what is your name who would lead us across the sea?
Scota: My name is hidden. Some call me Scota the Dark One.
Nel: I am called by those who know me the Fair Stranger.
Crowd: We shall follow you to the ends of the earth! Exeunt.
THE TORAH
SCENE 4. PALACE IN THE CITY OF THE SUN
Scribe: We find ourselves within the Palace of the City of the Sun, already - having been built by dreamers - failing into disrepair. The Pharaoh Smenkhare, of a gentle disposition, is being bullied as usual by cousin Amoses.
Enter Smenkhare and Amoses:
Amoses: Your Holiness, why did you permit your daughter and her husband to leave Egypt and not myself? They go from some whim, but I am commanded by the voice of God.
Smenkhare: Your god. Amoses, I love my daughter and saved her from the wrath of the people against our sacred family. But every time I gave you permission to leave with your Israelites, the priests and General have thwarted you. They fear you will return with a foreign army and depose me.
Amoses: I could have done that any time as leader of a rebellion had I wished to - your Holiness. But God has commanded me to bring my Israelites over the Red Sea to a land overflowing with milk and honey.
Smenkhare: (Sadly) Where your tribes will slaughter the inhabitants of that land, who own the cattle and the bees. But I give you permission to leave with my blessing - because I know you will do so anyway. In return I beg you to preserve papyri of Akhenaton’s prayers to the Aton, which priests of Amon are now burning.
Amoses: I shall do so. I never break my word, unlike your Holiness. Exeunt.
Enter Scribe and an Irish Bard.
Scribe: My Irish fellow poet, you ask what happened then? Smenkhare was forced by his army to pursue Amoses - that is all I know. His reign was ended. Egypt returned to her ancient ways and remained loyal to these for thousands of years. All annals concerning the heretic family were destroyed.
Bard: In our Irish book of invasions it is written that the Pharaoh, father of Princess Scota, was drowned in the Red Sea. It is believed that Amoses and his tribes escaped. Most of the tribes were never heard of again. There was one tribe that some say reached Wales and settled there. Amoses, with merely two tribes left, reached his promised land, or so I am told. It is certain his Torah has brought his God's law to many lands.
Scribe: What became of Scota? We were not permitted to find out. But tradition tells of a wild girl with a loving heart.
Bard: It is written in our Book that Scota and Nel set sail across the sea with twenty-four married couples. With ever-increasing families that settled in Barbary, Galicia and Spain. Scota and Nel ruled jointly in Portugal. When Nel died, Scota and their son Gaelglas shared rulership. But they had one problem.
BIRTH OF A NATION
SCENE 5. PALACE IN PORTUGAL
Bard: Let us follow Scota and Gaelglas to their sea-side palace in Portugal.
Enter Scota and Gaelglas.
Scota: My son, it grieves me that we and our people are insulted by being called nomads and pirates and half-breeds because of their black or golden hair, or red like your own! Our people have no name, and we have no country to call our own.
Gaelglas: (strikes the ground three times with staff.) In the name of our Gods I command that henceforth any land which we own shall be named after you and be called Scota. And our people shall be named after myself, and be called Gaels.
Scota: It is spoken. So be it. Exeunt.
Bard: And so it came to pass. Nine hundred and forty years after Scota's death, a princess was born to the last native Pharaoh of Egypt, Nectanebus. Like her Ancestress she married for love, and took the name of Scota. She had refused to marry a conqueror of Egypt and with her father's blessing, escaped with her Gaelic husband, Milesius. They sailed across the Northern sea with their followers and finally landed in the West of Ireland. Our annals describe how the Milesians conquered the people of Dana, who retreated to their hollow hills. So Scota and Milesius ruled Ireland, which they named "Greater Scota", and Scotland "Lesser Scota", where their Gaelic followers also settled. But even in their palace in Taur's Hill, named Tara, Scota was unhappy.
THE SOUL’S LOSS
SCENE 6. PALACE IN TARA
Enter Scota, Milesius and their son Amergin:
Milesius: Scota, you are a queen, crowned with gold, and you have a fine family. Our place is surrounded by rich pastures filled with cattle. So why are you sad?
Scota: Conquerors in a foreign land dwell in the haunted homesteads of the vanquished. Our corn is reaped with hatred: the air we breath whispers of vengeance, and the cry of murdered children haunt our dreams. My husband, what terrible obsession draws you to sail from land to land with your Iron sword, ever seeking, never satisfied!
Milesius: It is an unquenchable thirst for the land beyond the horizon, the mountain reaching the skies, the pallid moon herself. But when I achieve each goal - it is as stale and ordinary as the place I left.
Scota: Alas, This applies to your longing for women as well. We Egyptians live our daily lives in deep content, obeying time-honored laws.
Amergin: There is a way of travelling while one sits still. Without killing, cruelty or suffering one may journey to ethereal realms and obtain ever rewarding delights. The wise ones of the Goddess Dana were not defeated. They have transcended their earthly bodies and dwell in shining beauty within their hollow hills. I have joined their company. They are still teaching me their magical arts of the four hidden treasures.
Milesius: My son, you were ever a dreamer, yet would that we might travel into a future and see the outcome of all our doings!
THE RETURN OF THE GODS
SCENE 7. UNITED NATIONS HEADQUARTERS
Amergin: I gaze into the future two thousand four hundred years ahead. We observe the headquarters of the United Nations of Earth. The world is prosperous and stable. So a President, Astronaut and Occultist are amazed by unexpected rebellion!
Enter President, Astronaut and Occultist
President: How dare these dissidents challenge our laws!
Astronaut: Too much sameness - same food - same work - same laws - and then death. No survival. The dissidents have a point.
Occultist: They have occult power. So I've brought the two leaders here. Don't worry! They'll be returned to the detention facility after the interview. Guards - bring the detainees!
Enter Scota and Nel-Milesius
President:(tapping Computer) You have no names, just "Dark Woman" and "Fair Man", mixed racial partnership, no fixed abode, unless you call an iron lean-to an abode. Who are you?
Astronaut: What empowers you?
Occultist: What is your Hidden agenda?
Music.
Scota: The time has come for me to unveil. I am the Goddess Isis. I call you to a greater life. My name and place are written in the stars.
Nel-Milesius: I am the God Horus of the rising sun. You are watched by My Golden Hawk's Eye within a triangle of stars. The time of your rebirth is at hand. Come with us to our realm in the heart of eternity.
Exeunt Omnes. End of Play.
Priest Hierophant: Companions, let us meditate on the law, the life force and the birth of souls.
Meditation
Reports are shared. Rays of harmony are sent forth. Thanks are given to the deities.
Sources: "Lebor Gabala Erenn", trans. Macalister, Irish Texts Society. "Goddesses of Chaldea, Syria and Egypt", Lawrence Durdin-Robertson, Cesara.
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