BOWYNN GODS: SUMON

Blessed Winter Solstice

QUESTIONS & ANSWERS: Ethic and moral punishments

QUESTION: Do Bowynns believe in Kharma or the 3-fold law?

ANSWER: No. Not in the way these are commonly believed. Kharma and the 3-fold law come from other cultures and practices. These idealisms and beliefs are not part of our faith. We adhere to the belief of Bia (balance) and that if what you do and say in life is just, true, moral and virtuous, then you are in good standings. If it is not, then the gods and those around you will call you out and tend to you justly. And the more wrong one does, the worse it is going to be. Like a rubberband: the more you pull on it, the worse it is going to hurt when it snaps back. And assuredly, it will snap back.

Blessed Winter Solstice

QUESTION & ANSWER: Thanksgiving

QUESTION: Do Bowynn celebrate Thankksgiving (Canadian or American)

Answer: No. That for two reasons. The first being out of respect for the people's whose land North and South America belonged to.

The second reason is because we have a sacred holy festival day on the days of November 14-16th, Emberfest. It is the most holy of Feast and the celebration/preparation of Winter. Sacred candles are lit in the home praying that its warmth light and glow will never fad throughout winter, protecting house and home. Stoves, hearths, ovens and fireplaces are cleaned. Then the officiating priest and priestesses come to the home singing hymns to the Goddess Phoenix, the goddess of primeval and element of fire. The officiants then gift a single blessed charcoal to the home owners. It is lit and there is a roar of joy and love, hoping that abundance and protection lasts the home and family the winter through.

During the festival homes are decorated with autumn leaves, candles, lantern, gourds carved into bird houses and images of Phoenix birds are everywhere. Small and large. The gourds houses are invites for Phoenix's children to come stay in the house and protect it. While it seems this holiday is a feast day, it is more than that. It is a time to give praise and thanks to the goddess Phoenix for bestowing on mankind the gift to domesticate fire for light, warmth, cooking food and casting spells.

Bowynn Gods: Naea

Naea  (Nay-ah)  Naea is the Bowynn goddess of springs, wells, lakes, rivers, streams and other small fresh bodies of water. She is the daughter of Tane and Kauldra and is one of the very few multi arm gods. As such she is a spider goddess. Her multi limbs represent the many rivers of the world.      Naea is a free spirited goddess, spending much of her time wandering the sides of wells and ponds and weaving away in her godly or animal form on the side of streams and rivers. Her prime domain is to make sure such bodies of water are protected from pollutants and destruction as much as possible. As such, Naea is one of the very few gods of the Bowynn pantheon to seek revenge on mortals that destroy her realm. One sacred story speaks of the fisherman that was so filled with joy when he caught a fish as soon as his hook hit the water. He became so happy that he kept fishing till the lake was depleted of fish. Naea found out about this and that night as he and his family gorged out on the fish the man caught, there was a knock on the door of a beggar woman. She asked for a fish to get her by. The man and woman gave her the smallest fish in the batch, so small it would not fill a cat. The old woman ended up being Naea and for the couple's lack of moderation and charity, Naea made all the other food in the house disappear till all that was left saw the fish. The couple quickly became sick of eating fish all the time and thus learned their lesson. There are many legends of mortals abusing wells and springs then suffering Naea’s wrath but never death.      Despite this and other such sacred tales Naea is not a vicious goddess. Infact she is a most gentle goddess. She only seeks out those that have done wrong with her gifts. So, she should not be feared. Other times she is most giving, as the sacred stories of her creating a well for a family that had nothing to drink for days. Because of her watery realm, Naea's temples are often nothing more than a well surrounded by a gazebo.      Naea is depicted in her godly immortal form as a delightful young woman with long flowing hair. Her garments are of blues, purples and greens and silver or glass baubles as jewelry. Sometimes she is seen with a pitcher of fresh water and other times with a loom. In her totem form Naea is seen as an elegant spider. Sacred gifts to Naea come in the form of glass pieces, fresh water, river and lake plants and flowers, spoons of white and blue yarn and votive images of a spider.

Bowynn Gods: Mano

Mano  (Man-oh)  God of hate, jealousy, tricks, evilness, all that is wicked, war and destruction. Mano is the only god in the Bowynn faith that is of negativity and after his confinement and destruction by the gods, he said to be never invoked again. Even in the Hall s of gods, Mano is not spoken of nor his image depicted. Despit this Mano is still listed in the Pantheon of the Bowynn gods, as a sever lesson to be learns and avoided..

     Mano was the bastard son of Phoenix and Sumon and hated his cousins Brand, Brenda and Kord. Spending so much time with them as kids, Mano became jealous of his cousins and started to play tricks on them. This led to Mano's enviousness to spread to all the gods, He saw them all as prefect and himself as flawed. Though he tormented other gods as well, he seemed to target his two cousins the most, and later on started to fancy Brenda, who was the goddess of love and beauty. As the years went by, Mano's tricks became more and more malicious and destructive; stealing, harmful and in some cases physically painful. What exactly caused this jealousy is unknown, as Mano had just as much beauty and gifts as his cousins. Whatever the reason, the tricks escalated to a point where Mano was reported to Anhur for kidnapping his cousin Brenda and it took Brand and Kord days to find her. He also started to teach mortals how to behave wickedly to each other. He encouraged theft and destruction,

Needless to say, Anhur punished young Mano. This sat wrong with Mano and the malicious god started to outright battle with Brand and Kord. But his rage blinded him so much that the twins always defeated him, sending Mano running. In turn Mano finally had enough, stole the sword "Nilwynn" from the war god Tirren and used it to slay his cousin Brand as he slept in a field. This was possible only because only an immortal weapon can kill a god. When Kord discovered his twin brother dead, he vowed revenge and a great war started between the two. Kord, being much stronger, caused Mano to even the odds by creating an army, the malicious Tii spirits. However, Kord created the Kii, to battle them. The battle raged for months and in the end, Kord defeated Mano, chained him and brought him before the gods for judgment. Anhur cast the final verdict and decreed Mano be stripped of all godly hood and gifts and changed him for eternity in a cave in the ocean.

At some point Mano had been able to and took on Anhur's son, the demi-god Allon. Their own battle was just as destructive till Allon slew the anti-god, casting his body into the sun, so that it would never soil the earth again.

     Like all gods, Mano has two forms; in his godly form, Mano is a young handsome god, with jet black wavy hair. Divine law dictated his image never to be depicted in any form, so not to manifest him nor his ways back into existence. And he is certainly never invoked. In his godly form Mano used to take the form of a Woodpecker, Lion Shark and Octopus.

Bowynn Gods: Briora

Briora  (Bry-or-rah)  The Briora are Kii (spirits, fairies, nymphs) of wisdom, organizers of books and protectors of buildings like libraries and other places where tomes of knowledge and records are kept. The Briora are diminutive spirits a lot like their European Fae cousins but do not bare wings at all. They take up residence in libraries among the books, where they indulge in reading, cleaning, maintaining and sorting books that are out of place. The Briora are the immortal essence of the term “A treasure in books.” In Bowynn libraries, images of the Briora and a shrine to them are kept. Most heavy readers will even places small images of Briora on their own bookshelves. Gifts to them are generally simple like a candle and incense. Even candy. 

Bowynn Gods: Khammii

Khammii  (Kham-My)  Khammii are the Kii (spirits) of freshwater bodies, such as ponds, streams, lakes, rivers and so forth. They are said to be of human size, very beautiful and live either in the waters they protect or on its shores. Unlike Mermaids, the Khammii do not have fish bodies. But they can turn into westland animals like fisf, herons, egrets, bitterns and otters. The beauty of the Khammii is depicted in many of the sacred tales. The sadness comes when one learns how protective the Khammii are of their waters. So much so, that mortals that abuse their waters fall to a dramatic ending. Other times sacred stories speak of a mortal and a Khammii that have fallen in love and either one or the other dies, in an attempt to live with the other. Clearly a warning as to how dangerous bodies of water can become.

     The Khammi can be compared to mermaids or water nymphs, but the gender of the Khammii is mixed; some are male and some female. 

QUESTION & ANSWER: Samhain/Halloween

QUESTION: Do Bowynn Celebrate Halloween and Samhain?

ANSWER: No, we do not celebrate the Keltic/Wiccan Samhain. We do celebrate Ky'Kora, which is a rather loose equivalent to Samahain. A three-day holiday from October 30 to November 1st. But that is about all Ky'Kora has in common with Samhain.

We do celebrate Halloween as a total separate holiday. But we celebrate it on November 1st, as the 31st is a most divine and holy day, set aside for spiritual worship.

BOWYNN GODS: Saulnat

Saulnat  (Sawl-nat)  God of the light in Daunnat, the next world. He is the son of Shayla and Saul, the god and goddess of Light and Day.

     When first created by the lord Chumash, Duannat was a very dark and foreboding place where the dead would go, much darker than the night. Thus it was a dismal place to be. He asked Saulnat, the son of Saul if he would be willing to bring his inherited light to Daunnat. In turn Chumash promised him the great feasts of Daunnat and his own home. Saulnat agreed to this and took a part of the essence of the sun with him to Daunnat. With the sun light now in Daunnat, light filled the land, crops grew and forests came into being, thus turning Daunnat into a much glorious place.

     Despite Saulnat’s great gift to Chumash, the souls of the dead and Daunnat itself, he is not a widely worshipped god. Only in the hymns chanted at a death is Saulnat spoken of, that his light never be extinguished and act as a beacon. But despite this, he is revered greatly as a bastion of hope for the living and the dead, a symbol of life eternal. Saulnat is seen as a much older man than his father; a man is his elder years with a man of white hair and a long white beard. Saulnatt us said to wear ling white robes and has a most decorative staff in hand that the light of Daunnat is contained in.

     Sacred to Saulnat is a simple white candle. No totem animals are associated with him.