The other week Zephyr and I both wrote posts going over the Triple Goddess and the Triple God. This is likely the most common version of this concept for most of you. It might even be the only version you’ve heard of. I know it was the only version that I knew of until about 3 days ago. Lol
So, while scrolling on amazon like a week ago, I found a book called ‘Pagan Degrees for Children’ by Shanddaramon. This post isn’t really about the book itself. I was reading through this book to see what it contains. I wanted to find out how it can help us teach the children Paganism. I stumbled across a section of the book on deities. One of the things it says is to have the child study the four faces of the Goddess. I read this and honestly thought it must have been a typo. Serenity and our other friend, who was here over the weekend, thought it was strange. They had never heard of it before. That is significant. Our friend (who is going to be featured on the blog here soon) has been practicing paganism. They have been practicing longer than Serenity, Zephyr, and I have been alive.
I went to Google to figure out what the hell this mysterious fourth face of the Goddess was. Honestly, I got kind of disappointed. I couldn’t have just assumed what it was. It seems so obvious now. The fourth face of both the God and the Goddess is the Child. Like duh, right? Lol.
So, what does this change about the Triple God/Goddess? Really nothing. Everything from the posts on the Maiden, Mother, Crone and the Warrior, Father, Sage still stand. This fourth aspect really just gets slapped in front of both of them. It makes way too much sense. I should have wondered why in both aspects they start out like teenagers. Adding the child phase makes sense. Everyone in the three other phases of life has experienced the childhood phase. It should be recognized in the divine too.
The Fourth Face – The Child
This fourth face would represent the little boys and girls all of us were at one point. It’s the curiosity of life and learning what you can and can’t do. It’s the playfulness of making friends and rolling around in the grass on a warm day. The child comes to you when you need to let loose. You remember what it was like to not worry about everything. You just enjoy the things around you. The child phase spans from birth to around the start of puberty. After this, the person would move into the next phase, whether it be the Maiden or the Warrior.
We generally don’t see this aspect of divinity in most cases. Normally when we see anything about deities, they are considered older than time itself, they aren’t really depicted as children. And I personally think that should change. I want to see all the gods and goddess depicted as children too. I mean, who’s to say they weren’t children at some point? Granted, it’s unlikely. However, we’re also talking about beings that can change how they look. They can alter how we perceive them at will. Why couldn’t they decide to be depicted as a child every once in a while? Or maybe they do. We have focused so much on achieving things in our lives. We often forget to take the time to reflect on where we have come from. I mean, we all were children at one point. Whether it was a good time or a bad time, we were. Maybe the child’s main focus is to help others remember to take a break. Everyone needs to just enjoy the ride every now and then.
Well, this honestly took a different path than I originally intended it to go. I’m not complaining about it, but I didn’t really intend to get all philosophical. Lol. Maybe I need to start listening to the child myself about some things. Lol.
Anyways, have you heard of the fourth face of the god and goddess before? What do you think about the child phase of the deities?
