Ra-Hoor-Khuit Network's
Magickal Library
Wiccian
The Full Moon
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Casting the Circle, Diane Stein
The lunar cycle is 28-1/2 days, and the Full Moon is the center and high energy point of that cycle. The Full Moon phase includes
the date of the Full Moon (the fourteenth night) plus three nights before and three nights after it for a total of seven days. These
are Days 11 to 17 in the lunar calendar (beginning with the New Moon as day 1) The Full moon is the time of the Mother and Mother
Goddesses, the woman/divinity at the height of her creative power.
The Mother Goddess is strong, capable and all-giving. She gives birth from her body, nourishment from her breasts, and has the
strength and wisdom to protect and raise her offspring. The Mother's offspring are not only babies, though that is the
metaphor of the Full Moon. The Mother's creations include everything from moountains to panthers, books to symphonies, woven
rugs to computer programs.
In the Mother peace tarot deck, the Full Moon Mother is the Empress or Strength card. She is pregnant with ideas, highly
sensuous and luxurious, surrounded by young animals who turn to her for protection and nurturing. The Full Moon Mother is capable
maturity personified. She is all-powerful, as the human mother seems to the infant, and what she says goes. The Mother of the
Full Moon is also the Earth Mother, who needs protection as much as she protects. The Goddess of the moon is immanent on the
earth.
Some Goddesess representitive of this cycle are: Selene (Creted), Ishtar (babylonia), Luna (Etruscan), Mary (Christian), Isis
(Egypt and Greece), yemaya (West Africa), Astarte (Semiticd), Venus (Rome), Aphrodite (Phoenician), Lilith (Hebrew), Hathor
(Egypt), Amaterasu (Japan), Parvati (India), kwan Yin (China), Hina (Polynesia), Mawu (Dahomey), Demeter (Greece), Hera
(Greeced), Freya (Scandinavia), Copper Woman (Native America), Luonnotar (Finland), Arianrhod (Wales), Tiamat (Semitic), and Aido
Hwedo (Haiti). She is also The Great Mother, The Great Goddess - or just Mother.
Use red candles for the Full Moon phase (or white ones, which are fine for any ritual). Red is for the Mother aspect of the
Goddess, red for birth and menstrual blood, for women's wombs.
White candles or silver ones are an alternativeo red, for the light and illumination of this moon phase. Flowers on the altar
are heady and full ones; try red or white chrysanthenmums or red proteas, red or white peonies, red roses or red or white hibiscus.
Use one color or the other, red or white. Go for the unusual and exotic; braid flower crowns or leis. Lush abundance is a symbol
of the Mother on the Full Moon. The Goddess is pouring out her energy, sexuality, creativity and charm.
"All acts of love and pleasure are my rituals."
Women's bodies at the Full Moon are in the ovulation stage (in menstruating women whose cycles began at the New Moon). This is
fertility and sexuality at its height; the choice of conception or not for this cycle; the choice of joyous sexuality, heterosexual
or lesbian. The follicle of the Waxing Moon has burst to release the ready egg. It reaches the uterus, also ready with its lining
developed enough again to sustain a pregnancy, through one of the fallopian tubes. If the egg is fertilitzed on the way, a
pregnancy occurs. If the egg is not fertiltzed, it is reabsorbed and menstruation happens in the next stage of the moon cycle,
fourteen days after ovulation. The Full Moon is the time of births and deaths; more of these happen at the Full Moon than at
any other time of the lunar cycle. This phase for women, menstrual or not, is a time of choices, births, deaths and
fulfillments - the all-giving and all-taking Goddess.
Women's emotional and psychic lives are heightened at the Full Moon, and dreams reflect the cycle. Full Moon dreams are of
babies and eggs, pearls, round shining objects, breasts and moons.
Full Moon dreams are more likely to be precognitive and psychic ones, and every form of psychic activity is heightened at this
time. Divination by scrying, tarot cards, runes, Table or Iife, or I Ching is powerful. Emotionally, the energy is wired and
intense, and many women are made uneasy by it. Women who flow with the moon phases learn to channel this nervous energy into
projects or physical activities for a feeling of total aliveness.
Sexual arousal is strongest at this time, also with energy that needs to be released inlove-making or in other ways. The power
of this energy for creating, manifesting, accomplishing and for turning ideas into realities is immense.
Full moons may have been the first of the witches Sabbats, as women in early times were aware of the moon's power and its
connection to ovulation and conception. Full Moons and dark moon menstruation were probably the earliest ritualized acts. In days of
no pollution or artificial light to abscure night skies, the rising of the Full Moon was an awesome and beautiful sight. As patriarchy
took over, the time and rituals were ridiculed and avoided for their "lunacy." Men, who had no connection to the lunar cycle,
feared its female power, and the power of women's fertility and choices became something to suppress. Women today reclaim that
power, take that "lunacy" and make creative things of it, returning its energy for women's consequence. Women who draw
down the moon in the Full Moon ritual learn how powerful the moon is, how powerful the Moon Mother and how powerful is their own
Moon Goddess-within.
Full moon riuals are rituals of women's affirmation, manifesting, fulfillments and power-within. They take the high
energy of the Full Moon Goddess and transform it into things they want to make happen in their lives. In these rituals, women
become the Goddess by drawing her power into themselves, and they use the Goddess's creative/conceptive/birth power for taking action and
fulfilling wishes, moving the New Moon's beginnings into full growth and active presence, Women ask for money and abundance at
the Full Moon, for wishes to comke true and love to consumate, and they develop consequence and Goddess-within power in their Be-ing.
Fertility/creativity and abundance is the theme of the Full Moon, with the warning "Be
careful what you ask for." On the Full Moon you might get it.
Full moon wishing Ritual
This ritual for the Full Moon is intended to tap the Goddess's power at its height and make wishes and dreams come true. Women
can have anything that they want in their lives and Full Moon rituals are the perfect time for proving it. They take ideas from
the psychic plane and bring them down to earth. When women draw the Moon into themselves at the Full Moon and feel the power of the
Goddess within them, they know they can do anything, no matter what the patriarchy
tells them otherwise. Along with wishes come responsibilities, so think carefully before asking. What you ask
for at the Full Moon will surely manifest.
Use lots of candles in this ritual, choosing either red or white/silver for the overall color theme. Place lots of crystals
on the altar, to clear them in the Full Moon energy of the ritual and so their own energy will magnify the ritual's results. Put a
shiny silver dollar on the altar for prosperity; use a "Susan B."
Full Moon rituals are at their most powerful outdoors, where the rising Full Moon Mother can observe, approve and become a part of
the proceedings.
need
Candles - Choose white/silver ones or red for the overall color theme of this ritual, and flowers in the same color.
Crystals on the altar.
A silver dollar for prosperity.
Incense - Use amber for clarity, rose for love, vervain for abundance, or myrtle wood for love, abundance and fertility.
Mugwort is a psychic opener.
Tarot deck, rune set, I Ching, Table of Ife seashells, or scrying bowl/crystal ball.
Mooncakes - Round or crescent cakes or cookies for the Full Moon.
Fragrant oils and mirror for Self-blessing.
Matches, charcoal block for loose incense, ritual wand, altar.
outline
Light candles.
Purify - With incense smoke or sprinkling.
Cast Circle/Invoking Goddesses of the Moon for the elements and spirit, emphasing women's rights and freedom.
Earth - Copper Woman (Native American), for women's free will.
Air - Lilith (hebrew), for reproductive freedom.
Fire - Erzulie (Haitian), for women's power and passion.
Water - Kwan Yin (China), for self-healing and self-love.
spirit - Selene (Crete) or Hathor (Egypt), for women's rights everywhere.
Drawing Down the Moon -The high priestess draws down the Moon to herself and the group.
Charge of the Goddess - high Priestess reads the "Charge" or another woman reads it. Or play Shekinah Mountainwater's sung
version on Songs and Chants of the Goddess, Vol.1.
Each woman in the circle sings her own name and the group sings it back to her three times.
Body of Ritual - Fulfillments/Wishes/Thanks. Go around the circle. Each woman gives a fulfillment that's happened since the
last Full Moon, a wish to manifest by the next Full Moon, and a thanks for something already begun or given. (Or use a thanks, a
goal and an affirmation - I want/I have), Continue going round the circel till the women run out of wishes, then go round once more
and ask for one more thanks. Move rapidly, keep it in short phrases.
Pass around a tarot deck, I ching book, rune set, or table of Iife seashells. Each woman picks a card or rune without looking
first for a Full Moon message or direction. (Or use a scrying bowl or crystal ball. Or do full
divination readings for each other in a small group or if working alone.) Go around the circle, each
woman explains her reading, if she chooses to reveal it.
Raise energy. Use humming or howl at the moon, use drums, rattles, faster-moving chants. Full Moons are too high-powered to
be quiet. Direct the cone of power to fulfillment of the women's wishes and remember to send some of the energy for earth healing
and for women here and in other cultures who have less freedom.
Ground.
Self-blessing/mirrors. Energy may be too high after howling and drums to do the Self-blessing, and this can become a long ritual.
Gauge the mood and needs of the group.
Share mooncakes.
Open circle
Ground again/Group hug.
Potluck dinner.
Some songs and chants to use for the Full Moon include:
Isis, Astarte, Diana, hecate,
Demeter, Kali, Inanna. (by Deena Metzger)
or
The earth, the air, the fire, the water
Returns, returns, returns, returns. (by Starhawk)
or
(chorus)
And the Full Moon, is her vagina spread wide.
And the Full Moon, is her vagina spread wide.
With a whole wide world of all possibility
Every possibility comes pouring out.
1. And the New Moon is her waiting womb.
And the New Moon is her waiting womb.
With a whole wide world of all possibility.
Every possibility waiting to grow. (Chorus)
2. And the Old Moon is her empty womb.
And the Old Moon is her empty womb.
With a whole wide world of all possibility, Every possibility returning home. (Chorus)
(by Peter Sodeburg)
This page last updated: 02/27/2018