From the four great cities of the Tuatha de Dannan four
gifts were brought to the Irish, treasures given to these 'Children of Danu' to ward of the
invading Celts of Iberia. From Gorias, the Druid Esras sent the Gae Bolga, a weapon
capable of uniting elemental energies. From Finnias, the Druid Uscias sent Manannan Mac
Lir's sword Fraegarthach, the Answerer. From Murias, the Druid Semias sent the
cauldron of Dagda, the horn of plenty. From Falias, the Druid Morfessa, sent the Lia
Fail upon which all the Irish high kings were invested. In each of these an echo of our
program faculties gifts to us are to be heard, shown through lingering questions they posed,
and intuitive connections they shared. Charlie asks what does the survival of Gaelic say about
the futility of cultural conquest. Patrick asks what part of modernity is worth preserving and
what of the Gaelic worldview should be reawakened. Sean gives us a connection to the power song
and poetry had in shaping that worldview. Rebecca suggests that we are capable of repairing the
severed dualism of self and other.
Language is a virus; it infects our thought patterns and shapes our image of the environment we
live out our existence in. Collins makes the mistake of not recognizing the power that the
Gaelic language had in subverting colonizing influences. Even after the colonized Irish had moved
into the mimicry phase, when Irish society was adapting to the Anglo-Saxon culture by adopting
English, the Gaelic language was still the dominant syntax in which English was used. The power
of prepositions in shaping the mode of interaction and connectivity was at the root of such
societal mores as hospitality and communalism.
The Gaelic language is one of the earliest offshoots on the Indo-European language tree, as well
as being one of the only remaining branches from the Celtic trunk. In this it derives its power
to suggest a direction to look for information on our earliest civilized cultures, the
Indo-Europeans. That is if we are about discovering what we have lost in that transition which
the warrior satire the Tain is emblematic of. In this uncovering it is likely we will find models
of matrifocal societies who offer us a more effective means of interrelating on a social level
then the murderin' hate with which our mate-dominated culture operates. If the language of a
people is a reflection of the values by which they live, we would do well to learn how to use
language more effectively to foster moral codes like Dark Eileen's. We are what we hear as much
as what we see. We cannot escape the chains that imprison us unless we recognize our own agency
in their investiture of power over ourselves. The language we use is the limitation we put on our
worldview and only by listening can we hear those echoes of older traditions.
The Tibetan language, also another early offshoot on the I/E language tree, is only used for
religious purposes. One of the Druidic revivalist groups intends to use Gaelic as a liturgical
language, not unlike Latin in the earlier Catholic mass. The use of Gaelic for connective ritual
is a powerful metaphor, especially if we stop to consider one of the foundational aspects of the
Gaelic worldview, that of hospitality. Raising a glass with s1ainte, or the ritual of greeting
in the Yeats play Cathleen ni Houlihan, are excellent ways in which to reintroduce a focused and
intentional use of Gaelic, in order to underscore the need for a reawakening of our lost sense
of connectivity, or community.
Patrick asks us to consider what is we would take from that which we have inherited in this
'filthy modem tide' and what it is we should reawaken in regards to the Gaelic worldview. Love
of poetry was one of the essential civilized activities the Irish have always been involved with.
It seems ironic that the British could deprive them of their humanity and yet here is a
flowering of one of the greatest human endeavors. Their love of verse and indeed literature is
what allowed so many of the classical works to be brought back into the light. It takes a
sophisticated intellect to so playfully construct words in verse like the Irish have. Sean
O'Casey, W.B. Yeats, James Joyce all of these men were capable of taking verse and prose, turning
it into such beauty that one would have to be a God looking down on the Ardagh Chalice to see
anything as awe inspiring
Be drunken always/ Nothing else matters ... Be drunken with what/ With wine, with poetry, or with
virtue, as you will/ But be drunken. This is the one virtue I feel we need to retrieve from the
past. Our own culture is so wrapped up in the cult of death and the stigmatizing of love,
replacing it with a consumerism of sex that we cannot be drunken in the manner Baudelaire suggests.
For largely we have used our drunkenness to anaesthetize the drive for life, this vitality which
the Irish fully embraced. So bright bums the light, even in their sorrow they maintain a love of
life and a connection to their fellows and their environment; we can't even imagine it awash in
our modernity.
'As you will' from Baudelaire and Whatever you do do/ It's better you do not from the poem 'Rules'
suggest the strength and resiliency of a proud people. The Irish are a people who refused to
bear the foreign chains around them with ignominy. It is the rules and regulations of the
Anglo-Saxon, the Catholic Church, and Protestantism which drags down the greater glory of the
Gaelic worldview. Their own legal system was not in relation to power over as these others were,
instead it reflected the responsibility one had to the people of one's community. If one had to
get a lawyer to solve a dispute, it was already too late. If a person felt wronged, it was not
jurisprudence which solved the problem but shame and it's collective implication which mediated
the antagonism.
The chief poet or ollamh was accorded a place of such honor in Irish society that it was
at his blessing that the high king was given the grail of the Goddess. In this he acted as the
chief priest in establishing the precedent for stewardship. The Poets were the storehouse of
knowledge with which the Gaelic order reflected upon their history, their cultural values, and
their sense of place. They gave solidity to the otherworld and functioned as mediators between
there and here. When Elizabeth cut down the forests to get at these masters of verse and song she
rivaled Cromwell for sheer evil. For in their power of political persuasion through the art of
satire she knew her mark on history would be tarnished.
The songs we have learned though given short shrift in these essays are none the less one of the
most vital parts to the curriculum. The songs allow us to connect to a culture now long gone,
yet remaining vibrantly alive in the meter and harmony of these works. Mick Maloney's performance
was a treasure in so many ways. One of the things I took away form the experience was the use
of agricultural motifs in song as a connective medium to environmentalism and the moral qualities
which are so much a part of the Irish. They are reflective of a pastoral identity that the Irish
embody, and it is true indeed of all humanity until the Industrial revolution.
The poem 'Mise Raftery' is a tremendous piece of poetry and a reflection on the eventual fate of
most of the Irish Bards. In it we see the levels to which these once temporal high priests were
brought to, 'singing to empty pockets'. In it we can wrap our tongues around the tonal character
istics particular to Gaelic. It is a model for the history of Ireland as well as the Gaelic
language. Memorizing it and the Yeats poem force us to work in the oral traditional form which
the Bards taught and learned.
Rebecca suggested early on the image of the Mobieus strip in relation to the turning of objects
into their opposites. In so many instances this idea of dualism turned upon itself showed up in
our course materials and lectures. Whether it was the matrifocal milk ties being turned into
blood ties to the patriarchal kings, or the last monologue in Joyce's The Dead where love of
life turns into the fear of death, this image has come up again and again. In it is the seed of
success for our endeavors to awaken those sleeping ideals of the ancient Irish.
The concept of cyclic time, as opposed to linear time suggests the most obvious explanation of
this activity. In linear time there is only one direction and no connective quality to maintain
interaction, whereas cyclic time is reflective of a wheel turning round in the same path and yet
progressing. Where linearity suggests a goal or destination to be attained, a thing to be
acquired and controlled, the cycle suggests connectivity or the interaction of all points in
the round with that which came before and that which will come after. In this interactivity
there is a unity of subject and object reminiscent of the 'being' society of Eric Fromm, as
opposed to the split duality of Augustine suggestive of 'a 'having' society.
In this connectivity we listen to the stories each other have to offer, this is Irish hospitality
; the hospitality of spirit which recognizes the inherent creativity in all of the cosmos. It is
not reverence out of blind devotion, but respect for the innate inviolability of our connection
to everything else. In this recognition we walk between the worlds, neither here nor there, not
making judgmental distinctions of relevance or importance. In the act of recognizing this virtue
we reconnect the severed dualism of the either/or. Uniting the people's high king with the
Goddess of the land, and in this unification, the ripe fertility of life ensues. In essence this
hospitality is the same code of conduct as Dark Eileen suggests in the words, "generous,
handsome, and brave".
I have been greatly motivated by the ideas and ideals we have studied this quarter. They have
reawakened me to a desire to teach, to open a school whose curriculum teaches these virtues we
have lost in this race for modernity. I have felt attached to a community of peers of which many
would be excellent additions to this educational community, this 'hedge school'. There is a rich
spiritual heritage resident in the Gaelic society and in reawakening a desire to integrate these
themes the old is brought into the new and the cycle turns again. At times I have felt overwhelmed
with sadness and frustration at the history of conquest the Irish have undergone, and at other
times I have felt epiphanies which suggest ways in which my own heart moves, long trodden paths
I had forgotten. If there is anything I can say of accomplishment for the quarter it would be
that I have embraced my fear of success and leadership and become an outspoken member of our
programs community. My single greatest achievement would be my final exam. While my mea culpa
would have to be a fear of not paying enough attention to the songs, and to the illuminated
manuscript. None the less these are arts I am still attempting to reawaken from long dormant
slumber. I will cherish this experience most fondly in my deep heart's core.