Magdalene Rosary Seven Groups of Seven
Posted by Joan Norton at 2/22/2009 7:55 AM 
Categories: The Magdalene Rosary
Tags: Mary Magdalene 14 Steps To Awaken the Sacred Feminine Women in the Circle of Mary Magdalene
Categories: The Magdalene Rosary
Tags: Mary Magdalene 14 Steps To Awaken the Sacred Feminine Women in the Circle of Mary Magdalene
When I was writing my part of 14 Steps To Awaken the Sacred Feminine: Women in the Circle of Mary Magdalene , co-authored by Margaret Starbird, I tried to create fifteen lessons but it simply wouldn't happen. I was worried about the number 14, I thought it was a strange number to have. Don't ask me why, I was just sure that fifteen was the right number.
When the book was in it's final stage, the one last chance to add or subtract anything, Margaret added her Magdalene Rosary to the prayer section, along with her story of the unusual way they came to her. You remember the story.....she fell asleep praying her rosary for her daughter's health and in the morning the broken chain of rosary beads had reconfigured into groups of seven. She knew that seven was the very sacred number of the divine feminine and she knew in the moment that the rosary needed to be updated to reflect Mary Magdalene's story, and so she had a friend re-make her beads. And she wrote the prayers. And thus we have the Margaret Starbird Seven Gospel Mysteries of Mary Magdalene and the Seven Legendary Mysteries of Mary Magdalene. They were given to us out of the mystery of Margaret's synchronicity. What is a better answer for our "daughter's health" than to
re-include the Sacred Feminine in christianity?
Number symbolism tells the story of the hidden structures of the universe, within us and outside of us. The inner organization of things on the vibrational level and the level of the consciousness of "the Whole", i.e. God. Apparently in the spaces we can't see with our eyes, things are divinely proportioned and organized in harmony and beauty. The number seven is said to represent "psychic unity", otherwise known as the Sacred Union and "the Universal Soul", and integration of masculine-feminine, right brain-left brain. As you well know, seven is the number of the cycles of our female bodylife......surely the most foundational cycle of creation in Creation. I've read that men have these same cycles in their physiology but they're more subtle to perceive.
The first of the seven Gospel Mysteries of Mary Magdalene tells us that she was healed of seven demons when she met Jesus. We understand her story to be "the way of the heart" towards Enlightenment or the soul's journey on Earth completed, and we can know through this piece of story that bringing one's demons out of the dark is the first step. In Jungian definitions this is called "doing your shadow work" of knowing the things inside yourself which are rejected and live unconsciously in you. Mary Magdalene lived in a time when the feminine principal was rejected, aggressively attacked, and repressed so when she "met the Light" she was bringing the feminine principal itself back into the story. In fact, the story of Enlightenment can't happen without the feminine dimension inside a person being held as Sacred Partner. Without raising the feminine principal to equality, the story won't start.
The Pleiades is called the Seven Sisters. There are seven visible planets to the naked eye. You can't divide the number equally, you always have to accomodate for imbalance and yet there is harmony. Maybe that's why it represents the spirit of God. It is said to mean that you have to be conscius of both your feminine and masculine parts in order to be Whole...Enlightened.
In early tarot systems, the seventh card is The Chariot. It's illustrations show a queen handling a chariot pulled by white horses. They've got to respect each other and be in harmony to carry the thing along, don't you think? White horses are an ancient, ancient representation of God. The white unicorn that's Jesus the Bridegroom is in the same symbolic vein.
Numbers and their role as representations of Godde's consciousness will come up in your dreams and in your synchronicities, your experiences of "meaningful coincidence". That's why they're interesting, they are a part of your inner life. Because they come up inside of us it means we have the "blueprint of Creation" inside of us. I find them very, very mysterious in dreams......I always feel I'm quite inadequate in diciphering their meaning to the dreamer. But I think I'm getting the hang of this one, the number seven. What a glorious mystery to experience in myself the unavoidable urge to create 14 lessons and not 15, with absolutely no understanding of why.
O Mystery
The Seven and Seven Mysteries of Mary Magdalene
When the book was in it's final stage, the one last chance to add or subtract anything, Margaret added her Magdalene Rosary to the prayer section, along with her story of the unusual way they came to her. You remember the story.....she fell asleep praying her rosary for her daughter's health and in the morning the broken chain of rosary beads had reconfigured into groups of seven. She knew that seven was the very sacred number of the divine feminine and she knew in the moment that the rosary needed to be updated to reflect Mary Magdalene's story, and so she had a friend re-make her beads. And she wrote the prayers. And thus we have the Margaret Starbird Seven Gospel Mysteries of Mary Magdalene and the Seven Legendary Mysteries of Mary Magdalene. They were given to us out of the mystery of Margaret's synchronicity. What is a better answer for our "daughter's health" than to
re-include the Sacred Feminine in christianity?
Number symbolism tells the story of the hidden structures of the universe, within us and outside of us. The inner organization of things on the vibrational level and the level of the consciousness of "the Whole", i.e. God. Apparently in the spaces we can't see with our eyes, things are divinely proportioned and organized in harmony and beauty. The number seven is said to represent "psychic unity", otherwise known as the Sacred Union and "the Universal Soul", and integration of masculine-feminine, right brain-left brain. As you well know, seven is the number of the cycles of our female bodylife......surely the most foundational cycle of creation in Creation. I've read that men have these same cycles in their physiology but they're more subtle to perceive. The first of the seven Gospel Mysteries of Mary Magdalene tells us that she was healed of seven demons when she met Jesus. We understand her story to be "the way of the heart" towards Enlightenment or the soul's journey on Earth completed, and we can know through this piece of story that bringing one's demons out of the dark is the first step. In Jungian definitions this is called "doing your shadow work" of knowing the things inside yourself which are rejected and live unconsciously in you. Mary Magdalene lived in a time when the feminine principal was rejected, aggressively attacked, and repressed so when she "met the Light" she was bringing the feminine principal itself back into the story. In fact, the story of Enlightenment can't happen without the feminine dimension inside a person being held as Sacred Partner. Without raising the feminine principal to equality, the story won't start. The Pleiades is called the Seven Sisters. There are seven visible planets to the naked eye. You can't divide the number equally, you always have to accomodate for imbalance and yet there is harmony. Maybe that's why it represents the spirit of God. It is said to mean that you have to be conscius of both your feminine and masculine parts in order to be Whole...Enlightened. In early tarot systems, the seventh card is The Chariot. It's illustrations show a queen handling a chariot pulled by white horses. They've got to respect each other and be in harmony to carry the thing along, don't you think? White horses are an ancient, ancient representation of God. The white unicorn that's Jesus the Bridegroom is in the same symbolic vein. Numbers and their role as representations of Godde's consciousness will come up in your dreams and in your synchronicities, your experiences of "meaningful coincidence". That's why they're interesting, they are a part of your inner life. Because they come up inside of us it means we have the "blueprint of Creation" inside of us. I find them very, very mysterious in dreams......I always feel I'm quite inadequate in diciphering their meaning to the dreamer. But I think I'm getting the hang of this one, the number seven. What a glorious mystery to experience in myself the unavoidable urge to create 14 lessons and not 15, with absolutely no understanding of why.
O MysteryThe Seven and Seven Mysteries of Mary Magdalene
What gorgeous pictures of the divine within you send us for our holy imaginations to feast on! I love the luminous Christos energy gathering, the seven stages of life with the merkaba in the center, and the lady with the chariot! Then the jewelry is gorgeous, too!
I wondered about the historical sevens (earthplane) and the legendary sevens (bringing spirit to earthplane?) as I prayed the Magdalene Rosary. I connect the seven beads with the seven chakras, too, those vibrational energy openings in our bodies that connect the material world with the spiritual realms when we are fully balanced.
I was reminded of how "The Book of Mary Magdalene" seems to follow the opening of the seven chakras in its organization, too. I wonder if there is a correspondence between "events/experiences" of the historical sevens and the legendary sevens and what we have come to know as the function of each of the chakras.
Love!
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Hi Sandra, That makes sense about 7's possibly being used to pattern the Gospel of Mary Magdalene (was that what you meant?).
I think that we'd find 7's in the underlying pattern of many ,many everyday aspects of our life. And it was you, dear girl, who said you thought Mary Magdalene's healing of the seven demons might have been her recovery from the negative projections of her time. You had that insight and it set me on a pathway of thinking that has flowered. I just love the idea that it's projections onto us of "bad and lessor woman" that causes our chakras to run backwards . We internalize the bad self esteem of these projections and it's reflected in our physical being. Of course. All you healers out there will know this more than me. I might be oversimplifying. But if "demons" are psychological conditions that "work against us" , then our own self support, self love, spiritual self esteem are bound to be involved .
Readers, see more of Sandra's perceptions about what sexual abuse does to us physically/spiritually/chakra-ly at www.GrowingUpWithoutTheGoddess.com She tells a tale which includes recovery of a sacred union spirituality.
Somehow I think this picture goes here. Ruth Thompson painted it of Mary Magdalene receiving her due respect.
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I love Ruth's luminous painting and the awe and respect of these three wise men kneeling before her!
Yes, you got my meaning about the organization of "The Gospel of Mary Magdalene." I am also wondering if there is a one-to-one correspondence between seven prayers/beads and each of the seven chakras.
I see that kind of harmony in the first prayer of healing because the first chakra is linked to survival on the earth, and demonization has killed and still kills millions of women. I would like to wonder together some other time about how/if the other lines of prayer align with the other chakras.
Love!
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Hi Sandra, Yes, let's keep this thread of inquiry alive as we go on. I'm pondering my way through the 14 prayers with the intent to write something and I know I will benefit from what's contributed here. Thanks! xoJoan
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HI JOAN,
ALL OF THE PAINTINGS ARE SO AWESOME! SOMETIMES THE SYMBOLISM IS BEYOND MY LIMITED KNOWLEDGE, BUT ONE COMMON MYSTERY IS THROUGHOUT.. SHE HAS ALWAYS BEEN WITH US , HUH? OR
"DUH!" FOR SOME OF US.. !
THANK YOU AGAIN FOR ALL THE ENLIGHTENED INFORMATION!
SHEILA
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Hi Shiela, I certainly know what you mean about symbols being obscure, but I think their real usefulness is in creating just the response you spoke of. "A picture is worth a thousand words" is really the truth. That's why I think it's so helpful to dig up all these old images of Magdalene and her story. "The word game" is the way the orthodox church gained too much control. They still do it that way with the idea that God's WORD is the only thing. I saw in a book by Barry Dunford a medallion/coin from the earliest times, with a likeness of Jesus on it, and the inscription "the Light made living". Not the Light made Word. Images are more "living" than words, and images are really God's primary language. We don't read a book in our dreams, we see movies. That's how our souls talk to us. So...you definitely "got it" about the symbolism. Love, Joan
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Joan!
Such wonderful post. I, too, have felt a deep connection to numbers and dates. 25 has been one I've loved for a long time, but 3 and 33 have always been important to me.
I find it ironic. Back in my drinking days, I'd imbibe with Rolling Rock beer and on the back of those bottles is a 33 (some legend involving the makers) so it was always a silly toast among friends, "To the 33!" However, when I thought about that recently, how seriously portentous that '33' actually was: I sobered up on the 3rd day of the 3rd month. Hmmmm. And back in 1995 when I met my husband, it was on July 22....and the universe merely smiles.......
Thank you for your continued work!
Much love and blessings from Iowa-
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Hi Jen, Thanks very much for sharing your story of the "mystery of the 33"....that's really a good one. Hurray for that change! When numbers are doubled, it can mean they're intensified...the meaning of the one is made more by doubling it. Often in dreams there's a doubling. Twining can mean that we're talking on both the physical and the soul level. And the 3....when it appears in dreams it always seems to mean there's movement afoot, and then a 4 appears and it's a completion. (I guess that's the 7) You'll notice in fairy tales that the sequence of trying to gain the treasure, or the secret, or the answer to something, comes usually in 3's and then the 4th try is when the situation changes. Often the 4th is accomplished by a way or a person no one thought could do it...like the "feelingful" brother or something.
Goodness, you met your husband on July 22.....and I think you said he's a good support of your "sacred feminine self"....it seems like a wonderful fate to meet him on Magdalene's Feast Day.
Thanks for being there.... xoJoan
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Hi Joan,
Have you thought about that there are 14 steps on the 'Stations of the cross' (Via Dolorosa) http://www.stationscross.com/stations_of_the_cross.htm. These stations can also be seen from the Divine Feminine point of view, if you replace Jesus with 'The Woman and her seed' (mentioned in Revelations). I believe that while traditional Christianity has focused on the 'Via Dolorosa', once the feminine aspect has been restored, it will become a 'Via de Allegria' (The Way of JOY)
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Hi Rebecca, Thanks so much for your comment. I think you are so right in what you say and I love the "Way of Joy". When Margaret Starbird and I wrote our book about starting Magdalene Circles, we called it "The Way of the Heart". The feeling and meaning are the same as your description. But alas, the publisher felt we needed a more descriptive title.
Thank you for being one of the "sacred feminine" women who are working with other women to bring the feminine in the gospel back to life again. And thanks for the Mary's Garden website. I'm going to look at it right now.Joan
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