Katabasis: Descent into the Underworld Part 1

Chthonic Deities, the Cult of the Dead, and Ancestor Veneration in the Agrarian Mysteries

As the nights lengthen into Autumn, we continue our exploration of the spiritual cosmos. We have descended, to the threshold of the underworld, the dark and shadowy world of the dead, the ancestors, of the chthonic spirits and deities, the roots of the world tree, behind and beyond and underlying our physical realm. This realm has been described in nearly every mythology in the world. It is not a physical place, though countless places in our physical world are seen to be portals of entry into its shadowy depths. In reality, it is a place out of space and time. 

We have discussed the dual aspect of the deities of agriculture, that they are simultaneously the gods and goddesses of the soil and the underworld beneath it, of fertility and death alike. All things planted in the dark earth must die and rise again to the light, pass into the kingdom of H…