wolfen045
I have read with interest everyone's ideas and approaches to the Devil. I agree with a great deal of what has been said so far. As a Pagan/Wiccan, I see certain commonalities between the Devil, Pan and the Horned God. I see them all as an invitation to explore the More "primitive" sides of our nature the animal/mammilian parts of ourselves that in Western culture we are taught to be ashamed of. Yet,pardoxically this same culture , through it's various media outlets titililates us (pun Intended) daily with images of sex and violence . We recieve mixed messages don't look/ don't touch ~~ please look /please touch. In our Western culture(I am an American so I can not speak for other culures) we are taught to repress our feelings and to deal with things through our intellects. We claim that we desire to be liberated, but we greatly fear what would happen if we were to really allow ourselves to truly act out some of our deepest desires/fantasies. Of course we do need to know what is right and wrong and we don't want to bring harm to our selves and others. The devil/Pan teach us that we must learn to embrace the animal within us. we must learn to love the "darker" aspects of ourselves in order to be more fully human . Without light there can be no darkness. And without the darkness we cannot fully appreciate the light. I am very facinated by the werewolf mythos which I see as very much applicable to this card. We must learn to put on and take off our fury pelts with ease. Every once in a while we need to lift our faces/muzzles to the moon and howl with joy. As Diana pointed out in her thread we cannot approach god without first approaching the Devil. I want to add that we must approach our full beings in order to approuch the God/dess. ( Iam sorry that this is a dense block of text . I have only had my coputer sice January and I don't know how to edit this to make it more readable.) Blessings to all Wolfen