06/20/2025
In honor of upcoming Fairy Day (6/24) . . .
The Secret Fire of Faeries and Spirits.
After Christianity became the dominant religious paradigm, faeries and spirits of place developed a more sinful origin in folklore, and a spiritual context influenced by a monotheistic point of view.
The new ambiguity of their status meant that the good people occupied a type of neutral space between something that could benefit and something that could harm, but now those outcomes were more simply defined as good and evil.
The sidhe, depending on who you asked, might be agents of either side.
From the Christian perspective, faeries were seen as existing in a type of ‘not quite evil enough for hell, not quite good enough for heaven’ state.
Many Christian stories explained the faeries as fallen angels who had rebelled against god but then regretted their actions.
After the 16th century the church seemed quite content with promoting the idea that faeries were diminutive sprites emanating from the imagination of children and superstitious elements of the rural population. Much like the takeover of pagan sacred sites, the cloaking of older folkloric beliefs and animism subjugated fairies, ancestors and spirits to newer Christian saints and holy powers.
Miracles and relics began to replace amulets and cures. Ancestors, once venerated and considered part of the otherworld, became more dangerous spectres, perhaps caught in a twilight limbo between heaven and hell, much like the Christian view of faeries themselves.
Personal experiences and encounters with faeries took on sinister connotations and a person might be considered evil or a witch for speaking about such matters.
A comparable and perhaps notorious anecdote relating to this is that of the Rev Robert Kirk who was a Scottish scholar and clergyman. Kirk’s book The Secret Commonwealth of Elves, Fauns and Fairies was published in 1691 and collected many instances of encounters with faeries and provided instructions on how best to avoid or, indeed, make contact with them.
However, at this time the Inquisition was still in full force across Europe so Kirk’s interest in what many perceived to be Demonic entities placed him at odds with many of his own religious colleagues.
Some, in fact, speculated that Kirk himself might be a changeling sent by the devil in order to corrupt the faith of his parishioners and to lead them back to ancient pagan ways.
The fact that Kirk was also a seventh son, according to some sources, lent him an aura of the otherworldly, as this was a particular sign of association with second sight and affiliation with the faery folk.
Of course, the supposed fate of Kirk was another warning to those who might try to dabble in the old ways and venture to places associated with faeries.
One summer evening, Kirk, while out walking, collapsed and died upon a faery hill.
Or so it seemed.
In the days following his funeral, a cousin of Kirk’s had a strange dream in which the reverend pleaded with him to rescue him from faeryland. Kirk told his cousin in the dream that he was not dead at all but was in a magical swoon caused by his supernatural captors. Kirk had promised his cousin that he would be able to appear for just one moment at the baptism of his child and when this occurred his cousin was to throw a ceremonial knife over his apparition.
This would have the effect of releasing Kirk from the faeries’ spell.
At the baptism, Kirk was true to his word and appeared in the doorway of the church.
Alas, his cousin was so shocked at seeing this ghostly apparition that he forgot the instructions about the knife and Kirk remained cursed.
He then vanished, doomed to live in faeryland for eternity.
Was Kirk really taken by the faeries he had spent his later life documenting or did he die a natural death only to have his passing used as a way to propagandise the evils and dangers of pagan ways?
Local folklore posits that Kirk’s coffin was interred empty or, in other versions, full of stones. Rev. William M. Taylor popularised this belief by writing that people of the time believed Kirk had been physically captured by the faeries because he had been, “…prying too deeply into their secrets."
Dr. Jeffey Kripal has also written about this ancient acknowledgment of the danger inherent in contacting gods and spirits. Perhaps the most famous example in this context is when Moses is instructed to tell his followers to stand back from the mountain when Yahweh appears as it will result in their death as these excepts demonstrate.
“And you shall set limits for the people all around, saying, ‘Take care not to go up into the mountain or touch the edge of it. Whoever touches the mountain shall be put to death.” Exodus 19:1: 13.
“On the morning of the third day there were thunders and lightnings and a thick cloud on the mountain and a very loud trumpet blast, so that all the people in the camp trembled. 17 Then Moses brought the people out of the camp to meet God, and they took their stand at the foot of the mountain. 18 Now Mount Sinai was wrapped in smoke because the Lord had descended on it in fire. The smoke of it went up like the smoke of a kiln, and the whole mountain trembled greatly.” Exodus: 19: 1: 19.
An odd consequence of his time in the presence of God is that Moses must then wear a veil as his face is ‘shining’ and disturbs those who see him.
“When Moses came down from Mount Sinai, with the two tablets of the testimony in his hand as he came down from the mountain, Moses did not know that the skin of his face shone because he had been talking with God.” Exodus 34:29: 4.
Returning to Robert Kirk, and his description of the interior of fairy mounds we discover that he wrote, "Their ‘places’ are large and fair, and unless at some odd occasions are unperceivable by vulgar eyes. Have continual Lamps, and Fires, often seen without Fuel to sustain them."
Is Kirk speaking about the same phenomenon which created a fire on Mt .Sinai?
Looking at a quick and odd similarity to the Irish legend of the blind druid Mog Ruith, we are told that he flew in a machine called an oared wheel named Roth Ramach.
It was said that inside the wheel night was as bright as day and it could blind those who looked at it and deafen those who heard it.
Considering previous posts which discussed the relationship between the colored lights, rainbows, and the appearance of shining beings, perhaps there is also a connection to actual mechanisms of otherworldly manifestation.
(C.) David Halpin.
Photo Credit: Alex Stoddard.
https://www.instagram.com/alexbstoddard