Pomegranate: The International Journal of Pagan Studies
https://journals.equinoxpub.com/index.php/OLDPOM
<strong>Editor</strong><br /> <a href="mailto:chas.clifton@csupueblo.edu">Chas Clifton</a>, Colorado State University-Pueblo<br /><br /> <strong>Letters and Review Editor</strong><br /> <a href="mailto:cwc@iastate.edu :">Christopher Chase</a><br /> Send Books for Review to Christopher Chase<br />402 Catt Hall<br />Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies<br />Iowa State University<br />Ames, Iowa 50011-1302 <br /><br /> <strong>Editor Emeritus</strong><br /> Fritz Muntean, Vancouver<br /><br /> <em>The Pomegranate</em> is the first International, peer-reviewed journal of Pagan studies. It provides a forum for papers, essays and symposia on both ancient and contemporary Pagan religious practices. <em>The Pomegranate</em> also publishes timely reviews of scholarly books in this growing field. The editors seek both new interpretations and re-examinations of those traditions marked both by an emphasis on nature as a source of sacred value (e.g., Wicca, modern Goddess religions) as well as those emphasizing continuity with a polytheistic past (e.g., Ásatrú and other forms of 'reconstructionist' Paganism). The editors also seek papers on the interplay between Pagan religious traditions, popular culture, literature, psychology and the arts.<br /><br /> <span style="color: #be844a;"><strong>Metrics/Indexing and Abstracting</strong></span><br /> H-Index 2015: 5<br /> CiteScore 2018: 0.14<br /> SJR 2018: 0.111<br /> SNIP 2018: 0.446<br /><br /><ul><li><a href=" http://www.scopus.com/scopus/home.url" target="_blank">Scopus Abstract and Citation Database</a></li><li><a href="/index.php/POM/manager/setup/www.rtabst.org" target="_blank">Religious & Theological Abstracts</a></li><li><a href="http://isiwebofknowledge.com/" target="_blank">ISI Web of Knowledge</a></li><li><a href="http://www.epnet.com/thisMarket.php?marketID=1" target="_blank">EBSCO's Academic Search Premier & Religion and Philosophy Collection</a></li><li><a href="https://dbh.nsd.uib.no/publiseringskanaler/erihplus/" target="_blank">European Reference Index for the Humanities (ERIH Plus)</a> </li><li><a href="https://www.atla.com" target="_blank">The American Theological Library Association (ATLA)</a> </li></ul> <br /> <span style="color: #be844a;"><strong>Publication and Frequency</strong></span><br /> May and November<br /><br /> <strong>ISSN 1528-0268 (print)</strong><br /> <strong>ISSN 1743-1735 (online)</strong><br />Equinox Publishing Ltd.en-USPomegranate: The International Journal of Pagan Studies1528-0268The editors will not consider manuscripts which are under consideration by other publishers. It is assumed that once you have submitted an article to this journal, it will not be sent to other publishers until a decision about inclusion has been made. Only by special arrangement will the editors consider previously published material. Full details of our conditions related to copyright can be found by <a href="https://www.equinoxpub.com/home/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/2015-Journals-copyright-conditions.pdf " target="_blank">clicking here</a>. <a href="https://www.equinoxpub.com/home/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Equinox-Journals-Contributor-Agreement-2015.pdf " target="_blank">Click Here</a> for the contributor contract, which you should print, sign and post back to Equinox once your manuscript is accepted.Who Is, and Who Is Not a Pagan? Struggles in Defining Contemporary Paganism: A Response to Ethan Doyle White
https://journals.equinoxpub.com/index.php/OLDPOM/article/view/39673
<p class="western" style="text-indent: 0in; margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: 150%;" lang="cs-CZ" align="left">The article deals with Pagan studies’ attempts to define contemporary Paganism and claims that definition-building is not a fruitful way of getting to a better understanding of the phenomenon. The article (i) introduces the ways that Pagan studies have tacked the issue of defining contemporary Paganism, (ii) providing particular examples, and (iii) scrutinizing them with a help of classificatory and referential optics. Some scholars in the field have suggested employing family resemblance and polythetic definition for solving the definitional issues. The article (iv) analyzes these propositions and argues why these proposals are not feasible ways of conducting the inquiry. Instead, (v) it proposes a completely different research approach: to formulate a hypothesis, pick a point of reference of contemporary Paganism and test its self-representation against the hypothesis, together with scrutinizing the history of Paganism conceptualizations during the centuries to find out how much these conceptualizations influence our present inquiries and insider self-representations.</p>Pavel Horák2020-10-04222020-10-04Where Are There Sacred Mountains and What Makes Them Magical? A Material Religion Perspective
https://journals.equinoxpub.com/index.php/OLDPOM/article/view/39052
The persistent notion of the holy mountain, both as a special place infused with divinity and as a pilgrimage or tourist destination, is to be included among the physicalistic foci of material religion as an emerging study. The mountain is not only a feature of the natural world but also a material object that intersects with worship throughout the world’s diverse religious and spiritual traditions. It also is increasingly becoming a concern of the environmental movement in terms of both ethical arguments and considerations of embodied enchantment. Among the selected axes mundi surveyed in the present article are those found in the Himalayas, North America, Australia, New Zealand, the Middle East, Greece, and Japan. What constitutes a mountain’s alleged sacredness, where are such mountains to be found, what awe and wonder associations might they have with earlier religious understandings as well as present-day spiritual beliefs, and what are some of the social consequences of mountain veneration in terms of today’s ecological awareness? These questions belong to the remit of material religion as it examines the interface of corporality and divinity.<p class="western" style="margin-left: 0.5in; margin-right: 0.5in; margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: 100%;"> </p>Michael York2021-01-21222021-01-21The Native Faith Group Veles: A Case Study of Slovene Contemporary Paganism
https://journals.equinoxpub.com/index.php/OLDPOM/article/view/41141
<p class="western" style="orphans: 0; widows: 0;">The Slovenian Rodnovery (Native Faith) group Veles blends contemporary Pagan influences from outside Slovenia with elements of more native Slavic Paganism or “Old Faith,” including elements that have supposedly survived in western Slovenia until the middle of the twentieth century. Our analysis is based on a survey questionnaire administered to members of the group as well as a field survey and participant observation conducted on holy days.</p>Nejc PetricMirjana Borenović2021-01-22222021-01-22Hellenismos: Texts in the Contemporary Worship of the Ancient Greek Gods in North America
https://journals.equinoxpub.com/index.php/OLDPOM/article/view/40056
The article explores worship of ancient Greek gods among three contemporary Pagan groups in North America. The main focus is on how the groups use texts, both ancient and modern, in their theology and rituals. The groups’ approaches are explored through interviews, analyses of websites, and the texts referred to. How do the groups approaches differ from each other and what can we learn from their different reconstruction strategies?Stian Sundell Torjussen2021-04-28222021-04-28The Shaymaran: Philosophy, Resistance, and the Defeat of the Lost Goddess of Kurdistan
https://journals.equinoxpub.com/index.php/OLDPOM/article/view/38409
<p class="western" style="line-height: 100%; orphans: 0; widows: 0;">This article analyzes the myth of Shaymaran, represented as a half-human and half-serpent. The significance of this representation is, I argue, two-fold: it is significant for her recognition as a goddess, and it is an important testament to the existence of polytheistic religious traditions of goddess-worship among the people of Kurdistan. I analyze the content of such myth that supplies us with important non-material archaeological evidence, particularly relating to the ideology and practice of goddess-worship. By deconstructing this representation and analyzing the content of this myth using a comparative approach vis-à-vis the Abrahamic genesis, I offer important information on the often-overlooked parts of unwritten history of goddess worship, which is continuously sustained through the circulation of this myth and the image. The myth of Shaymaran can therefore also be considered as a counter-narrative, one forged by the oppressed, to a post-colonial dominant monotheistic history and philosophy.</p>Dilşa Deniz2021-01-21222021-01-21Roger Canals, <i>A Goddess in Motion: Visual Creativity in the Cult of María Lionza</i>
https://journals.equinoxpub.com/index.php/OLDPOM/article/view/38940
Roger Canals, A Goddess in Motion: Visual Creativity in the Cult of María Lionza (New York: Berghahn Books, 2017), 202 pp., $120 (cloth).Jip Lensink2021-02-09222021-02-09Peter Levenda, <i>The Dark Lord: H. P. Lovecraft, Kenneth Grant, and the Typhonian Tradition in Magic</i>, Henrik Bogdan, ed., <i>Servants of the Star & the Snake: Essays in Honour of Kenneth and Steffi Grant</i>
https://journals.equinoxpub.com/index.php/OLDPOM/article/view/43364
<p>Peter Levenda, The Dark Lord: H. P. Lovecraft, Kenneth Grant, and the Typhonian Tradition in Magic (Lake Worth, Fl.: Ibis Press, 2013), 352 pp., $35 (hardcover).</p><p>Henrik Bogdan, ed., Servants of the Star & the Snake: Essays in Honour of Kenneth and Steffi Grant (London: Starfire Publishing, 2018), 360 pp, photographs, £25 (hardcover).</p>Richard Kaczynski2021-09-06222021-09-06Thomas Hatsis, <i>The Witches’ Ointment: The Secret History of Psychedelic Magic</i>; <i>Psychedelic Mystery Traditions: Spirit Plants, Magical Practices, Ecstatic States</i>
https://journals.equinoxpub.com/index.php/OLDPOM/article/view/43365
Thomas Hatsis, The Witches’ Ointment: The Secret History of Psychedelic Magic (Rochester, Vt.: Inner Traditions 2015), 304 pp., $19.95 paper; Psychedelic Mystery Traditions: Spirit Plants, Magical Practices, Ecstatic States (Rochester, Vt.: Inner Traditions, 2018), 288 pp., B&W illustrations, $19.99 softcover.Chas S. Clifton2021-09-06222021-09-06