Lady Godiva and Other Thoughts


In the myth of Lady Godiva, (and it is considered a myth. Although she really did exist, what happened on her famous ride, if it even happened at all, is disputed) the beautiful Lady Godiva took pity on the peasentry which was overtaxed by her husband. Her husband agreed to lift the taxes if she would ride through town naked, thinking she would never do it.

But of course she did, and the peasentry who loved her dared not gaze at her, and none saw more than her beautiful legs. And her husband lifted the taxes.

In many ways, the Godiva myth can be seen as a symbolic representation of the universe. In this interpetation, Lady Godiva is the inner mysteries, what lies behind the veil, the secrets to life, the universe, and everything.

Godiva is beautiful, and she is presenting herself to the town in full view, completely exposed, for all to see her as she truly is. But most choose not to look at her, and those that do look mostly just glimpse some small part of her (like her legs).

And much like Lady Godiva, feminists have tried to hijack the inner mysteries as their own.

But that’s the thing. There’s no reason not to look at Lady Godiva, and there’s no reason not to see what lies beyond the viels. It’s presenting itself to be viewed, and it’s beautiful, and there is nothing inherently sinful with apprieciating beauty.

It’s rare in classic Greek works to see the gods depicted in the nude. It was considered profane to depict a deity nude through-out most of Greek history. In contrast though, the Romans regularly depicted their deities in the nude and never saw it as profane. Nowadays some of the Greek deities are depicted nude due to the Roman influence.

A deity is something of great beauty. Even deities who have forms which are not usually considered beautiful, or are considered horrific, are beautiful. They are divine in nature, and there is a divine beauty about them. A deity depicted nude is completely exposing the form of that deity, they are something very beautiful, and to some extent their beauty is there to be apprieciated.

And there’s a parellel between that and human nudity. The human figure is something that is beautiful and should be apprieciated as such. There is a lot of stuff out there on skyclad magick, and there are some very powerful applications of nudity within magick. However there is a lot of idiocy on the subject too. And it’s become somewhat taboo to talk about.

This isn’t to say that the gods want you prancing around the woods naked in service to them. But there is nothing wrong with exposing oneself completely to ones gods so that your complete beauty can be apprieciated by them. Such an act would be sacred nudity.

There is a difference between magickal nudity and sacred nudity. The former is done as a means to an end, it is done for a cause and effect relationship. The nudity will help make something happen or result in some power being gained. Sacred nudity isn’t about making anything happen or gaining any power. It is simply nudity for spiritual reasons. Sacred nudity isn’t the means, but an end.

There also isn’t anything wrong with a group of practitioners operating in the nude for no other reason but so that each could allow the others to apprieciate their complete beauty. That too would be sacred nudity. The fact that one person may apprieciate the beauty of another’s form, that it may have some vouyeristic appeal to it, does not make the act less sacred. The opposite would be true, the act of apprieciation would make the nudity sacred.

One Response to Lady Godiva and Other Thoughts

  1. Brooke says:

    I like what you said about her, I am a decedent of her.

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