The Golden Dragon of Sumud in the LEVANT

The Golden Dragon of Sumud  In the beginning, when the seas were restless and the winds carried the cries of the oppressed, there arose a dragon unlike any other. Her body was vast, her tail coiled around the shores of Spain and North Africa, where the great flotilla of Sumud gathers.  Her head stretched eastward, her golden jaws open wide, guarding the lands of Palestine and Lebanon from those who sought their ruin. This dragon was not born of fire or smoke, but of transformation. She fed not on flesh or innocent blood, but on the poison of the destroyers, the ogres of genocide, the architects of terror.  Each time she devoured such darkness, she transmuted it within herself.  From ruin, she created radiance. From violence, she forged protection.  And upon her back, scale by golden scale, a new armour grew, each one a shield for the Global Sumud Flotilla, each one a testament that destruction could be remade into defense, death into unyielding life. The dragon moved not only with the currents of the sea, but with the constellations above. Her breath shimmered with the oldest wisdom, that which had watched empires rise and fall and had whispered secrets into the roots of the earth.  She was and still is the bridge between stars and soil, between the wounded present and the eternal resilience of peoples who refuse to be erased. Those who journey with her are carried by her strength.  Their boats glide in safety upon the ocean swells, guided by her vast presence. She is their guardian, their protector, their unbreakable companion. And so it is told: as long as there are destroyers, the dragon will feast upon them.  As long as there are tyrants, her scales will multiply.  Her golden back will blaze brighter with each act of transmutation, until no darkness can pierce the radiance she has become. This is how it is. This is how it will be. -------- ​Words and Cloth --- Azul Thome - 4-09-2025

The slaying of the dragon = the slaying/suppression of sacred earth wisdom (goddess, cyclical, chthonic powers) by patriarchal sky-gods. ​ ​The awakening of dragons ​= the return of suppressed powers in times of crisis when human or cosmic order collapses, the latent dragon rises again, potentially as protector rather than enemy

SOME RESEARCH AND FINDING of the GOLDEN DRAGON in the LEVANT

...when humanity reaches its darkest time, the Mediterranean Dragon , representing deep, ancient wisdom of sea and earth can reawaken as a protector against destructive forces, restoring balance.

The slaying of the dragon = the slaying/suppression of sacred earth wisdom (goddess, cyclical, chthonic powers) by patriarchal sky-gods. ​The awakening of dragons = the return of suppressed powers in times of crisis when human or cosmic order collapses, the latent dragon rises again, potentially as protector rather than enemy. This is not “New Age invention” It is consistent with how myth cycles treat chaos monsters: as dormant cosmic forces that return in dark ages or end-times. Goddess Traditions on the Mediterranean Coast The Phoenician goddesses (Baalat Gebal at Byblos, Astarte at Tyre and Sidon, Tanit in Carthage) were sea-linked protectors. They were invoked by sailors for safe passage across the Mediterranean, their temples doubling as ports of protection. Their symbols (doves, ships, the crescent, the solar disk) tied them to both earth wisdom and the sea’s life-giving but dangerous cycles. As patriarchal myths rose, the goddesses’ fluid, maritime, and fertile qualities were increasingly subordinated to storm-gods or sky-fathers. In this sense: the “slaying of the dragon” mirrors the subjugation of the goddess of the sea and earth , a symbolic slaying of maritime/earth wisdom traditions. Symbolically: when humanity reaches its darkest time, the Mediterranean Dragon , representing deep, ancient wisdom of sea and earth can reawaken as a protector against destructive forces, restoring balance. So the link is clear: The Mediterranean Sea itself was mythologised as the primordial dragon in the Levant. The slaying of Yam/Lotan represents the suppression of older, goddess-linked, sea/earth wisdom. But the sea-dragon always remains present, latent beneath the Mediterranean a power that can return in times of great upheaval. Here’s a conceptual map of the Levantine coastline, showing the key sites where goddess traditions and dragon/sea myths intersect: ​Byblos (Baalat Gebal) – Lady of Byblos, sea protectress Tyre & Sidon (Astarte) – “Our Lady of the Sea” Beirut – localised legend of St George and the Dragon Jaffa – Perseus & Andromeda’s sea-monster- Palestine  Ugarit – Baal slays Yam/Lotan, the earliest sea-dragon myth (research on many sites, readings and praying. Dragons as you know, all over our world, earth and cosmos are connected to the ancient earth wisdom, a threat to patriarchy... as patriarchy crumbles we will feel the vital energy of dragon rising to protect the living.  We must feed them though. )  I will leave you ponder on what they need feeding with! Your comments are welcome. Anything brutal and disrespectful will be removed. SOULidarity  Azul  www.souland.org insta: www.instagram.com/azul_souland/ ​

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Newsletter Summer 2021

My present home

​What I am working on and
being worked by...

Completing a potent article for Dark matter: Women witnessing, titled: ‘Dead and Alive, Being with Ancestors’. I will share it on the next newsletter. :)

​A series of 13 Paintings on old roof tiles, not yet finished: The Council of all Beings of the place I live on at the moment, in la Drôme, France. They will be part of the eARTH Soul ORACLE card set I am creating and collating for the end of the year.

​Soon I will do a Podcast on ‘the sacred work of Grief’, with my own sister Carole and brother Mathieu. They created: Le Lave Linge: parle de développement personnel, de famille, d'amour... de la vie. Quelques podcast merveilleux vous y attendent. En Français , a bientôt! :)

​Also with my brother Mathieu, who co-created KALIMA cercle de paroles, I will be offering circles in French. More soon…:) Kalima un mot arabe veux dire: 'mot' 

​My new book and the Oracle eARTh SOUL Card…for the end of the year, inshallah! :)

MY OFFERINGS FROM
​SEPTEMBER 2021

Updates on “Pathosophy: Wisdom Born of Suffering and Grief”

YOU CAN PRE ORDER THE BOOK IF YOU WISH TO SUPPORT ME

​And here is the Message of Water again, as we approach its 5th and final anniversary...

...from the Water at the River Dart, Devon, England passed on to Azul on 2nd Dec 2016:

​..."When you create containers of sacred beauty that opens your Heart to what Love truly is, then you will realise with a massive sob that you were loved all along, always have and for ever by all of Us - who you think You are Saving! 
​
You have five years​ as a species to Wake up, Mature and Remember in your bones that you
belong to Life ."

2nd December 2016

eARTh art by Azul Thome

FULL MESSAGE of WATER

​" My dear child do not worry about me, Water. I recover quickly with the song of our birds, the love of trees, with movement, moments of rest and the prayers moving around our Earth. I regain balance with your heartfelt tears, your remembered songs added to the ones of so many now. Do not focus your energy on 'Saving me'. Something way more profound is taking place right now, listen and observe! 

All of us; Soil, Water, Plants, Air, Animals and all Ancestors are Calling you Humans, to us so we can Save your species. We know and have known for a while that you do not have much time left if you do not wake up to your birthright Belonging to Earth and come Home soon, real real soon. We keep dying, we keep Giving Away our Lives to shake you up from a deep and very long amnesia. Once you can allow the truth and quality of such Love to permeate through your traumatised being and desolate soul you will wake up from a life time of anaesthesia to your immense grief and capacity for Love.

When you create containers of sacred beauty that opens your Heart to what Love truly is then you will realise with a massive sob that you were loved all along, always have and for ever by all of Us who you think You are Saving! 
You have five years​ as a species to Wake up, Mature and Remember in your bones that you belong to Life "

​~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

​2nd December 2016 - www.souland.org 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The Message of Water was given to Azul Thomé on 2nd December 2016 by the River Dart, Devon, UK after she fell on her knees asking the river how to love when there is so much loss?

The Message of Water is 4 Years old today... we have reached the last year of its guidance, what does it mean to us humans? ​

TO SUPPORT YOU WHEN YOU READ THE MESSAGE and AFTERWARDS...

And here to keep you in good company, is a beautiful ceremonial song ~ inspired by the Message of Water ~ by our dear Ayla Schafer

​Thank you for your company.
All eARTh are by Azul Thomé

You are engaging in madness. 
I feel obliged to accompany you.
​
Alejandro Jodorowsky ~

eARTh art by Azul Thome - PATHOSOPHY series

"The human soul is hungry for beauty… When we experience the Beautiful, there is a sense of homecoming".  ​ John O’Donohue Water finds its greatest power by seeking its lowest point. ​ -Zen saying the Ash tree under a microscope, sorry! QUESTIONS to remember when remedies are offered for our illnesses including COVID Are they blessed by our ancestors and by the living world? Do they hold sacred beauty of Life, are they woven with wild poetry, are you held while you compost the immense and subversive grief held in your body? Are you asked to identify with the illness or with the alchemist and medicine person in you? If not how can they be of truth and of Life these medicated pathologies? Now please don't think that I am demining your or my pains, I am not. What I have been stubbornly exploring since the age of 9 is how to bring back the wisdom and the medicine to and of the people who feel pain and are suffering?  ​ eARTh art in the forest by Azul Thome “The breezes at dawn have secrets to tell you Don't go back to sleep! You must ask for what you really want. Don't go back to sleep! People are going back and forth  across the doorsill where the two worlds touch, The door is round and open Don't go back to sleep!” ​ ― Rumi eARTh by Azul Thome "Beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing there is a field, I will meet you there. When the soul lies down in that grass the world is too full to talk about.”   Mawlānā Jalāl-ad-Dīn Muhammad Rūmī eARTh art by Azul Thome "Grief is subversive, undermining the quiet agreement to behave and be in control of our emotions. It is an act of protest that declares our refusal to live numb and small. There is something feral about grief, something essentially outside the ordained and sanctioned behaviors of our culture. "  Francis Weller eARTh art in the forest by Azul Thome

This morning I would like to write about the toxic spell I am under with COVID19, the proposed journey from pathology to pathosophy through the sacred work of grief composting and the vital feeding of Soul.  What happens if we move from allopathy to allosophy? What is the root of the collective terror and disorientation we feel? Can the disappearance of our nomadic freedom be the awakening call for loving more furiously and for radical generous cœurage? I am writing so when I forget again and fall under the strong spell cast on us, I can at least return to it. May it be so, inshallah and inshgaia! I have no answers. I am sharing my experience of the last 2 months when I was not sure I would come back from madness and illness. The last 9 months has seen me feeling dis-eased, very disorientated with a brain unable to do simple tasks  I have been experiencing deep physical and psychic pain while feeling uncontrollable raw emotions. I am deeply exhausted with cough and breathlessness.   The above list holds the perfect materials for an alchemist and a medicine person to be born and/or practice.  The above list also holds dangerous materials and definitions for a corrupted system to use to control us and put on under a spell...the spell of terror, blind obedience and of course increase isolation from all that matters... DEPRESSION in OUR SYSTEM unable to grieve I took a risk to seek support from the allopathic system of my gp practice 2 months ago. I was immediately put on antidepressant, painkillers and valium. I took it all and walked again on that path of medicated pathology. I had to find something I had lost the last time I was there. So I put the pills on my altar and prayed for a safe return. After a few days of swallowing the pills I gradually stopped crying, the pains in my body dulled and a feeling resembling a voiceless stupor wrapped over me. I became controllable again, pacified and numbed.  WILD GRIEF, MOVEMENT and FOREST After a few weeks I stopped it all and allowed myself to feel what i had parked for the experiment. First my immense grief, sorrow and rage moved again. I allowed my body to move and paint, stitch and embroidered through the many stages of pain and I relearned to lay on the forest skin while breathing with the trees, my kins.  I needed to leave the home of Soul to return to it with some refreshed clarity. I am unsure if it is wise to use myself as the raw material but sometimes we are required to be the laboratory, the alchemist, the temple, the dangerous path, the prima materia and the patient all at once. PATHOLOGY and PATHOSOPHY Being conditioned to pathologies, our experiences of pain, strong feelings and suffering all our life we seem to look for something to fit these symptoms into. ME, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, depression, psychosis, bipolar, autism, manic, etc... When tired and alone we just want to rest there, for a moment, for a sense of veneered belonging, a home, however dysfunctional it is. I noticed that when I think of dying it gives me the same feeling of rest and belonging!!!?   That makes me suspicious, it awakes in me to the possibility that something dangerously unfriendly is going on in our world right now. A world that makes us want to rest and belong in the arms of the system that harms and controls us...  Are we part of a human system that would rather see us dying than living?  Looking at the evidence, it is probably the case. After all our healing system is all about illness, not about well being, kindness or the thriving of life.  People who are truly alive are dangerous! Perhaps because they are fearless, interconnected to the web of life and compassionate... These pathologies were named and defined by whom and for whom? Why have we accepted them with such docility? Same question can be transferred onto every part of our society, politics, laws, truths, all over the world ...  These pathologies become prison cells, they take away our freedom, stifle our imagination and crash our dignity. They enable medication to be passed on without proper check about its true effect. Power is never shared with the sick and the suffering one. Our return to the web of life, to our wild grief, to our songs, dance, art, poetry, old stories and empowering myths are never part of the prescription. We are never asked about our relationship to our visible and invisible allies and to our well and wise ancestors. All of these threads are never spun by doctors and patients.. They are bellitelated, shamed and laughed at most often. They are flipanteley and dangerously named as irrelevant matters and discarded. If you have ever been in a psychiatric hospital you will know what I mean. Hospitals are the same. We love you nurses and some docs. It is the system and the anesthesia I am addressing here. OTHER WAYS I am reminded of a few of my mentors. Francis Weller about depression: " depression is a plea from the soul to stop all you are doing and go down on your knees to feel your grief" Martin Prechtel who said to a director of a psychiatric hospital: "Aha this is where you keep your shamans!" and of  Malidoma Somé : What a real shaman sees at a mental institution   So if we look at the spell of ALLOPATHY: "treatment of disease by remedies that produce effects opposite to the symptoms," The definition says it all. How can I break the strong spell of allopathy . I call on Sophia, I call on Allosophy: "wisdom born of the other" "Allo" means 'other..."Al": means 'beyond'... Where is 'Pathosophy' in this? where is "the wisdom born of suffering, of feeling" Where does she reside? Why is the breath of freedom and respect that come from the enquiry not encouraged by our medical system? I let you guess.  SOPHIA Sophia is the feminine aspect of divine wisdom. You can see that She is not what the people in power will want to foster in the people they are meant to serve and protect. Recently I have been offered another emerging pathology : "long covid or post covid, or covid syndrome". In the uk the medical system is setting up a series of test at the end of November to identify us and create a new illness. The illness will lead to new medications .  I rested there for a few days, in the seat of being part of the reffered one for the new experience. My ego and love of pioneer adventures got confused. I even felt relief again to belong to some study of suffering even if unknown.  To fall into the void, to fall into the unknown frightens me, so I grab prematurely onto some offered solutions, like a shocked amnesiac, anaesthetised zombie. I realised this morning that I had given up the fight for beauty. That by being offered a comfortable and easy solution my whole being was weakening even more, divatilasing. By being offered a pathology woven in the terror of Covid19, added to the growing control of our lives, the world wide authoritarianism and a mad making system I became even more unwell. I was under a spell. I am under a spell. And the forgetting keeps happening, the falling asleep - again and again. It took me to look into the eyes of a painting I made in the forest to wake up to my strength again. That tree is becoming my temple.

eARTh art by Azul Thome : "PATHOSOPHY"

“I had drunk so deeply of grief and innocently gambled so hard with fate and irony that a special kind of vision was gathering in my eyes, not entirely clear just yet. This was the same look people saw in your eyes when you have died for beauty and come to live accepting nature as life with no promise of paradise, and mad at people who couldn't see that.” 

― Martin Prechtel,

​And words from  Khalil Gibran on
PAIN

“Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding.

Even as the stone of the fruit must break,
that its heart may stand in the sun,
so must you know pain.
Much of your pain is self-chosen
.It is the bitter potion by which the physician within you heals your sick self.
Therefore trust the physician, and drink his remedy in silence and tranquillity:
For his hand, though heavy and hard, is guided by the tender hand of the Unseen,
And the cup he brings,
though it burn your lips, has been fashioned of the clay which the Potter
​has moistened with His own sacred tears.”―

Khalil Gibran, The Prophet

eARTh art by Azul Thome: "PASSAGE"

Listen... Water brings a Message (We belong to Life)

The River Dart, Devon, England