Christian Wonder Tales
by Dr. Martin Shaw
Christian Wonder Tales
by Dr. Martin Shaw
Exclusive Discount to Symbolic World VIP Patrons
WONDER9823
Course Overview
Mythographer, writer and storyteller Dr Martin Shaw takes us deep into the heart of what he calls Christian Wonder Tales. Profoundly mythic, these teaching stories range from the early saints through to the grandeur of the Round Table and Arthurian tradition. Shaw emphasises these stories as remerging providentially on time for the perils of modern life. Filled with vocation, sacrifice, and courage, these are an inheritance many of us simply didn’t know we had.
A Seanchai (storyteller) Shaw notes that this will not be a journey undergone with a great deal of powerpoint and handouts. It will be an adventure of the ear as well as the eye. In traditional style he will tell or read the stories orally, and explore responses with the students afterwards. Between sessions he will pose a bardic question to be brooded on weekly, as well as a reading list made available on confirmation of attendance. Recordings from his archive will be offered to support study, with advice on the act of storytelling itself.
Live class dates: Tuesdays, November 12th - December 10th, 2024 (No class on November 19th, 2024)
Time: 2 - 4 pm EST
Classes are hosted and livestreamed on our Symbolic World Circle community platform. Please go to the Community tab on thesymbolicworld.com website and sign up on our Circle platform. This is where class is hosted and you need to create a profile in order to see your purchase and participate.
Recordings: All class video recordings are made available to participants with downloadable audio.
Materials: Additional material for your edification, including a reading list and recordings from Martin Shaw's archive.
Patron discount: All Symbolic World patrons at the Involved tier or higher qualify for a 10% discount on the course. Please ensure you're logged into our website and a card will appear at the top of this course page. Apply your discount code at the checkout.
Course Details
Live Course Schedule
- Tuesday, November 12th, 2024
- (No class on November 19th, 2024)
- Tuesday, November 26th, 2024
- Tuesday, December 3rd, 2024
- Tuesday, December 10th, 2024
Course Outline
Lesson 1: Tuesday, November 12th, 2024: ORIGIN STORIES
In this first session we address beginnings: from a Christian and early Irish perspective. We will explore the mythic story of Ireland’s early development: The Invasion Tales of the Tuatha De Danann. The need for a culture to sit inside a story is developed, and how metaphor and poetry assist that process. This first session has a possible extra thirty minutes due to the timeless-time keeping of the storytelling tradition.
Lesson 2: Tuesday, November 26th, 2024: SIGNS & WONDERS
Christianity arrived in Ireland on the tip of a tongue not the tip of a spear: this creates a different kind of spiritual investigation. We explore tales of the early saints of the Celtic world, and the end of one age and the beginning of the next. This is illustrated in St Patricks mythic encounter with Ossian, the son of the great Finn McCool (with the story of Ossian’s birth also being told). A desert father and mother influence is explored in these early lives, and the notion of Green Martyrdom.
Lesson 3: Tuesday, December 3rd, 2024: PERILOUS QUESTS
We journey with St Brendan to the land of the Hidden Country – an adventure that is anything but straightforward: we encounter a series of island designed to deepen the voyagers soul. What could a modern persons faith look like when Jasconious deep, or as elevated as a birds-eye view, or in dwelling in profound hesychastic quiet? These perilous quests tell us that such journeys are never A to B and favour the circle over the straight line.
Lesson 4: Tuesday, December 10th, 2024: A RULE FOR LIFE
A deep dive into Gawain & the Green Knight and the chivalric and Arthurian traditions. One of the greatest poems of the medieval era, it presents a Christian Wonder Tale that is freighted with peril, humour and magic. Threaded throughout is a value system we would benefit from today, and in our last gathering we will be asking what could it be to re-establish such qualities. What would have to be sacrificed for such a Rule for Life?
In this session we will draw closer to two essential themes in Shaw’s work – the vigil in the wilderness and the notion of the Merrie in pre-reformation religious life, both vitalising elements in the mystic heart of Christianity.
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Presenters
Dr. Martin Shaw
Dr Martin Shaw is an award-winning author of seventeen books. His most recent, Bardskull was named Book of the Day in the Guardian, and described as “rich and transgressive” in the Sunday Times. Founder of the Oral Tradition and Mythic Life courses at Stanford University, he has been a wilderness rites of passage guide for twenty-five years and is director of the Westcountry School of Myth in the UK. Robert Bly describes him as “a true master: one of the very greatest storytellers we have”, and Rowan Williams as “a true and transformative enchanter”. An Orthodox Christian, Shaw has introduced thousands of people to the mythic imagination.
