Five Lessons Of The Pentagram

The pentagram has many different meanings depending on what religion you belong to as well as where you live. For some it represents evil, others protection, divination, magic(k), or a load of other things. But what does it mean to me? Well, being that I came to know the star through Wicca, my outlook of it tends to be spiritually centered. But being that I feel as if I'm on a different level than was when I was a convert, I think my thoughts on it has improved.

At first it represented the five elements, earth, air, fire, and water, the five building blocks and Spirits that gave rise to the world (world meaning universe in my jargon). To me they have another representation, the five key values of a Pagan; strength, love, knowledge, will, and balance. Each of these values correspond to the elements of earth, water, air, fire, and spirit respectively. As I wear my pentagram necklace with pride, I know that no matter what I'm faced with, that I will exercise these important concepts so that I will remain strong and be the better man, no matter the ignorance.

People could learn a lot from what the pentagram teaches if they simply opened their mind to learn its lessons. Its a lot like nature, if people were to stop demonizing and exploiting its resources as well as its earthly attributes and just opened to its functions we would be a lot better off. The pentagram itself doesn't belong to any one faith, but is a symbol that could mean anything a person or group decides to make it mean. The applied associations don't stay with it, but is a morphing thing that sheds and reworks things applied to it.

Let's consider something as simple as its placement, a topic that brings much debate as to its fixed meaning. For one camp in represents general evil in the sense that when one point face up means the spiritual over the senses while the other is the senses over the mind. For some this is true so its true to them where others see it as representing Satanism or darkness, banishment, a degree of Wiccan clergy, the list could go on frankly. But now you see that how with each individual and group the associations vary wildly on the "good-evil" scale.

With me I see things, not surprisingly, in a different context. While I concede that the pentagram whether inverted or everted could mean the previous list of things could also represent the balance of the elements. When its a single point up it could mean the elements arising from spirit, the force that expanded from a singular sphere to create all that is and will ever be. If they're two points up then to me it shows spirit arising from the four base associations. Both are actually true, But it proves how something as simple as a group of lines and your outlook could have a dramatic effect on how a symbol is percieved.