#female divinity

[haggishlyhagging]

In Europe during the Middle Ages Mary had been incredibly powerful as a symbol, as channel to the Archimage, who was not entirely concealed—or con-sealed. Indeed, one could say that this image was powerful to an insufferable degree within a phallic society. Most of the major cathedrals were built to the "Mother of God," the Source who gave birth to god. No matter how lengthily the theologians protested, or how subtle their droning distinctions and discussions, it is obvious that she outranked male images of divinity. Instead of functioning to conceal the Background memory of the Archimage, she was at times translucent, transparent, functioning to dis-close this Archaic Active Potency in women and nature.

A study of theology, piety, art shows that indeed the Archimage was shining through this attempt at manipulation and concealment. To describe this phenomenon I have invented the word Arch-Image to Name the Mary image. The Archimage threatened to explode through the Arch-Image, and indeed volcanic eruptions of consciousness/memory in women did take place. In short, Mary malfunctioned as an archetype; the situation was intolerable to the mind-molders.

The protestant solution was substitution. Androgynous, sweet Jesus, the misbegotten and transsexed parthenogenetic daughter who incorporated both masculine and feminine roles, being lord, savior, and sacrificial victim, was the logical surrogate for the female principle. Being plastic, Jesus was pliable enough to serve as stop-gap, filling the molds required for phallic anthropomorphic symbolization.

The catholic solution to the impending threat of explosion has been the retention of Mary, who was required by popular demand, while dogmatically draining this symbol of her residual vibrancy, slowly remolding and re-finishing her back into archetypal shape. The project of the papal puppeteers has been to make this fembot function as a decoy, distracting those who sense the Presence of the Archimage—in their Selves, in their sisters, and in all Elemental reality. Thus catholicism worked on the symbolic level in a drawn-out process of psychic manipulation which has never been completely explored. During the centuries following the Witchcraze it has strived to drain, contain, pervert, and freeze this Arch-Image—the one who has been troublesomely translucent, dis-closing rays of Elemental Be-ing, casting shadows and reflecting shimmerings of the Archimage.

This slow vampirism is a tactic which complements the protestant total erasure of the Arch-Image. This dual strategy on the symbolic level mirrors the "real" political double strategy, employed by both sides of christianity, of murdering some women while maintaining others in the state of living death which is patriarchal womanhood.

-Mary Daly, Pure Lust

[m1ssnovember]

My body doesn’t love me anymore.

I bleed and for that I am to be grateful

It’s coagulated and it doesn’t hurt anymore.

[hexandbalances]

When did the vulva become obscene?

An ad alluding to the vulva is sparking controversy, but there are few objections to phallic symbols. What explains this difference in treatment?

In Greek art, depictions of the vulva – believed to boost female fertility – are only found on objects intended for women. 

 Statuettes of pregnant women touching their vulvas have been found in Egypt. Other figurines of vulva-women, found in Asia Minor, were probably worn by pregnant women as protective amulets. The ethnologist and psychoanalyst Georges Devereux associated these headless figurines, whose faces are engraved on their bellies, with the myth of the priestess Baubo, who showed her vulva to Demeter to distract the goddess from her grief at the loss of her daughter.

Like Ra in the Egyptian story of Hathor, Demeter reacted by laughing–but Baubo showed her vulva as a gesture of female solidarity, with no erotic intention.

The denigration of the vulva outside the female sphere is illustrated by the birth of the goddess Athena, who was growing in Zeus’ skull. One day, Zeus had such a headache that he begged the god Hephaestus to split open his skull with a hammer and chisel. Hephaestus complied, carving out a sort of improvised vulva.

The goddess Athena, in full armour, sprang out from this crack – so the lord of the gods was able to give birth to his daughter, proving the vulva’s worthlessness. This myth is a fantasy of male birth-giving – procreation in which the vulva plays no part.

[haggishlyhagging]

Every christmas season christians sing about and erect images of the Magi, understood to be three wise men from the East who, according to the gospel of Matthew, paid homage to the infant Jesus. They are often popularly described as "kings." These three wise men are described as following their star to the crib of the newborn Jesus. Christian preachers have interpreted the story to signify the universality of the kingdom of Jesus. (There is often a token Black in popular depictions and crèches.) Indeed, this message seems to be conveyed in christian music and art depicting the wise men as kneeling before the baby Jesus and offering him gifts.*

Among the popular descriptions of the three "kings" are some depicting them as throwing down their crowns before the infant. Such embellishments reinforce the popular image of the renunciation of power by these wise and powerful rulers before the baby-god.

Nag-Gnostic star-gazers have reason to be fascinated by this story. One Nagging question that often re-occurs is "Why are there three?" Since we are by now familiar with innumerable myths of the Triple Goddess, many of which originated in the Middle East, the thought that in a religion of reversals the Triple Goddess would be presented disguised as three wise kings is indeed a Nagging thought. Also interesting is the fact that stars are closely associated with the Goddess. As Cooper points out:

Stars are attributes of all Queens of Heaven, who are often star-crowned. The star is pre-eminently the symbol of Ishtar, or Venus, as morning and evening star.

All of this suggests that if the subliminal message in the story is that the Goddess was brought to her knees before Jesus, the implications are indeed vast. If, symbolically speaking, Goddesses and no mere kings were throwing down their crowns, then star-crowns were thrown down, indicating a surrender of the whole cosmos. Even if the more conservative image of these dignitaries as merely kneeling and bowing their crowned heads is retained, the symbolism is essentially the same. Moreover, in traditional symbolism: "The radiate crown represents the energy and power contained in the head, which was regarded as the seat of the life-soul." The message of surrender of mind/spirit to the incarnate boygod is obvious. **

Gnawing through the surface level of the "three king" symbol to the subliminal suggestion of the Triple Goddess surrendering to patriarchal religion, Nags note that the story thus unraveled is indeed an eye-opener. That is, it is an epiphany, in the sense of "sudden manifestation or perception of the essential nature or meaning of something . . . an intuitive grasp of reality through something usually simple and striking."

The spectacle of the patriarchal symbolic conquest of Female/ Elemental divinity is perceptible here, as in other patriarchal myth, and it is "simple and striking." Shrewd Shrews will be interested in finding further clues, however. These are to be found, of course, in words. As we have seen, the word Magi is derived from the Indo-European root magh-, meaning "to be able, to have power." Clearly, the empowering act for women will be to stop kneeling, collect our star-crowns and gold, and resume the Journey. This is, of course, a journey of star-lust.

* The story of the "three kings" so obviously belongs to the realm of popular legend that it has been something of an embarrassment to biblical scholars and theologians. The point is that it continues to function as an integral part of the imagery of the christmas story for hundreds of millions of people, and the symbol is embedded in the imaginations of believers (and nonbelievers).

** Perhaps the three royal visitors were hoping to have the last laugh. At any rate, the symbolic significance of their gifts would seem to suggest a rather morbid attitude toward a baby shower. Myrrh, for example, signifies suffering and sorrow. See J. C. Cooper, An illustrated Encyclopedia of Traditional Symbols (London: Thames and Hudson, 1978), P. 110. Frankincense was used not only in worship but also for embalming and fumigation.

-Mary Daly, Pure Lust

[m1ssnovember]

🥀

[haggishlyhagging]

The Holy Spirit, symbolized by a dove, is a distinctively feminine principle—the Comforter—and yet has ever been treated by the Christian Church as masculine, alike in dogmas propounded from the pulpit and in translations of the Scriptures. A few notable exceptions, however, appear at an early date. Origen expressly referred to the Holy Ghost as feminine, saying, "The soul is maiden to her mistress, the Holy Ghost."

An article upon the "Esoteric Character of the Gospels" in Madam Blavatsky's Lucifer (November 1887), says:

Spirit or the Holy Ghost was feminine with the Jews, as most ancient peoples, and it was so with the early Christians. Sophia of the Gnostics and the third Sephiroth, Binah (the female Jehovah of the Cabalists) are feminine principles. "Divine Spirit" or Ruach, "One is She, the Spirit of the Elohim of Life," is said in Sepher Yetzirah.

An early canonical book of the New Testament known as "The Everlasting Gospel" (also as "The Gospel of the Holy Ghost") represents Jesus as saying, "My mother, the Holy Ghost, took me by the hair of my head up into a mountain."

The word "sacred" simply meaning "secret" —having its origin as shown at the time when knowledge was kept hidden from the bulk of mankind, only to be acquired by initiation in the mysteries—so also the word "holy" simply means "whole," that is, "undivided." In its ignorance, unwisdom and fear of investigation, mankind has allowed a division of the two divine principles—male and female—to obtain firm hold in their minds. Prejudice, which simply means "prejudgment" (a judgment without proof) has long ruled mankind, owing chiefly to that bondage of the will inflicted by a tyrannous, self-seeking priesthood. But we have now reached a period in history when investigation is again taking the place of blind belief, and the truth, capable of making man free, is once more offered.

It is through a recognition of the divine element of motherhood as not alone inhering in the great primal source of life, but as extending throughout all creation, that it will become possible for the world—so buried in darkness, folly and superstition—to practice justice toward woman. Not legislation but education will bring about the change—not external acts but internal thought. It is but a few years since the acknowledgment of a feminine element even in plants was regarded by the church as heretical. Yet, though still perceiving but partial truth, science now declares the feminine principle to inhere in plants, rocks, gems and even in the minutest atoms, thus in some degree recognizing the occult axiom, "As it is above, so it is below."

-Matilda Joslyn Gage, Woman, Church and State