Everywhere, throughout the early historic nations, were
worshipped symbols of the attributes or functions of the dual or
triune God. Each symbol represented a distinctive female or male
quality. Animals, trees, the sea, plants, the moon, and the
heavens were, at a certain stage of religious development,
symbolized as parts of the Deity and worshipped as possessing
certain female or male characteristics or attributes.
It is plain that, with the decline of female power, and the
consequent stimulation of the animal instincts in man, the pure
creative principles involved in Nature-worship gradually became
unsuited to the sensualized capacities and tastes of the masses;
but in addition to this were other reasons why the female
principle in the Deity should be concealed. Women were already
deposed from their former exalted position as heads of families
and as leaders of consanguine communities. All their rightful
prerogatives had been usurped. The highest development in Nature
had become the slave of man's appetites, and motherhood, which
had hitherto been accepted as the most exalted function either in
heaven or on the earth, trailed in the dust.
Under these conditions it is not perhaps singular that the
capacity to bring forth, and the qualities and attributes of
women which are correlated with it, namely, sympathy--a desire
for the welfare of others outside of self, or altruism,--should
no longer have been worshipped as divine, or that in their place
should have been substituted the leading characters developed in
man. From the facts at hand it is plain that at a certain stage
of human growth physical might and male reproductive energy, or
virility, became the recognized God. With passion as the highest
ideal of a Creator, the female element appeared only in a
sensualized form and simply as an appendage to the god which was
dependent upon her ministrations. Under the above conditions it
is not in the least remarkable that by the priests it should have
been deemed necessary to conceal from women the facts bound up in
their nature. Woman's importance as a creative agency and as a
prime and most essential factor in the universe must be
concealed. "Isis must be veiled."
Through the appropriation of the titles of the original dual
God by reigning monarchs, is perceived at least one of the
processes by which the great universal female Deity of the
ancients has been transformed into a male god. We are assured
that the "redundant nomenclature of the deities of Babylon
renders an interpretation of them impossible. Each divinity has
many distinct names, by which he is indifferently designated." It
is observed that each Deity has as many as forty or fifty titles,
each of which represents a certain attribute.
Since the invention of the cuneiform alphabet, by which
pictures have been reduced to phonetic signs, the attempt has
been made to arrange or classify these gods according to their
proper order in the Pantheon, but thus far much obscurity and
doubt seem to pervade their history.
In Assyrian, Babylonian, and Egyptian mythologies are observed
much confusion and no small degree of mystery surrounding the
positions occupied by certain gods. "Children not unfrequently
change positions with parents," but more frequently, we are told,
"women change places with men," or, more properly speaking, the
titles, attributes, and qualities ascribed to the Great Universal
female God are now transferred to the reigning monarch. Thus not
unfrequently a deity is observed which is composed of a male
triad, the central figure of which is the king or military
chieftain, and to which is usually appended a straggling fourth
member, a female, who, shorn of her power, and with a doubtful
and mysterious title, appears as wife or mistress to his
greatness, while upon her is reflected, through him, a slight
hint of that dignity and honor which was originally recognized as
belonging exclusively to the recognized Deity.
The Goddess Vishnu, from whose navel as she slept on the
bottom of the sea sprang all creation, after her transformation
into a male God, is supplemented by a wife--Lacksmir. Lacksmir
means wisdom; but she has become only an appendage to her "lord,"
upon whom is reflected all her former glory.
So greedy did rulers become for the splendid titles belonging
to the female divinities that we are told that "the name of the
Great Goddess Astarte not unfrequently appears as that of a
man."
Although man had usurped the titles of the female God and had
denied her recognition as an active creative agency, still, as
nothing could be created without her, she was permitted, as we
have seen, to remain as wife or mistress to the reigning monarch,
in whom had come to reside infinite wisdom and power. Her symbol
was an ark, chest, boat, box, or cave. This woman, although
dignified by the title "Mother of the Gods," and even by that of
"Queen of Heaven," is utterly without power.
Not only is it plain that the titles and attributes of female
gods have been appropriated by males, but it is also true that
the more ancient deities, which are now known to have been
female, have by later investigators been represented as male.
The interpretations which have hitherto been put upon the
Babylonian and Assyrian deities by many of those who have
attempted to unravel the mysteries of an earlier stage of
religious worship, is doubtless due to the fact that since the
so-called historic period began, the qualities which have been
considered godlike have all been masculine; it has therefore
never occurred to the minds of these writers that the ancients
may have entertained quite different notions from their own
regarding the attributes of a Deity; hence, whenever the sex of a
god has appeared doubtful, especially if it be in the least
degree powerful or important, it has at once been denominated as
masculine, and this, too, notwithstanding the fact that such
rendering has oftentimes involved inconsistencies,
contradictions, and absurdities which it is impossible to
reconcile either with established facts or with common sense.
Unless the symbols representing religious belief and worship
are viewed in the light of later developed facts in mythology,
archaeology, and philology, there occur many seeming absurdities
and numberless facts which it is found difficult to reconcile
with each other; especially is this true in regard to some of the
symbols used to express the distinctive female and male
qualities. The serpent, for instance, although a male symbol, in
certain ages of the world's history appears as a beautiful
woman.
This is accounted for by the fact that a woman and a serpent
once stood for the god-idea. Together they constituted an
indivisible entity--the creating power in the universe. They
therefore became interchangeable terms. The woman when appearing
alone represented both, as did also the serpent.
"In most ancient languages, probably all, the name for the
serpent signifies Life, and the roots of these words generally
also signify the male and female organs, and sometimes these
conjoined. In low French the words for Phallus and life have the
same sound, though, as is sometimes the case, the spelling and
gender differ"; but this fact is thought to be of no material
importance, as "Jove, Jehova, sun, and moon have all been male
and female by turn."
No doubt many of the inconsistencies hitherto observed in the
religion of the ancients will disappear so soon as we obtain a
clearer knowledge of their chronology; and events which now seem
contradictory will be satisfactorily explained when placed in
their proper order with regard to date. Religion, like everything
else, is constantly shifting its position to accommodate itself
to the changed mental conditions of its adherents; hence, ideas
which at any given time in the past were perfectly suited to a
people, would, in the course of five hundred or one thousand
years, have become changed or greatly modified.
During a certain stage in human history "all great women and
mythical ladies were serpents"; but when monumentally or
pictorially represented, they appeared "with the head of a woman,
while the body was that of a reptile." This figure represented
Wisdom and Passion, or the spiritual and material planes of human
existence. The mythical woman whom Hercules met in Scythia, and
who was doubtless the original eponymous leader of the Scythian
people, had the head of a woman and the body of a serpent.[73]
Even the Mexicans declare that "he, the serpent, is the sun,
Tonakatl-Koatl, who ever accompanies their first woman." Their
primitive mother, they said, was Kihua-Kohuatl, which signifies a
serpent. In referring to this Mexican tradition, Forlong remarks:
"So that the serpent here was represented as both Adam and Adama;
and their Eden, as in Jewish story, was a garden of love and
pleasure."[74]
[73] Herodotus, book iv., 9.
[74] Rivers of Life, vol. i., p. 143.
The traditions extant among all peoples seem to connect the
introduction of the serpent into religious symbolism, with a time
in the history of mankind when they first began to recognize the
fact, that through the abuse of the reproductive functions, evil,
or human wretchedness, had gained the ascendency over the higher
forces. The Deity represented by a woman and a serpent involved
the idea not alone of good, but of good and evil combined.
Together they prefigured not only Wisdom and generative power,
but evil as well. Mythologically they represented the cold of
winter and the heat of the sun's rays, both of which were
necessary reproduction. From this conception sprang the Ormuzd
and Ahryman of the Persians, the story of Adam, Eve, and the
serpent in Genesis, and the legend of Kihua-Kohuatl and
Tonakatl-Koatl in Mexico.
"The serpent remained in the memory and affections of most
early people as wisdom, life, goodness, and the source of
knowledge and science, under various names such as Toth, Hermes,
Themis, the Kneph or Sophia of Egyptians and Gnostics, and Set,
Shet, or Shem of the Jews."[75]
[75] Forlong, Rivers of Life, etc., vol. i., p. 143.
The Serpent Goddess, although embracing evil as well as good,
was still the "Giver of Life" and the "Teacher of Mankind." These
were the titles which in later ages began to be coveted by
monarchs, and then it was that the attributes belonging to this
Deity began to appear in connection with royalty.
There is no ancient divinity about which there seems to be
connected so much mystery as the Assyrian Hea. When referring to
the "great obscurity" which surrounds this God we are assured
that there is at present "no means of determining the precise
meaning of the cuneiform Hea, which is Babylonian rather than
Assyrian," but that it is doubtless connected with the Arabic
Hya, which is said to mean "life," or the female principle in
creation. This Deity is the God of "glory" and of "giving,"
titles which during the earlier ages of human existence belonged
to the Queen of Heaven, the Celestial Mother.
The representation of the god Amun or Amun-ra, which
superseded the triune Deity, Kneph, Sate, and Anouk at Thebes,
and from which in Assyria doubtless proceeded the trinity, Amun,
Bel-Nimrod, and Hea, is supposed to be identical with the Greek
Zeus, which means the sun. This God is represented by a female
figure seated on a throne. It is crowned with two long feathers,
and in the right hand is observed the cross, the emblem of life.
Manetho, the celebrated Egyptian historian, declares that the
name of this God signifies "concealed."
There can be little doubt that the titles of the ancient
Deity--the Destroyer or Regenerator, or, in other words, those of
the God of life which embraced the idea of the moving force
throughout Nature, were, in course of time, appropriated by the
rulers of the people. It is stated that the name of a certain
Egyptian God appears first in connection with royalty, that "his
name was substituted for some earlier divinity whose
hieroglyphics were chiselled out of the monuments to make place
for his."
According to the testimony of Rawlinson, the God Hea is
represented by the great serpent, which occupies a conspicuous
position among the symbols of the gods on the black stones
recording Babylonian benefactions. Now these flat black stones
are themselves said to symbolize the female element in the Deity,
in contradistinction to the obelisks, which prefigure the male,
while the serpent, for reasons which have already been explained,
appeared for ages in connection with the figure of a woman. In
later inscriptions "king" is everywhere attached to the name of
the God Hea, which fact shows that the titles ascribed to her
were those particularly coveted by royalty. Hence we are not
surprised to find that in an inscription of Sardanapalus, in the
British Museum, there "occurs a remarkable phrase in which the
king takes the titles of Hea."
Among the Assyrian inscriptions appear Bel-Nimrod, Hea, and
Nin or Bar. In view of the facts which have come to light
regarding Hea, it is altogether probable that the triad
Bel-Nimrod, Hea, and Nin represent the trinity as figured by the
father, mother, and child. That Nin was the son or the child of
Bel-Nimrod "is constantly asserted in the inscriptions." He
appears also as the son of Hea, yet the fact that Hea should be
represented as a woman, or as the mother of Nin, and the central
figure in the trinity, seems not to have been observed by those
who thus far have been engaged in deciphering these inscriptions.
By representing Hea as male, Nin is made to appear as the
offspring of two fathers while he is left absolutely motherless.
To obviate this difficulty an ingenious attempt has been made to
account for his existence by substituting his own wife as the
author of his being. Although in the numerous accounts which I
had read of Hea, in my search for information concerning her, she
had always been designated as male, still I was satisfied from
the descriptions given that originally this Deity was female.
Therefore upon receiving a copy of Forlong's Rivers of Life and
Faiths of Man in All Lands, I was not surprised to find the
following:
"Hoa or Hea, the Hu of our Keltic ancestors, whose
symbol was the shield and the serpent, was worshipped near rivers
and lakes, and if possible on the sea-shore, where were offered
to her such emblems as a golden vessel, boat, coffer, or fish,
and she was then named Belat Ili (the mistress of the
Gods)."[76]
[76] Vol. ii., p. 94.
She was the Goddess of Water. Of this Forlong says: "Water,
perhaps more than fire, has always been used as a purifier. . . .
Christians have but imitated the ancients, in the use of Lustral
water--now-a-days called Holy Water, and into which salt should
be freely put."
According to Francis Vasques, the Cibola tribes of New Mexico
pay no adoration to anything but water, believing it to be the
chief support of all life. The Hindoo faith and the Greek
Christian Church prescribe "adorations, sacrifices, and other
water rites, and hence we find all orthodox clergy and devotees
have much to do with rivers, seas, and wells, especially at
certain annual solar periods."
The extent to which these ancient rites are still practiced as
part and parcel of modern religious observances is not realized
by those who have given no special attention to the subject. As
spring advances, all ranks of Russians from the Czar to the
humblest peasant proceed with their clergy to the Neva, where
with solemn pomp the ice is broken and the water, which is held
to be of virgin purity, is sprinkled upon the heads of Czar,
nobles, and other dignitaries. The following is an account given
of the worship of Hea not many years ago in the public press:
"An Imperial and Arch-episcopal procession was formed,
consisting of, first, the High Priest of the empire in all his
most gorgeous robes, the two masters of ceremonies walking
backwards (probably because not of a holy enough order), long
double files of white- and gold-robed bearers of sacred flambeaux
or candles, for Fire must enter into every ceremony, whether it
is the male or female energy which is being worshipped. Following
these Religieux came all the sacred relics and fetishes of the
Church, as Maya's holy cup for water, all holy books, crosses,
banners, with sacred emblems in their order, and finally the
Czar, humbly, and, like all his people, on foot, followed by
courtly throngs. These all proceeded to a handsome pavilion or
kiosk, erected close to the edge of the water, when the
Metropolitan of the Church reverently made an incision in the
ice, and took out a little water in a sacred golden cup bearing
strange devices. The firing of guns accompanied these solemn acts
in all their stages, and wherever the grave procession moved, it
always did so with measured tread, chanting sacred verses to the
old, old Deity of our race, and surrounded with all the pomp of
war; whilst at intervals, peals of Christian bells and the
booming of near and distant guns added to the solemnity of this
water pageant. After the filling of the golden cup, which, of
course, represents the earth and its fulness, and, at this
season, the now expected increase, the High Priest placed a
golden crucifix on the virgin water and blessed its return from
wintry death, invoking the precious fluid to vernal life and
productiveness, when lo! a holy child suddenly appears upon the
scene, reminding us that this is everywhere the outcome of the
'wafers of life' in all animal as well as vegetable
production.
Boodha in the garden of Loobim through which flowed a holy
stream, and Christ by the brook at Bethlehem, nay, the first pair
in the garden of the four rivers, are all the same
idea--fertility and creation. The high Russian Pontiff now slowly
and solemnly stooped, and taking up some of the holy water,
proceeded to sprinkle the vernal child--Jesus, whispered these
crowds, but the ancients said Horus. The sacred fluid was then
sprinkled on the clergy, the Czar, and all dignitaries, and
finally on the sacred emblems, banners, guns, etc. Men and women,
aye, wise as well as foolish, of every rank, now crowded forward,
and on bended knee besought their Patriarch to sprinkle and to
bless them. Finally, the great Czar put the cup to his lips,
humbly and reverently, and then filled it to overflowing with a
wealth of golden pieces, for it is the still living
representative in the nineteenth century A.C. of 'the golden
boat' of Hea of the nineteenth century B.C.'[77]
[77] Forlong, Rivers of Life, vol. ii., p. 95.
The symbol of Neith or Muth, Athene or Minerva, the great
universal female principle of the Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans,
was the shield and serpent. In Celtic Druids I find that Nath,
the Egyptian Neith, the "goddess of wisdom and science whose
symbol was the shield and serpent, was worshipped among the
ancient Irish." The male God associated with her was Naith, and
according to Higgins represented "the opposite of Neith."
In Rivers of Life is observed a reference to the Assyrian
Goddess Hea by Lucian. In a note Forlong says that no doubt Hea
is the same as Haiya or Haya. In other words she represents the
universal hermaphrodite--the creative principle throughout
Nature, which was originally worshipped as female. The actual
signification of the word Haya is "life." In ancient Arabia it
was applied to a group of kinsmen.
The Rev. Mr. Davis is of the opinion that Noe or Noah was the
same as Deon and that both were Hu or Hea the mighty, whose
chariot was drawn by solar rays. This God was in fact the same as
Zeus, Bacchus, and all the rest of the sun and water Deities. It
has been observed that, according to the ancient cosmogonies,
within water was contained the life principle, and as a woman
presided over it, or was the only being or entity present, she
must have been the self-existent Creator. From this woman sprang
all creation. According to the account in Genesis, the Spirit of
God moved on the face of the deep and creation began.
By all nations water has been employed as a symbol of
regeneration, and as it contained the beginning of things it was
female. The Hindoos regard it as sacred, and in one of their most
solemn prayers it is thus invoked: Waters, mothers of worlds,
purify us![78]
[78] Quoted by Inman from Colbrook, vol. i., p. 85.
Doubtless it was from these ancient speculations regarding the
beginnings of things that Thales, the Milesian philosopher,
received his doctrine that water is the original principle. The
ancient Egyptians and the Jewish people to this day have the
custom of pouring out all the water contained in any vessel in a
house where a death has taken place, because of the idea that as
the living being comes from water, so does it make its exit
through water. Hence "to drink or to use in any way a fluid which
contains the life of human beings would be a foul offense."
The fact is noted by Inman that in all Assyrian mythology the
water God Hea is associated with life and with a serpent.
Although Rawlinson declares that Hea is Babylonian rather than
Assyrian, may she not, in view of the facts concerning her, be
not only Babylonian, but Egyptian, Indian, Phrygian, Mexican, and
all the rest?
It would seem that in this Deity, who is figured in connection
with a shield and serpent, as is Minerva, and who is worshipped
near water-- an emblem which is sacred to her,--and whose titles
correspond exactly to those of Neith or Cybele, might be traced
the remnants of a once universal worship--a worship in which the
female energy constituted the Creator.
Although it is declared that "great obscurity surrounds the
God Hea," no one, I think, whose mind is free from prejudice, and
who understands the significance of the early god-idea, and the
true meaning of the symbols used in later ages to express it, can
study the myths connected with this Deity without at once
recognizing her identity with the great female God of Nature who
was once worshipped by every people on the globe, but whose
worship had become sensualized to satisfy the corrupted taste of
a more depraved age--an age in which passion constituted the
highest idea of a God.
Although the serpent Deity was originally portrayed with the
head of a woman and the body of a serpent or fish, after the
change of sex in the god-idea which has been noted in the
foregoing pages had been completed, it is observed that this
figure is represented by the head of a man and the body of a
serpent. Hea, the great goddess to whom water, the original
principle, is sacred, and who is suspiciously connected with
Noah, the life-principle which appears at the close of a cycle,
has changed her sex. This god is now the "Ruler of the Seas,"
"Master of the Life-Boat" (the ark), and "Lord of the Earth." The
earth is his and the fulness thereof. He is the "Life Giver," the
"Lord of Hosts," who subsequently becomes the maker of heaven and
earth.
Minerva, who had been the first emanation from the Deity and
the daughter of the Great Mother of the Gods, now has a father
but no mother. Jove, who in course of time came to be represented
as a male Creator, brought her forth from his head. Later, woman
is produced from the side of man. The male principle, symbolized
by a serpent, has become "the one only and true God." It is
Passion --the "Healer of Nations"--the great "I Am."
No unprejudiced individual who carefully follows the results
of later investigation, and who attempts to unravel the mysteries
surrounding the ancient gods and the significance of the symbols
of worship belonging to the earliest historic times, will fail to
note the attempt which has been made in later ages to conceal the
fact that the Deity worshipped in very ancient times was female.
Neither will he fail to observe the modus operandi by which the
attributes and prerogatives of this Deity have been shifted upon
males--usually deified monarchs. After priestcraft and its
counterpart, monarchial rule, had robbed the people of all their
natural rights, kings assumed not alone the governing functions,
but arrogated to themselves the symbols, titles, and attributes
of the dual Deity. The reigning monarch became not only the
temporal ruler and priest, but was actually God himself, the
female principle being concealed under convenient symbols.
.