Valtyr

July 16, 2013

"Ancient moon priestesses were called virgins. ‘Virgin’ meant not married, not belong to a man-a woman who was ‘one-in-herself.’ The very word derives from a Latin root meaning strength, force, skill; and was later applied to men: virle. Ishtar, Diana, Astarte, Isis were all all called virgin, which did not refer to sexual chasity, but sexual independence. And all great culture heroes of the past…, mythic or historic, were said to be born of virgin mothers: Marduk, Gilgamesh, Buddha, Osiris, Dionysus, Genghis Khan, Jesus-they were all affirmed as sons of the Great Mother, of the Original One, their worldly power deriving from her. When the Hebrews used the word, and in the original Aramatic, it meant ‘maiden’ or ‘young woman’, with no connotations to sexual chasity. But later Christian translators could not conceive of the ‘Virgin Mary’ as a woman of independent sexuality, needless to say; they distorted the meaning into sexually pure, chaste, never touched. When Joan of Arc, with her witch coven associations, was called La Pucelle-‘the Maiden,’ ‘the Virgin’ - the word retained some of its original pagan sense of a strong and independent woman. The Moon Goddess was worshipped in orgiastic rites, being the divinity of matriarchal women free to take as many lovers as they choose. Women could ‘surrender’ themselves to the Goddess by making love to a stranger in her temple."

—

Monica Sjoo and Barbara Mor in the book “The Great Cosmic Mother -Rediscovering the Religion of the Earth” (via sacredwoman)

There’s a lot of nonsense right here, but let’s just pick out Joan of Arc. What the fuck, guys, her “witch coven associations” were allegations made by her enemies along with a slew of other slanders. Joan of Arc was really fucking Christian, and was passionate about her love for the Christian god, and claiming her as a pagan is about as tasteful as Mormons posthumously baptising people into their church.

Never trust anyone who treats ancient spirituality like a monolith, or who thinks they can generalise about ALL cultural heroes.

In fact you can probably simplify your life a lot if whenever anyone says “all cultures” you throw your drink into their face. If you don’t have a drink, get one, you’ll need it.

(via daunt)

2:42am | URL: https://tmblr.co/Z2cQ0xpn6MJd

(Notes: 39,465)