Wednesday, June 09, 2004
Inanna
Inanna was not one of the 30 goddesses I studied/worked with in my priestess training. However,
In short, I'm a Goddess Geek.
So, it doesn't necessarily surprise me that a goddess with whom I haven't worked came to me when I was meditating on the Venus transit, but what I'm curious about is why. Why Inanna?
To start finding answers to this question, I pulled a few of my favorite reference books from my shelves and opened Baring and Cashford's The Myth of the Goddess, Evolution of an Image.
Their Chapter Five -- Inanna-Ishtar: Mesopotamian Goddess of the Great Above and the Great Below is a treasure-trove. First paragraph, second sentence:
And from the section, 24 pages later, titled Inanna as Queen of Heaven:
Well, that certainly gives food for thought ... which I'll most likely be serving up here, for awhile.
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Tonight, I pick my sister up at the airport. She's here for a two-week visit. She says she's been crying every day since school let out, and I'm probably going to be doing a lot of that with her. She's bringing recent pictures of my nephew, and some of his writings and journal entries. Yesterday, my partner picked up a book from the library that my sister just heard about -- His Bright Light, the Story of Nick Traina -- about a young man with ADHD and Bipolar diagnoses who committed suicide when he was 19. The book states that a third of those with bipolar disorder commit suicide. My gosh, why didn't anyone tell us how lethal this illness is? Suicide outnumbers death by homicide, 5 to 3, and AIDS/HIV deaths, 2 to 1. In 1999, suicide was the 3rd leading cause of death among young people 15 to 24 years of age, following unintentional injuries and homicide. Almost 10% of the adult US population suffers from a depressive disorder each year.
Sunday, we're having a memorial for Cobi here, seven weeks after his funeral in Texas. He spent eight summers here with me, so he's got a few close friends, young people and adults, and we've waited for my sister's visit to come together to memorialize him.
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- I'm an information sponge.
- I have a huge book collection (as one of my young friends said: She has books on Goddesses I've never even heard of!).
- I'm on my third copy of Barbara Walker's The Woman's Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets. The first two fell apart from (over-)use -- I read the second of them from cover-to-cover before I let it go ... in sacred ceremony ... and that's 1,136 pages!
- Same goes for multiple readings and copies of Patricia Monaghan's Goddesses and Heroines and Merlin Stone's Ancient Mirrors of Womanhood.
- I'm a sought-after team member when it comes time to play a "name-that-goddess" game.
In short, I'm a Goddess Geek.
So, it doesn't necessarily surprise me that a goddess with whom I haven't worked came to me when I was meditating on the Venus transit, but what I'm curious about is why. Why Inanna?
To start finding answers to this question, I pulled a few of my favorite reference books from my shelves and opened Baring and Cashford's The Myth of the Goddess, Evolution of an Image.
Their Chapter Five -- Inanna-Ishtar: Mesopotamian Goddess of the Great Above and the Great Below is a treasure-trove. First paragraph, second sentence:
(In a cylinder seal dating from 2334-2154 BCE) An eight-rayed star is near her, the image of the planet we now call Venus; for in the mythology of this goddess the crescent moon and the evening star, as the 'daughter' of the moon, belonged together.
And from the section, 24 pages later, titled Inanna as Queen of Heaven:
The Sumerians and Babylonians were fascinated by the stars, in the way, perhaps, that we now respond to the idea of exploring the universe. Nightly from the roof terraces of their houses they must have watched the great constellations wheeling around them, as they came to identify the most brilliant stars and gave the zodiacal belt the names and images that have endured to this day. Both Inanna and Ishtar were worshipped as Queen of Heaven. Their principal images were the moon and Venus, the morning and evening star, which may have given rise to the image of the eight-pointed star as well as the stylized rosette with eight petals as symbolic of their presence. Eight was the number sacred to the morning and evening star, addressed as the 'Radiant Star', 'The Great Light' in a Sumerian poem. Eight was the number of years it took for the planet to return to the same point of the zodiac while at greatest brilliancy. It is also the number of the sacred year, celebrated not only in Sumeria but in Egypt, Crete and Greece, when the full moon coincided exactly with the longest or shortest day, so reconciling lunar and solar time.
Well, that certainly gives food for thought ... which I'll most likely be serving up here, for awhile.
---------
Tonight, I pick my sister up at the airport. She's here for a two-week visit. She says she's been crying every day since school let out, and I'm probably going to be doing a lot of that with her. She's bringing recent pictures of my nephew, and some of his writings and journal entries. Yesterday, my partner picked up a book from the library that my sister just heard about -- His Bright Light, the Story of Nick Traina -- about a young man with ADHD and Bipolar diagnoses who committed suicide when he was 19. The book states that a third of those with bipolar disorder commit suicide. My gosh, why didn't anyone tell us how lethal this illness is? Suicide outnumbers death by homicide, 5 to 3, and AIDS/HIV deaths, 2 to 1. In 1999, suicide was the 3rd leading cause of death among young people 15 to 24 years of age, following unintentional injuries and homicide. Almost 10% of the adult US population suffers from a depressive disorder each year.
Sunday, we're having a memorial for Cobi here, seven weeks after his funeral in Texas. He spent eight summers here with me, so he's got a few close friends, young people and adults, and we've waited for my sister's visit to come together to memorialize him.
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Tuesday, June 08, 2004
Habit
Send an email to W.
Call the eye doctor.
Proofread P&A's shopping cart pages.
June 8th; Venus transit.
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Coming up to full wakefulness from sleep and meditation with a to-do list is a long habit of mine: One of the early "practical" benefits of my hypnopompic meditations.
A Spring Equinox dream and meditation encouraged a shift in practice, from to-do to to-be. But habit is habit, and so to-dos are still natural waking companions.
Signs of change: after this morning's third to-do item, my focus shifted from doing to being, and then I remembered that today is the day: June 8th, the first of the paired Venus transits (occultation) in this 121-year cycle, a time when Earth, Venus and Sun are in direct alignment, with Venus between the two, "occulting" (eclipsing) the Sun.
The astrologer Richard Giles says:
As I meditated on the Venus transit and how I might want to be, consciously, in alignment with this celestial sign of great hope for a renewed world, I remembered my partner's suggestion that I write a book (her suggested title: Bypassing Armageddon). But what do I have to tell the world about Bypassing Armageddon? How do we do that? In answer to these questions, the Goddess Inanna came to mind.
Inanna, Queen of Heaven and Earth, "held comprehensive sway over the Pantheon of the Ancient Near East for many centuries, if not millenia." (Asphodel Long, In a Chariot Drawn by Lions) She held the "insignia and regalia" of the me ("the 'memes' or 'how-to viruses' -- of the arts and sciences of civilization"). Long tells us that the me equip Inanna with the means of "keeping the world order in being." She also quotes from Wolkstein and Kramer's Inanna, Queen of Heaven and Earth:
Long tells us that this association with measuring "carries with it the connotation of justice, and by extension, truth, right and wisdom. What is measured correctly establishes a true picture; measurement provides exact methods that can be checked to discover falsity." And also:
Oh Ancient Queen,
Keeper of truth, right and wisdom,
Show us the true picture of our world,
Our solid planet,
Our species evolving, embracing a new consciousness:
Eden Recovered.
Shatter the illusion of the Armageddonites,
Break the mold of fear and hopelessness,
Remind us:
We are what we think.
Remind us:
We are alive in your Garden.
Remind us:
We can measure our world,
Reject false images,
Transform hard truths into new ways of being,
Develop sacred, sustainable habits,
Be in right relation with each other, and our world.
Oh Ancient Queen,
Keeper of truth, right and wisdom,
You who carry the measuring rod and line,
You who keep the world order in being:
Prepare us to meet you again at the table,
Remind us that we are welcomed guests at the feast of life.
Help us see the future in our hands, hearts and thoughts.
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Call the eye doctor.
Proofread P&A's shopping cart pages.
June 8th; Venus transit.
---------
Coming up to full wakefulness from sleep and meditation with a to-do list is a long habit of mine: One of the early "practical" benefits of my hypnopompic meditations.
A Spring Equinox dream and meditation encouraged a shift in practice, from to-do to to-be. But habit is habit, and so to-dos are still natural waking companions.
Signs of change: after this morning's third to-do item, my focus shifted from doing to being, and then I remembered that today is the day: June 8th, the first of the paired Venus transits (occultation) in this 121-year cycle, a time when Earth, Venus and Sun are in direct alignment, with Venus between the two, "occulting" (eclipsing) the Sun.
The astrologer Richard Giles says:
Venus transits seem to presage great shifts in human consciousness and this June promises the same...The eight years that pass between each occultation are fecund processing moments for new ideas and world change. Previous cycles show that global communications and a shift in consciousness regarding the scope and nature of the world are all part of these transits. The other focus is Venus's role as female entity and ruler of the feminine, the creative and as an artistic channel for new breakthroughs.
As I meditated on the Venus transit and how I might want to be, consciously, in alignment with this celestial sign of great hope for a renewed world, I remembered my partner's suggestion that I write a book (her suggested title: Bypassing Armageddon). But what do I have to tell the world about Bypassing Armageddon? How do we do that? In answer to these questions, the Goddess Inanna came to mind.
Inanna, Queen of Heaven and Earth, "held comprehensive sway over the Pantheon of the Ancient Near East for many centuries, if not millenia." (Asphodel Long, In a Chariot Drawn by Lions) She held the "insignia and regalia" of the me ("the 'memes' or 'how-to viruses' -- of the arts and sciences of civilization"). Long tells us that the me equip Inanna with the means of "keeping the world order in being." She also quotes from Wolkstein and Kramer's Inanna, Queen of Heaven and Earth:
she took the lapis measuring rod and line in her hand
Long tells us that this association with measuring "carries with it the connotation of justice, and by extension, truth, right and wisdom. What is measured correctly establishes a true picture; measurement provides exact methods that can be checked to discover falsity." And also:
Inanna's possession of the measuring rod and line, as goddess of practical exactness and of the me, the divine symbols of order and sustenance of the world, indicates that she holds the universe together.
Oh Ancient Queen,
Keeper of truth, right and wisdom,
Show us the true picture of our world,
Our solid planet,
Our species evolving, embracing a new consciousness:
Eden Recovered.
Shatter the illusion of the Armageddonites,
Break the mold of fear and hopelessness,
Remind us:
We are what we think.
Remind us:
We are alive in your Garden.
Remind us:
We can measure our world,
Reject false images,
Transform hard truths into new ways of being,
Develop sacred, sustainable habits,
Be in right relation with each other, and our world.
Oh Ancient Queen,
Keeper of truth, right and wisdom,
You who carry the measuring rod and line,
You who keep the world order in being:
Prepare us to meet you again at the table,
Remind us that we are welcomed guests at the feast of life.
Help us see the future in our hands, hearts and thoughts.
Wisdom has built her house, she has set up her seven pillars;
...she has set her table.
She has sent out her maids to call...
Come eat of my bread, and drink of the wine I have mixed
...walk in the ways of insight.
(Proverbs 9:1-6, as quoted in Long)
...she has set her table.
She has sent out her maids to call...
Come eat of my bread, and drink of the wine I have mixed
...walk in the ways of insight.
(Proverbs 9:1-6, as quoted in Long)
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Celtic Sacred Hours (3, 6, 9, 12 am/pm) Healing Practice:
What does my body need?
What does my spirit need?
Where is the flow? What wants to happen right now?
