
Metis is the name the Greeks gave to an intuitive intelligence often attributed to women. A statement like "there's no understanding women" reflects an ignorance of metis, for the path of metis is sinuous, unpredictable, and unsettling for those who have none of it in themselves. Synonymous with prudence, reflection and wisdom, metis is the opposite of deductive knowledge and is contrary to the linear logic of Apollo. Essentially an intuitive quality, it is what we might call today "situational intelligence." Rooted in an inner knowledge, an intuitive perception of contexts, and a sense of intimacy with all of nature's ways, it belongs to mythic thought, where logic does not apply....
Metis, Goddess of wisdom, who according to Hesiod "knew more than all the gods and men put together," was Zeus's first wife. Now Zeus, warned that his wife's intelligence could be passed on to their offspring, thereby producing children superior to himself, decided not to risk being dethroned. He swallowed Metis before she could give birth to the formidable Athena so that the royal power would never belong to anyone other than Zeus among the living Gods. Here is a myth typical of the patriarchal turn of mind. Zeus swallows his wife because she is too strong, and feminine intelligence, from then on called intuition, is imprisoned in the belly of Zeus. A shadow was cast on the notion of intuition that persists to this day because it is a kind of "gut" intelligence which, although not exclusively, tends to characterize women.... (from "The Feminine Intelligence of Hermes" in Ginette Paris' Pagan Grace)
Metis was an
Okeanis (Goddess of clouds and rain) and
Titaness (daughter of Gaia). She personified "wisdom, good counsel, cunning and prudence."
(Metis) The Greek word
metis is translated/interpreted to mean "the most knowing" and "of many counsels" (in the sense of the Homeric epithet
polymetis).
(The Goddess Athena)Metis, digital collage © 2005 Sage Starwalker
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