M. Isidora Forrest's Blog, page 33

Isis, Lady of the Holy Cobra

This is one of the most popular posts on this blog. I don’t really have an update on this one, except to say that I still don’t have a snake. Though I know people who do, so I can get my snake fix.

[image error] I know, it’s not a cobra…just a very cool snake

We are repelled by them. We are fascinated by them.

Beautiful. Elegantly simple. One long muscle sheathed in glossy scales, some like brilliantly colored living jewels, some darkly and dangerously camouflaged.

There was a time when I really, really, really wanted a snake. I did my research. I discovered which kinds were likely to make the best “pets,” if I can even call them that, and how to care for them. Heck, both my Deities have serpentine connections; I should have a snake.

[image error] The holy cobra

But in the end, I didn’t get a snake. We already had a fierce black cat and I figured the cat and the snake would pretty much drive each other crazy. Plus, I didn’t want to keep frozen baby mice in the freezer as snake food. Eeesh.

While I may occasionally see a little garter snake in my backyard (and if I come upon it unaware, it can still give me a tiny shiver), the ancient Egyptians came across serpents much more frequently.

[image error] The impressive Egyptian cobra

No doubt that’s why serpents of all kinds played important roles in Egyptian mythology—as well as in Egyptian daily life. In myth, serpents were known to be both protective and harmful. In daily life, they were most often frightening due to the many extremely poisonous snakes that make Egypt their home. Two of the most important of these are the Egyptian Cobra, a big, aggressive serpent that can grow to more than two yards in length, and the now-rare Black-Necked Spitting Cobra that can spit blinding venom into its victim’s eyes at a range of more than three yards.

[image error] The Black-Necked Spitting Cobra spitting

In ancient Egyptian art, the cobra is most often represented as the uraeus, the fiercely protective serpent seen guarding the foreheads of Deities, kings, and queens. As the uraeus, the cobra is a positive presence, a symbol of the power and protection of the Deities. Uraeus is a Latinized version of the Greek word ouriaos, which is itself a version of the Egyptian word uraiet, which indicates the rearing, coiled cobra. The root word has to do with rising up or ascending, so that uriet, a feminine word, can be interpreted as She Who Rears/Rises Up. The root word is also used to refer to the upward licking of flames. And indeed, the uraeus is often depicted spitting fire. This serpent fire represents both magical fire and the burning pain of the serpent’s venom.

[image error] Isis from Abydos wearing a uraeus crown (upholding the horns and disk) and a holy cobra upon Her brow

In the Book of Amduat, an Otherworld guide, twelve cobras blast their fiery breaths to illuminate the paths of the Otherworld for the deceased. In other texts, huge cobras are seen spitting poison in the faces of enemies of the deceased. The uraeus cobras are usually Goddesses, which like the Hindu Shakti, are the active powers of the male Deity on Whose forehead They often sit. Uraei are also sent out as the Eye of the God; so to the cobra’s association with fire, we can add the symbolism of the powerful Divine Eye. With the Egyptian emphasis on transformation and renewal, the cobra’s ability to shed its skin and emerge renewed was symbolically important as well.

Although both Egyptian Goddesses and Gods wear cobras as part of their headdresses, mainly (but not exclusively) Goddesses have a cobra form. In fact, the cobra hieroglyph was often used as a determinative when writing the names of Goddesses or priestesses; and showing a cobra within a small enclosure could indicate the shrine of a Goddess. Cobra Goddesses are numerous in Egypt. The most prominent is Wadjet, the Green One. She is the tutelary Deity of Lower Egypt and one of the Two Ladies Who represent the Two Lands of Egypt. The Harvest Goddess, Renenutet, is a Cobra Goddess, as is Meretseger, She Who Loves Silence, the Goddess Who presided over the Theban necropolis.

[image error] This Egyptian image from about the 2nd century CE shows Isis with a serpent body as Isis-Thermouthis

As a fiery and protective Goddess, Isis also takes the form of a cobra. Sometimes She is the Eye of Re, the cobra-formed, solar power of the God. Sometimes She and Nephthys are shown as two cobras and replace Wadjet and Nekhebet as the Two Ladies of Egypt. Sometimes She is Isis-Thermuthis, a Hellenized form of Isis-Renenutet, the cobra harvest protector.

In Egyptian iconography, cobras are commonly found on Isis’ headdress, while in Greece and Italy, Isis could be shown holding a cobra, or with a cobra wrapped about Her arm. In the Graeco-Roman period, a cobra-formed Isis is paired with Her Graeco-Egyptian consort Serapis (and sometimes Osiris), also in a serpent form. As serpent Deities, Isis and Serapis are Agathe Tyche (Good Fortune) and Agathos Daimon (Good Spirit), and were considered the special protectors of Alexandria. Household serpents, called thermoutheis (pl.) from the name Isis-Thermuthis, were known to be the messengers of Isis.

[image error] Isis as Agathe Tyche and Osiris as Agathos Daimon in serpent form

Isis is also associated with the cobra in one of Her most famous myths. In the tale, Isis decides to gain power equal to Re’s. The Sun God is old and drools as He continues along His path in the sky. So the Goddess takes up some of His saliva, mixes it with Earth and forms from it a holy cobra which She places along Re’s path. The next day when Re passes by, the holy cobra bites Him. Re experiences pain like never before. He calls upon the Goddesses and Gods to help Him, including Isis. She reveals that She can cure Re if He tells Her His True Name, the most potent magical name in the universe. After much stalling, He eventually relents and tells Isis His Name. The Goddess heals Re and renews Him so that He can continue on His path through the heavens; meanwhile She gains power for Herself—through the magic of a holy cobra. (Please see my discussion of this important myth in Isis Magic and here.)

Have you ever handled a serpent, felt it coil about your wrists or up your arms, exploring with its flicking tongue? If you have, you have touched the beauty of Isis in one of Her most compelling and awe-striking forms.

Isis & the Kore Kosmou, Part 3

This is the last in the Kore Kosmou series for now. But I’d also like to let you know that I found out some other strange and interesting information on the Isis-Paris post. I’ve updated it in the reddish text here.

[image error]

We ended last time wondering whether Horus, the son and student of Isis, might be the “Pupil of the Eye of the World” rather than Isis. So let’s have a look at that.

As you already know, the Kore Kosmou is one of the Hermetica, spiritual teaching texts meant to illuminate the student. Like a number of other Hermetica, it appears to end with a significant hymn. I say “appears” because our fragmentary text ends just as Isis is about to reveal the hymn to Horus.

“Ay, mother, Horus said. On me as well bestow the knowledge of this hymn, that I may not remain in ignorance.

And Isis said: Give ear, O son! [. . . ]”

And that’s where it breaks off.

[image error]Winds Of Horus by Pierre-Alain D; you can purchase a copy here.

The hymn that we don’t have is the culmination of the entire text and must have had great magical/spiritual power for it is the hymn Isis and Osiris recited before They re-ascended to the heavens after having completed Their civilizing Work on earth.

I’ve been reading a paper by Jorgen Sorensen about the Egyptian background of the Kore Kosmou. He suggests that the missing hymn, combined with a secret that Isis refuses to reveal to Horus earlier in the text could be the text’s main point.

The secret comes up in Isis’ narrative when the embodied souls, not remembering their divine origins, are really messing up the world and the Elements complain to the Creator. They ask that an “Efflux” of the Creator be sent to earth. The Creator consents and as it is spoken, it is so. The One the Elements have asked for is already on earth serving as judge and ruler so that all human beings receive the fate they deserve.

Horus interrupts to ask how this efflux or emanation came to earth. Isis replies,

“I may not tell the story of [this] birth; for it is not permitted to describe the origin of thy descent, O Horus, [son] of mighty power, lest afterwards the way-of-birth of the immortal Gods should be known unto men—except so far that God the Monarch, the universal Orderer and Architect, sent for a little while thy mighty sire Osiris, and the mightiest Goddess Isis, that they might help the world, for all things needed them.” (Mead, Kore Kosmou, 36)

Thus the coming into being of the efflux of the Divine is intimately connected with the coming into being of Horus Himself. It is a secret that Horus, a Hermetic student but not yet an adept, isn’t ready to know.

Sorensen suggests that had Isis revealed the secret, it would have been that Horus Himself is the emanation of the Divine that dwells on earth. He notes that the Kore Kosmou is not alone in this and that a number of other Hermetica teach that the student, when fully adept, may indeed be a source of divinity in the world.

[image error] A Roman-era Harpokrates, reaching for His mother

Sorensen thinks that the ancient Egyptian idea of the pharaoh as a living God is behind the concept of the Hermetic adept as a point of Divine light in the world. It is, of course, significant that the pharaoh is “the Living Horus,” the very embodiment of Horus, son of Isis, in the text.

What’s more, since kore can sometimes be translated as just “eye” rather than pupil, the “Eye of the World” can be considered the Eye of Horus, the Eye that, when healed and complete, becomes a great blessing for the world for it is the very essence of offerings and the greatest talisman of ancient Egypt.

I think I like this idea.

It would be consistent with the expansion of Egyptian funerary/spiritual literature to be available to more people. At first such texts were only for the king, then they became available to nobles, and eventually anyone, at least anyone who was able to purchase their own copy of the book of the dead. And we should remember that the hoped-for culmination of the post mortum process described in the texts was in essence to become a deity, living among the Deities.

[image error] Isis Pelagia, Roman, now in the Capitoline Museum, photo by Ann Raia.

By the time of the Hermetica, the idea developed so that living human beings can find the divine potential within themselves. What’s more, their Hermetic studies and practices can help them work toward that potential. Like the healed and complete Eye of Horus, the fully initiated, “completed” adept can bring blessings.

During the first centuries of the Common Era, the period of the Kore Kosmou, the religions of the Mediterranean world were in turmoil. This is the period of the rise of Christianity, the development of Neoplatonism, Gnosticism, as well as other new and changing religious and philosophical movements. People were dealing with the concept of monotheism, discovering its benefits—and paying its price, as Egyptologist Jan Assman puts it in the title of his book The Price of Monotheism.

Sorenson sees a society in which many people felt that the Divine had created the world then simply left it on its own, much like the complaints of the Elements in Kore Kosmou. This may be simply part of the human condition or it may have been something particular to that time.

[image error] Hermes Trismegistos as a rather pale pharaoh as pictured in Manly P. Hall’s Secret Teachings of All Ages

And yet many people today have that same feeling. That may be why we are seeing the rise of fundamentalist religions that insist that only certain beliefs and behaviors will put the world to right and bring whatever their particular conception of God is back into the world, while at the same time, fewer people identify as religious and more as atheist. Here in the first century of the second millennium, perhaps we too are in a period of spiritual upheaval.

During those first centuries of the first millennium, it may be that the sense of abandonment was even more acutely felt in Egypt where the Goddesses and Gods had always extended Themselves intimately into the manifest world. The solution of the Hermetic schools (which more and more scholars are now coming to accept derive from genuine Egyptian tradition) was to bring the ancient ideal of the Divine pharaoh forward so that now the individual adept—no longer just the pharaoh—could be a light of the Divine on earth, helping to turn the world to right (Ma’at) through their own being and actions.

There is much more that we could talk about in relation to the Kore Kosmou. For instance, we could trace the powers and blessings in the Isis & Osiris aretalogy of our text to concepts in Egyptian tradition. But this is work I haven’t yet done. So for now, we’ll leave the Kore Kosmou and next week’s post will be on another topic. (For aretalogy in relation to Isis, see here and here and even some .)

Isis & Kore Kosmou, Part 2

[image error] An Italian edition of the Kore Kosmou

For those of you just dropping by, we’re discussing a fragment of an ancient text entitled Kore Kosmou. In it, Isis is the Divine Teacher and She instructs Her “Wondrous Son” Horus in spiritual truths.

So let’s start with the title of the text. Unlike some other ancient texts, it actually does have a title: Kore Kosmou. The simplest translation is Virgin (or Maiden) of the World. “Kore” is “girl, maiden, virgin,” as, for example, Persephone is called Kore—Maiden or Daughter—to Demeter’s Meter—Mother. Kosmou is “of the world, universe.”

Oh, but it ain’t that simple.

As is so often the case when discussing Things Ancient, interpretations vary. In fact, as far as I’ve seen, there has yet to be a single agreed-upon scholarly interpretation of the title, though they all have something to offer us.

So let’s have a look. First of all, who is this Virgin, Maiden, or Daughter of Whom we speak?

[image error] A maidenly Isis-Mari by Willow Arlenea.

The most obvious answer is that She is Isis. Isis is the teacher in this text and She, like so many Egyptian Goddesses, has a youthful Form. In a Hymn to Osiris, Isis is even called the Great Virgin/Maiden (hwn.t or hunet). She is also a Divine Daughter, the daughter of Heaven, Nuet, and of Earth, Geb. What’s more, if the dating of the text to 1st-3rd century CE is correct, Our Goddess is by that time considered a kosmokrator, a universal ruler, so it’s no stretch to consider Isis to be the Maiden of the Universe in the title.

So, problem solved?

Oh, heck no.

What if the Virgin of the Universe isn’t Isis at all? It may be that the Virgin is Nature Herself. Nature is sexually virgin in the tale. She creates Her own abundance from seeds which She Herself supplies to the Sole Ruler and which the Sole Ruler then returns to Her in order to start the chain of fruitfulness upon the earth. We also find identification of Kore with Nature in another Hermetic text, the Perfect Discourse. That text reiterates that the Creator “does not possess the nourishment for all mortal living creatures, for it is Kore Who bears the fruit.” The text is, after all, a creation story, so perhaps the title refers to the creation of the Virgin Universe.

[image error] A maidenly Nature by Mystery Kids

On the other hand, Isis Herself may certainly be considered to be Nature. Plutarch calls Her “the female principle in Nature” (On Isis & Osiris, 53). We have also discussed the idea that Isis’ name of “Throne” may refer to Her as the Original Place of Being. So perhaps we are intended to understand that Isis, Nature, and Kore Kosmou are one.

And that’s all fine. But now we come to the more interesting interpretations.

They revolve around another meaning of the word kore. For it also means “pupil,” as in the pupil of the eye, that black, liquid, bottomless center in the center of the eye.

Now at first, that seems rather strange. How can a maiden and the pupil of the eye be related concepts? But it turns out that many cultures have an expression for the pupil that translates as “the girl in the eye.” In fact, according to ethnologists who’ve studied such expressions, about one-third of the languages in the world have a term for the pupil of the eye that refers to a small human or human-like being. For example, Spanish speakers call the pupil the nina del ojo, the “girl of the eye,” which ultimately derives from Latin, which had the expression: pupilla, the “little girl” of the eye. (“Figurative Language in a Universalist Perspective,” Cecil H. Brown and Stanley R. Witkowski, American Ethnologist, Vol. 8, No. 3, Symbolism and Cognition (Aug., 1981), pp. 596-615.)

[image error] The Eye of Horus with its deep, black pupil

The origin of the expression is probably the fact that when we look into someone’s eyes, we can see a tiny reflection of ourselves in the black mirror of the pupil.

The ancient Egyptians had this expression, too. Pyramid Text 155 says to Osiris, “Take to thyself the damsel [girl] who is in the eye of Horus; open thy mouth with her.” (That is Samuel Mercer’s translation; Faulkner translates it “pupil of the eye of Horus.” It is both.) Later, the expression was simplified to “the girl in the eye” and then just “the girl” so that by the time the Kore Kosmou was written, the pupil was frequently just called “the girl.” And yes, the Greek in which our text was written also has the expression: the pupil of the eye is the kore.

Not every language in which this expression occurs sees a girl in the pupil; some see babies, little men, or even angels. But in Egypt, it was a hunet, a young woman. Why?

This is pure speculation, but when it comes to the Eye of Horus, perhaps it is because His mother Isis is the young woman Who is reflected in His own Child God’s eye. Or perhaps it is because of the power of the Uraeus “Eye” Goddesses in Egypt.

[image error] Isis as a Uraeus Serpent

There are many myths in which the Divine Eye goes forth in the form of a powerful Serpent Goddess, usually as a great protective power.

Isis is among these Goddesses of the Eye. In the Festival Songs of Isis & Nephthys from the Bremner-Rhind papyrus (Faulkner translation), Isis protects both Osiris and Horus and She is “Mistress of the Universe, Who came forth from the Eye of Horus, Noble Serpent which issued from Re, and which came forth from the pupil in the eye of Atum when Re arose on the First Occasion.”

But there are more mysteries of the eye. A praise of Amun-Re from Hibis demonstrates the power and mystery of the Divine Eye: “O Amun-Re Who hides Himself in His iris/pupil, Ba Who illumines by means of His oracular wedjat-eyes, Who manifests a manifestation: sacred one Who cannot be known. Brilliant of visible forms, Who hides Himself with His mysterious akh-eye: mysterious one, Whose secrets cannot be known.”

[image error] Reflection in the pupil of the eye

As the physical eyes are the organs of perception of the light of the sun and the moon, so the Divine Eyes can illuminate or conceal the deep Mysteries hidden within Their depths, most especially at the core, in the pupil, in the deepest, yet most reflective, part of the eye. For in the darkness of the pupil of the eye lies concealed spiritual illumination.

Thus it seems that the title of our text may also be translated as Pupil of the Eye of the World/Universe and that, as would-be initiates, we should understand the blackness of the pupil to conceal spiritual light. And indeed, in the Kore Kosmou, the Hermetic teacher Isis, begins the process of illuminating Her Wondrous Son, Horus, Who is Himself the possessor of Egypt’s most important eye, the talisman of talismans, the offering of offerings, the Eye of Horus.

The Kore Kosmou teaches about creation, and souls, and reincarnation, and the nature of Divinity. It reveals Mysteries—but not yet all of them—to the Hermetic student, Horus. Thus a title like Kore Kosmou, with its hidden meanings, is quite appropriate to this teaching text.

[image error] The Kore Kosmou, the Pupil in the Eye of the Universe

Isis is the Girl in the Pupil of the Eye. As a Holy Cobra Goddess, She comes forth from the Pupil of the Eye of Atum and She is a Divine Eye Goddess Herself. She knows the secrets of the darknesses of the kosmos (cosmos), a word that not only means “world” or “universe,” but also order, and so perhaps even Ma’et. Thus She is the one Who can appropriately reveal—or conceal—the Mysteries of the creation, ordering, and structure of the universe and the souls within it.

But on the other hand, perhaps we should understand Horus as the Pupil of the Eye of the World; He is, after all, the student or “pupil” of His mother. And yes, that word is related, too…

So it seems I am not yet done with the Kore Kosmou. I’m still researching and reading and I think I shall perhaps have some more to say on this subject next time.

Isis & the Kore Kosmou, Part 1

[image error] “As Above, So Below” is probably the most well-known Hermetic axiom

My chat with Janus and Domonic of The Magician and the Fool podcast has been published. We had fun talking about a wide range of Isis topics. You can listen here.

This week, I’m starting a 3-part series on an ancient text known as the Kore Kosmou. When this post was first published, it was in answer to a request and a question from a friend of this blog, Andrea, about this particular text…

But first, some background.

The Kore Kosmou is one of the Hermetic texts and it follows the common pattern of a dialog between teacher and student. In the Hermetica, most often the teacher is Hermes Trismegistos and the student Asclepios, Ammon, or “Tat,” the son of Hermes. In the Kore Kosmou, Isis is the teacher and Her son, Horus, is the student.

Certainly, there were many more Hermetica than what has come down to us. It also seems likely that there were once more Isis-as-teacher texts than just the Kore Kosmou and the few fragments we have. This, of course, would make a great deal of sense: Isis and Thoth-Hermes—Egypt’s two great and wise Magician Deities—serving as the main Hermetic teachers. It is interesting to note that, as time goes on, more and more scholars are recognizing the genuinely Egyptian elements that are such an important part of the Hermetica. More on that later.

But in case you’re not familiar with Hermeticism and the Hermetica, here’s a brief introduction and then we’ll delve into Andrea’s question about the Kore Kosmou and discuss what the text contains.

Hermeticism & the Hermetic Texts
[image error] Hermes Trismegistos as a human sage, from the Siena Cathedral

Hermeticism began as a late Pagan branch of esotericism and was one of the many products of the meeting of the ancient Hellenic and Egyptian cultures in the centuries surrounding the beginning of the Common Era. The primordial and venerable religion of Egypt, its ancient wisdom, and its eternal magic combined with the dominant Greek culture, religion, and philosophy to produce a powerful mix that continues to influence esotericism to the present day.

Hermeticism’s most fertile home was the great syncretic Egyptian capital city of Alexandria—a city that had honored Isis from its inception and which left an indelible stamp upon the Hermetic tradition. As religious wisdom and philosophy flowed into Alexandria from many cultures, it likewise flowed into Hermeticism. In addition to Egyptian and Greek Paganism, Judaism, Christianity, Gnosticism, and Iranian Zoroastrian all added to the Hermetic amalgamation.

[image error] Thoth; Trismegistos’ Egyptian original

The Hermetic texts address a wide range of topics, including cosmic principles, the nature and orders of Being and beings, the human desire to know the Divine, astrology, alchemy, magic, and medicine, among others.

Scholars generally place the individual texts of the Hermetica in one of two camps: the philosophical and religious Hermetica, or the technical—that is, magical or theurgic—Hermetica. The main philosophical Hermetic texts that have come down to us are contained in the Corpus Hermeticum, a collection of approximately 17 treatises written in Latin and Greek. The exact date for the composition of the texts is unknown, but they are usually thought to be dated to the second or third centuries CE. Technical Hermetica range more broadly, and are tentatively dated to a period spanning the first century CE to the fourth. It is quite possible, however, that at least some of the texts were based on significantly earlier models.

We’re not sure when the Kore Kosmou was written either. In 1909, Egyptologist Flinders Petrie suggested that it could be as old as 510 BCE and thus is the oldest of the Hermetic texts. Frankly, it doesn’t feel quite that old to me and although it can be considered one of the most “Egyptian” of the Hermetica, it has enough in common with the other texts that the 1st-3rd centuries CE date seems more right to me.

So What Was the Question?

[image error] God the Father, from the Sistine Chapel

Andrea wanted to know what I thought about the androcentricity of the creation story told in Kore Kosmou. And it definitely is androcentric. The Supreme Creator is a He and a Father. “Nature,” the product of Creation, is a beautiful feminine Being. So there ya go; stereotypes all around.

But there’s absolutely nothing special about that. It’s just the usual sexism of the day.

As a woman reading the ancient esoteric texts, I almost always have to mentally “translate” or interpret them for myself. Is the author talking about human men or humankind? Are women intended to be included in this, that, or the other statement? Were women even worth bothering about in the author’s eyes? If there is an encounter with a feminine Divine Being in the text, does the same spiritual dynamic apply to women or would a woman have an encounter with a masculine Divine Being?

This is true of…well…just about every ancient text I’ve ever read, no matter the tradition. Not only must I puzzle through the meaning of the ancient author, but then I must try to discover whether or not it was intended to relate to me as a female seeker. (And all of this applies to heterosexuals; how much more translation is required if you’re LBGTQ?) So I grit my teeth and try to ignore the sexism to find the underlying spiritual meaning. Some days are better than others but, I must admit, it does get tiresome.

Okay, I’m done now. With that small rant duly ranted, let’s discover what’s in the Kore Kosmou.

As it is my opinion that the Ultimate Divine is ultimately beyond gender, as I summarize the text, I shall be using the term “Creator” and “Sole Ruler” (both of which are in the original text) instead of Father, Craftsman, God, or the masculine pronoun when referring to the Ultimate Divine. All other Deities retain Their traditional, textural pronouns.

What’s in the Kore Kosmou?

Give heed, my son Horus, for you shall hear secret doctrine, of which our forefather Kamephis was the first teacher. It so befell that Hermes heard this teaching from Kamephis, the eldest of our race. I heard it from Hermes, the writer of records, at the time when he initiated me in the Black Rites [possibly alchemy], and you shall hear it now from me…

—Kore Kosmou, Walter Scott translation

[image error]Isis from Athanasius Kircher

This is how Isis begins Her dialog. She then describes for Her son the creation of the Universe, the Elements, and Nature. Nature is the most important female character in the story and is described as “a being in woman’s form, right lovely, at the sight of whom the gods were smitten with amazement.”

Isis next describes how the Souls—which are Divine and share with the Creator the ability to create—were made and how they became too proud of their creative ability, overstepping the bounds the Creator decreed for them.

To punish the Souls for their pride, the Souls are placed into human bodies by Hermes Trismegistos on command of the Sole Ruler. Yet the Creator is merciful. As consolation to the imprisoned Souls, the Creator allows them to forget their heavenly origins, to receive blessings from the Deities, and to return to the Heavens provided they do good upon earth.

[image error] There’s a band called Kore Kosmou…and they have a gorgeous album cover

Nevertheless, once the Souls are embodied, they began to fight amongst themselves, killing each other and polluting the world, so much so that the Elements complain to the Creator. The Creator bids the Elements to return to Their work, for help is on the way.

And so the Creator sends Isis and Osiris, Who are “the efflux” of the Divine, to help create order, religion, and civilization.

The Goddess and God bring “that which is Divine” into human life, thereby putting a stop to savage slaughter. They establish the rites of worship on earth, consecrate temples, and give human beings food and shelter. They introduce the oath and law and justice. They teach the art of mummification. They discover the cause of death by finding that the life-breath eventually returns to its place of origin. They learn the ways of the Spirits and inscribe the secrets on stones for human edification. They devise the “magic of the prophet-priests” so that human souls can be nurtured by philosophy and human bodies can be healed by the healing art.

Having brought all these Divine blessings to earth, Isis and Osiris are allowed to return to heaven after speaking a hymn. Horus asks to learn the hymn…and that is, unfortunately, where the text breaks off.

[image error] Isis and Osiris, from a stele now in the Louvre, photo by Rama

Another fragment seems to pick up the tale and has Isis answering Horus’ questions about the nature of the many types of Souls, how they are differentiated, and how they become intelligent.

In the surviving Hermetica, Isis often concerns Herself with Souls; an interest continuing from Her early function as a funerary Goddess and a guide and protector of the dead. In other Isis-to-Horus fragments, Isis teaches about reincarnation and the nature of Souls. In their Isian and Hermetic concern with the journey of the Soul after death, the texts resonate with the power of the ancient Egyptian tradition from which they, in part, derive.

Read It for Yourself

If you’d like to read the whole text for yourself, you can find the G.R.S. Mead translation here. And the Kingsford-Maitland translation here. Both of these translations are in the public domain, which is why you find them online. Mead’s is overly poetic in true Victorian fashion and Kingsford & Maitland had their own agenda. Of the translations I know of, the Walter Scott version seems best to me, though he is criticized for some of the “corrections” he made. It, however, is not in the public domain, so you won’t find it online. Always remember; translation is an art, not a science.

But it seems that I’m not quite done with the Kore Kosmou. So next time, we’ll talk about some of the genuinely Egyptian elements in the text and find out how it may indeed be the most “Egyptian” of the Hermetica.

New article in The Light Extended

[image error]Coming in June

Hello, all! I am very happy to let you know that I have an article in the upcoming book, The Light Extended, A Journal of the Golden Dawn. It will be out sometime in June. In addition to my article, you’ll also find work from Chic & Tabatha Cicero, Adam Forrest, Tony Fuller, Darcy Kuntz, Samuel Scarborough, Frater YSHY, Jayne Gibson, Alex Sumner, Soror DPF, Frater D, and Frater Yechidah. Such Adept company!

I’m so pleased that this article is being published because it’s been a long time coming. I wrote it a number of years ago for a different book that didn’t happen. For this one, the article has been updated and edited. I hope you’ll like it. It’s titled “I Have Put On the Cloak of the Great Lady; I Am the Great Lady”: The Assumption of Godforms and the Key to Egyptian Magic. Here’s a bit from the introduction:

I am in the retinue of Hathor, the most august of the Gods, and She gives me power over my foes who are in the Island of Fire. I have put on the cloak of the Great Lady, and I am the Great Lady. I am not inert, I am not destroyed, and nothing evil will come to pass against me. I am the Great One Who Came Forth From Re, I was conceived and borne by Shesmetet, and I have come that I may weave the dress for my mistress. The dress is woven by Horus and Thoth and by Osiris and Atum; and indeed I am Horus and Thoth, I am Osiris and Atum.

Formula 485, the Coffin Texts

A series of Coffin Texts dealing with the weaving and wearing of the cloak of Hathor is among the clearest examples in Egyptian magic of what is most-often known today as the Assumption of Godforms. As in the example above, the deceased puts on the cloak of Hathor and becomes Hathor. He is both the weaver and the wearer of the magical covering of the Goddess—Her “cloak,” “dress,” or astral form.

[image error]Art seems to capture the Assumption of God/dessforms best; this is The Lotus Soul by Frantisek Kupka, 1898. This is what the energy feels like to me.

The Assumption of God/dessforms may well be the most powerful magical technique human beings have available—in this or the afterlife. It was one of the vital keys to ancient Egyptian magic and it can still be a key to the working of powerful, sacred magic today. 

We will look at how the ancient Egyptians may have developed this important technique, how they used it, and how it passed into the Western Esoteric Tradition. We will see how and why the technique was largely lost to us until being re-discovered and reconnected with its Egyptian roots by the magicians of the Golden Dawn at the end of the 19th century. Then, readers who would like to try this ancient technique for themselves are invited to use the brief ritual at the end of this article. It combines classical Egyptian and Hermetic theurgic formulae to assist you in Assuming the Godform of Amun, a Deity Who may be considered the God of God/dessforms.

I’ll let you know when it’s available!

Nuet, Mother of Isis

In honor of Mother’s Day, I offer this post about the mother of Isis, the Sky Goddess, Nuet.

[image error]A most beautiful Nuet

While I have no declared priestesshood for Nuet, She draws me. A lot. In fact, almost anytime I do spiritual work with Her, I am overawed by Her Eternity, Her Depth, Her Beauty, and I want to lose myself in Her.

Nuet is the mother of Isis. She is also called the Mistress of All and the One Who bears the Gods and Goddesses. She is the Splendid and Mighty One in the House of Her Creation. She is the Great One in Heaven and the “indestructible stars” (that is, the circumpolar stars that are always visible) are said to be in Her. She embraces the deceased king and each of us “in Her name of Sarcophagus” and “in Her name of Tomb.” She is the Mistress of the Secret Duat (the Otherworld). She is the Glowing One (perhaps as the Milky Way) and in Her we are joined to our stars, Becoming divine. She is the one Who gives birth to us and Who welcomes us back into Her starry body at our deaths. She is Heaven and She is the Otherworld. She gives birth to the Sun God Re each day and receives him back into Her body, by swallowing, each night. She is the one Who is “Amid the Iset Temple in Dendera” for She is over Her daughter and Her daughter is in Her.

One of the stars within Mother Night, is Sirius, the Star of Isis. Right now, She is absent from the night sky (at least where I am in the Pacific Northwest of the US). Each year, the star has it’s heliacal setting in May and its heliacal rising in August (again, here in my location). This happened in ancient Egypt, too, where the star’s rising heralded the beginning of the all-important, life-sustaining flooding of the Nile.

But now, right now, She has not risen. She is in the belly of Her Mother Nuet.

And while She is in Her mother’s womb, She is also in the Otherworld for Nuet is the Lady of the Duat and Her body is both the Heavens and the Underworld. So now in the rising heat of the year, our Goddess is in the cool depths of Eternity. Perhaps this is the time for us, as Her devotees, to enter the Otherworld as well. It may even be a particularly safe time to do so for now we have the support of Isis Who awaits us there. If we have scary things to face in our own personal Underworlds, now is a more supportive time to do so. The light of dawn comes more quickly now and the sunlight of Isis the Radiant One is more readily available to us after we have faced those inner darknesses that we must face in order to grow.

[image error]Nuet, the Circle of Eternity, encompassing All

This may also be a good time to explore our relationships with our mothers. A strong priestess of my acquaintance, who was serving as a Priestess of Nuet at a festival not long ago, told me an interesting thing about how she perceived the relationship between Nuet and Isis. It was her distinct impression that Nuet did not get along with Her daughter. Of course, in the human realm, this is far from an uncommon thing. Mothers and daughters (and mothers and sons, for that matter) can have issues. Now, with the light of spring and coming summer and the help of the Goddesses available to us, might be a time to shed some light on those issues.

But even if we don’t have mom stresses, this can be a time to honor our mothers, both human and Divine—perhaps under a star-filled sky. Since my own mother has already been enfolded in the wings of Isis, I shall plan to honor my Divine Mother Nuet and Her Starry Daughter, Isis…on the next clear and starry night.

[image error]The Star of Isis


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Iset Mystikê?

[image error] An early Greek Kore, looking very Egyptian, complete with braided wig

I’m going to be talking with Janus Sunaj and Domonic of the Magician and the Fool podcast next week about the Mysteries of Isis…and probably some other things, too. I’ll let you know when the podcast is available. In the meantime, here are some speculations about Isis, Egypt, Greece, and the Mysteries…

Most modern scholars now accept the influence of ancient Egypt on ancient Greece. We are finally able to take ancient Greek writers a bit more seriously when they tell us that—well, yes—the fractious city-states of Greece were indeed impressed and influenced by the ancient-even-then, ever magical, amazingly unified, and seemingly peaceful land of Egypt.

Hey, nobody operates in a cultural vacuum and the ancients didn’t either.

Writing in the 5th century BCE, the Greek historian Herodotus told his readers flatly that in the Egyptian language Demeter is Isis. In fact, he seems convinced that most of the names of the Greek Deities and many of the Greek religious rites came to the aboriginal Greeks, the Pelasgians, by way of Egypt. Among these rites are the famous Greek women’s rites of Demeter called Thesmophoria.

In his essay On Isis and Osiris, the Greek priest Plutarch remarks that “Among the Greeks also many things are done which are similar to the Egyptian ceremonies in the shrines of Isis, and they do them at about the same time.”

[image error] One of the Eleusinian priests, the Dadouchos

Diodorus Siculus, a Sicilian historian, records that Erechtheus, the mythical king of Athens, was himself Egyptian and it was he who instituted the Eleusinian rites after obtaining grain from Egypt during a Greek famine. He also said that the Eumolpids, the family that traditionally ran the Eleusinian Mysteries, were of Egyptian priestly stock.

How seriously should we take this? Could there be an Egyptian seed at the center of the defining Mysteries of ancient Greece, the Eleusinian Mysteries of Demeter and Kore?

It is quite true that we have no incontrovertible proof of an Egyptian origin of the important Eleusinian Mysteries. We do, however, have interesting footprints to follow up. We know for certain that either Egyptians were at Eleusis or that Greeks brought Egyptian talismans to Eleusis for Egyptian scarabs and a symbol of Isis, which date to the ninth or eighth century BCE, have been discovered there. The eighth century is the time to which the Eleusinian rites are usually dated, though it is likely that their true origins go back further, even if the rites were not in the form they eventually took.

[image error] Greek Bee Goddess…in what looks like an Egyptian nemyss.

The correspondences between the Eleusinian myth and the Isis and Osiris myth as related in Plutarch are notable: the search for a missing Divine Beloved, the mournful aspect of the searching Goddess, the connection of the Beloved with the Underworld, and the (possible in the case of Eleusinian myth) birth of a Divine Child. Plutarch’s 2nd century CE rendition of the story is usually seen as Demetrian influence on Greco-Egyptian Isis and Her Greco-Roman Mysteries. But what if it was the other way around?

There are scholars who have traced magical formulae from Egypt to Greece, then followed them as they returned from Greece—changed—to be re-adopted in Egypt at a later period. Perhaps something like that happened with the Eleusinian/Isis-Osiris myth. While the basis of the myth—missing Beloved, searching, mourning, finding—may have its roots in Egypt, by the time it came back to Egypt, it had been changed. For instance, the “weeping at the well” incident in both the Demeterian myth and Plutarchian Isis myth is not found in any Egyptian rendition of the Isis and Osiris tale. It would indeed seem that this revised piece of the story was adopted from Demeter’s myth into that of Isis.

[image error] Egyptian death rites as Mysteries

While this is speculative, it’s not just me speculating. There are actual scholars thinking along these lines. One of them is the highly controversial Martin Bernal (author of Black Athena, which traces African origins for a great deal of Greek culture). The much less controversial Walter Burkert has something to say about eastern influence, too, in his The Orientalizing Revolution: Near Eastern Influence on Greek Culture in the Early Archaic Age. Even scholars of a more classical bent admit the influence of Egypt on early Greece, especially in matters of religion.

Bernal’s work as a whole should not be dismissed just because he goes too far in some cases. In my opinion, overall he’s right: Egypt particularly, as well as other long-established near eastern nations, exerted a huge influence on early Greece in its formative stages. Once Greece became established, of course, it developed its unique culture. But again, no culture exists in a vacuum. We are all influenced by each other.

[image error] The entrance to the Eleusinian sanctuary today

Bernal spends a lot of time making etymological connections (etymology is the study of word origins) which are, at the very least, interesting. For instance, there are a number of Eleusinian terms that have no Indo-European cognates, yet can be explained in terms of ancient Egyptian or West Semitic. I won’t go into all the details because, if you’re not an etymologist, you might start to snore. One of these terms is the word “mysteries” itself. While it is usually explained as coming from an Indo-European root that refers to “closing the mouth” or staying silent, Bernal suggests that it might be better and more directly explained by an Egyptian root that refers to secrecy.

In this scenario, “mysteries” is derived from ancient Egyptian em sesheta (you can see the “m” and “s” sound there), meaning “in secret.” Sesheta, “secret,” was a word often used in relation to the Isis-Osiris rites, as well as other Egyptian rites.

Bernal also make connections between Greek words associated with the Mysteries and other Egyptian words, but frankly, I don’t have enough etymological background to judge. For instance, Bernal offers a connection between the Greek root of telete (initiation), which also means “completion” with the Egyptian djer, meaning “limit, end, or entire.” (You may recall this word from our discussion of Nephthys as the Lady of the Limit during the last few weeks.)

[image error] The Hierophant from the Thoth tarot deck; the Hierophant is the High Priest at Eleusis, and of the Eumolpid family

As I mentioned earlier, Diodorus Siculus recorded the tradition that the Eleusinian priestly family, the Eumolpids, were originally Egyptian. The ancient Greek scholar Apollodorus said that the Eumolpids were from Eithiopia. Apparently the Eumolpids themselves believed they had Egyptian origins, while others said they were from Thrace. Bernal suggests that the name Eumolpid, as well as the name of the second Eleusinian priestly family, the Keryxes, who served as Sacred Heralds, have  plausible Afroasiatic origins. In fact, he thinks that Greek keryx comes from Egyptian qa kheru, “high or loud of voice.” And that, if true, is extremely cool.

Of course, the big thing that may have come to the Greeks from Egypt is the idea of a blessed life after death. In the work of early Greek poets like Homer, the afterlife is a place of wan grey ghosts and no joy. Where did the idea of a joyful afterlife—for initiates, anyway—come from? Surely, surely it was influenced by Greece’s neighbors to the south, where they were well-versed in the ways of the afterlife and its joys, assuming one knew the proper passwords and pathways. It seems likely that this knowledge, which would have been sesheta until Books of the Dead became more widely available for everyone in Egypt, could have been turned into a Mystery cult at Eleusis, where a Goddess searched for a missing Beloved, eventually found Her, though She was forever changed having become the Queen of the Dead, and then bestowed the Mystery of a blessed life after death on Her initiates.

And we haven’t even gotten to the harmonies between Isis and Demeter, which are much more interesting than just Their “Mother Goddess” connection. Perhaps we’ll go there next time.

[image error] The monumental head of Isis-Sothis-Demeter from the Roman Emperor Hadian’s Villa, now in the Vatican Museum; I have seen Her in person and She is wow.

What does the rudder have to do with Isis?

[image error] An Egyptian rudder with seeing eyes and regenerative lotus decoration

As a river-dependent civilization, ancient Egypt was quite familiar with the rudders used to steer boats.

So it is perhaps no great leap to see the guiding rudder as a symbol of the greater guidance of the Divine.

Just as Egyptian pilots steered their earthly boats with these rudders, so they became a symbol of guidance and direction in the afterlife. And so may we also take them as a symbol of guidance in our spiritual lives as well as our everyday lives.

In the Book of Coming Forth by Day, for example, the deceased prays that Horus, the son of Isis, will be in charge of the rudder of his funerary boat and that Thoth and Ma’et will be beside Him. In other words, he prays to be guided by the strength of Horus and the wisdom of Thoth and Ma’et.

When depicted in the funerary books, these Divine steering-oars are often decorated with the Eyes of Horus, representing the power of the Sun and Moon, and the blue lotuses of rebirth. In a group of four, the oars represent the four cardinal directions.

[image error] The seven Cows of Heaven and Their Bull, with four rudders representing the directions

The rudder is also connected with the concept of abundance. In the Book of Coming Forth by Day, the deceased prays to the rudders of the directions asking them to grant bread, beer, offerings, provisions, long life, prosperity, health, and joy. Furthermore, directly following this prayer to the rudders is the formula of the Divine Cows and Their Bull. It, too, has to do with provisions in the afterlife, as well as rebirth from the Divine Cow. The proximity of the formulae of the Divine rudders and the Divine bovines, as well as their similar subject matter, indicates a relationship between them. Not only do both have to do with abundance and life, but also, like the four rudders, the four legs of the Divine Cow we sometimes associated with the four directions.

[image error] Isis guides the boat of the deceased in the Otherworld

Both cow and rudder are, in turn, related to Isis. She is the Divine Cow Who gives abundance and rebirth and She is also a Goddess Who guides. In Egyptian texts, Isis is one of the Deities Who guides the Sun God’s boat. In later Graeco-Roman sources, Isis is specifically connected with the symbol of the guiding rudder. As Isis Pelagia, Isis of the Sea, the Goddess was known to steer the ship of life with Her sacred rudder. Mariners of all kinds invoked Her guidance and protection as they crossed the Mediterranean, braving its many dangers.

In the Mediterranean world, the symbolism of the rudder continued to embrace the ideas of abundance and prosperity. In Hellenic lands, the rudder was a symbol of Agathe Tyche (“Good Fortune”). In Rome, it was the emblem of the Goddess Fortuna—and both Goddesses were intimately connected with Isis. In fact, of all the Goddesses in the areas influenced by Greece and Rome, Isis was the one Deity with Whom Agathe Tyche and Fortuna were most consistently assimilated.

[image error] Isis-Fortuna with rudder and cornucopia

As Agathe Tyche, Isis was considered the “luck” of a number of port cities, particularly Alexandria. In fact, Her headdress emphasizes her connection with cities. As guardian of cities, Tyche wears an elaborate crown shaped like city walls. Legend had it that Tyche gave birth to a Divine figure called Isityche Who was said to symbolize the combination of Divine Providence and Chance. As you can easily see, Isityche is none other than Isis-Tyche. In this combined Divine figure, “Isis” represents the wise guidance of the Divine, while “Tyche”—sometimes depicted as blind—represents unseeing Chance.

The Roman version of Agathe Tyche was the Goddess Fortuna. She was extremely popular throughout the Roman world. Every Roman emperor kept an image of Fortuna in his sleeping quarters in hopes of bringing good fortune to his reign. Anyone with particularly good or bad luck was said to have their own “Fortuna.” Fortuna even had Her own oracular shrines. Her symbols include the Wheel of Fate, a sphere representing the World that She rules, the cornucopia of plenty, and a rudder with which She steers Fate. When Fortuna is depicted specifically as Isis Fortuna, She also wears the horns and disk crown of the abundant Egyptian Cow Goddess; thus reuniting the Egyptian symbols of cow and rudder in the figure of the Goddess Isis.

[image error] Isis Fortuna with rudder, from the Temple of Isis, Pompeii

Like Tyche, Fortuna was often said to be blind. And, in fact, it may have been precisely because of this that Isis became so strongly tied to both Tyche and Fortuna. The Goddess Isis was well known to be the very opposite of blind. She is specifically a Goddess Who sees and understands the needs of Her worshippers. By invoking not just blind Tyche or blind Fortuna, but Isis Tyche and Isis Fortuna, one was invoking a seeing Fate—a more auspicious Fate steered by a skillful Mistress of the Rudder, the wise Goddess Isis.

Whether as the Divine Cow Goddess Who gives provisions and rebirth or as the guiding Goddess of the rudder and the cornucopia, Isis goes before us, guiding and leading us to abundance in all things. May She bless you. May She steer you toward that which you most desire. May She help you grow in strength and beauty of soul. Amma, Iset.

Isis & the French Connection

In honor of Notre Dame de Paris (“Our Lady of Paris”), and in the expectation that She will indeed rise again in beauty, I offer this post on Our Lady’s extensive connections with the ancient city of Paris.

If you’ve read Isiac lore broadly, you’ve probably come across the idea that the city of Paris is named for Isis, presumably from Per- (the Egyptian word for “house” or “temple”) or Par- (French for “with”) and Her name, Isis. We find that notion in places like Dan Brown’s The DaVinci Code and before him in David Wood’s 1986 book GenIsis: First Book of Revelations and before that in the musings of 17th century amateur “orientalists.”

Unfortunately, it ain’t so.

[image error]A Gallo-Roman Isis & Harpocrates

The name of France’s capital city comes from the Gaulish Parisii clan who had a settlement on what would become the Isle de la Cité, and along the banks of the Seine, starting about 250 BCE. They may have called it something like Lucotocia, possibly from the Celtic word for “marsh.” When Rome conquered them, the Romans built a military base there called Lutetia Parisiorum (“Lutetia of the Parisii”), which eventually got shortened to Paris. Interestingly, there is single mention (in Ptolemy’s Geographica) of a Parisii clan in Yorkshire, England as well, and scholars have speculated whether the Yorkshire Parisii were connected to the Seine Parisii. What’s more, while no one is entirely sure what the name Parisii means, some Celticists think it could come from proto-Celtic words meaning, “commanders,” or perhaps, “fighters,” or—my personal favorite— “they of the cauldrons.”

[image error]A gold coin of the Parisii tribe showing a (probably) female head, likely a Goddess. But not Isis.

It is very, very highly unlikely that the “-isii” part of the Parisii tribal name has anything to do with Isis—even in the face of quite a bit of wild-eyed speculation to the contrary; speculation that actually started hundreds of years ago and has grown exponentially of late as things get uncritically replicated across the interwebs.

[image error]Section of a map of Roman Paris (after Crypte Archéologique 2005, Paris; MacKendrick 1972).

Nevertheless, is it quite true that Isis does have a long history in France—and with the city of Paris. Isis came to Gaul with the Romans, in the same way that Her worship spread throughout the Roman Empire. So yes indeed, there were shrines and temples to Isis in France. This map shows the supposed location of a Roman Temple of Isis, at or near what is today the abbey of St. Germain des Prés in Paris. It is here, rather than at Notre Dame*, that we have the best hope of finding a lingering tradition of Isis’ presence even quite late.

A writer called Jacques le Grant, or Jacques leGrand, writing about the 1400s, recorded this Isis-Paris connection, tracing it to the 8th century CE:

In the days of Charlemagne [8th century] . . . there was a city named Iseos, so named because of the goddess Isis who was venerated there. Now it is called Melun. [Melun is about an hour south of Paris.] Paris owes its name to the same circumstances, Parisius is said to be similar to Iseos, because it is located on the River Seine in the same manner as Melun.

[image error]A French manuscript of the 1400s showing Isis arriving in Paris on Her ship

Le Grant’s reference probably comes from a poem about the siege of Paris by the Normans, written in 886 or 887 CE by a monk named Arbon, who had actually witnessed the siege. In it, Arbon supposedly mentions the veneration of Isis at Melun in his time (!). (I say ‘supposedly’ for I have not seen this poem myself so must withhold judgment.)

In a manuscript from about the same time, now in the French Bibliotheque Nationale, we see Isis, dressed as a Medieval woman, alighting in Paris from a ship with the caption, “The very ancient Isis, Goddess and queen of the Egyptians.” Apparently, as in this manuscript, Isis’ association with ships and sailing—think Isis Pelagia and Isis Pharia—was one of the reasons the French connected Her with Paris; one of the city’s symbols is a boat, due to the boatlike shape of the Isle de la Cité (where the Parisii were centered), in the middle of the Seine, in the heart of Paris.

Whether or not this is true is not the point. The point is that the city’s closeness with Isis is part of its lore.

[image error]The abbey of St. Germain des Prés in Paris

As shown on the map above, some say that a Roman Temple of Isis used to stand in the vicinity of what is today the abbey of St. Germain des Prés. A number of French historians in the 1500s repeated that tradition. And, of course, it was common for churches to be constructed on top of Pagan temples; indeed, it was policy. But I haven’t yet been able to find out whether the St. Germain des Prés tradition is based on archeology or simply on historical references. If you have an archeological source, please tip me off.

However, in texts, we do have an “Issy” associated with the site of the St. Germain complex. Sometime in the 500s, Childebert I, the Frankish king of Paris, gave his estate, Issy, to found a monastery on the site that would eventually become St. Germain des Prés. Scholars think the name “Issy” comes from Medieval Latin Isciacum, probably meaning “estate of Isicius,” a Gallo-Roman landowner. Isicius was most certainly named for the Goddess.

[image error]A Roman Isis and Harpocrates. Very Madonna and Child, no?

Is this perhaps the Isis Who stands behind the tradition of a Temple of Isis beneath St. Germain? Writing in the early 1600s, Jacques de Breul, a monk actually from St. Germain des Prés, repeated the tradition that the name Issy came from Isis—which it ultimately did if the Isiacum conjecture is correct—but it doesn’t necessarily confirm the existence of a temple on the spot.

Another St. Germain “Isis sighting” I’m trying to track down is the story that, in 1514, the Archbishop of St. Germain des Prés had a statue—which looked for all the world like the Christian Madonna and Child—removed from the abbey and destroyed. What did that Archbishop think he knew? I’ve ordered a book with the references. I’ll let you know what discover once I check it out.

[image error]

Isis had Her place in the French Revolution as well. As part of the celebrations commemorating the anniversary of the Revolution, in 1893, the Parisians built a huge image of Isis, symbolizing Nature and Regeneration, in the form of a fountain with water pouring from Her breasts. Both politicians and populace came to drink of the water of the Goddess and be renewed. The fountain was—quel dommage!—only temporary. As it was made of paper maché, it no longer exists.

[image error]The Parisian ship with enthroned Isis on the prow from Napoleon’s 1811 Paris Coat of Arms

The demise of the Revolution did not mean the end of Isis’ French connection. It remained so prevalent that Napoleon—who had developed a severe case of Egyptomania following his Egyptian expedition in 1799—had it checked out by his own scholar. Apparently he was sufficiently convinced that he had a Parisian Coat of Arms designed that included an enthroned Isis on the prow of the “Ship of Paris,” which was shown following the Goddess’ sacred star.

(Much of this has been collected by Robert Bauval and Graham Hancock in their book, Talisman. It’s an older publication, but I just ordered a copy. I suspect I may reach different conclusions than the authors did, but I do appreciate the work they did in collecting the pieces of the tradition and I will definitely be following up on the references.)

Isis is also to be found deeply embedded in the occult traditions of Paris, but that’s a topic too big to get into in one post. Here are links to some Isis connections from the early 20th century with two of my favorite occultists: MacGregor and Moina Mathers.

[image error]Dali with his work, called both “Aphrodisiac Telephone” and “Lobster Telephone”…no doubt Nerval’s lobster inspired the Surrealist artist

Yet for now, let’s turn our attention toward the Arts of the period, for She is very much found there as well.

There we meet Gérard de Nerval, French Romantic poet, Symbolist hero, and proto-Surrealist, and a person who did much thinking on the Divine Feminine.

As was so often true —especially for the artists, writers, and occultists who were clearly sharing ideas during this period—for Nerval, one of the most important forms the Divine Feminine takes is Isis. Nerval is a mad poet; literally. He seemed to have suffered from depression and probably schizophrenia. He believed that dreams were the true reality, which is why he was so inspired the Surrealists, but sometimes he had trouble sorting out dream from waking state. He also had some charming and well-known quirks. For instance, he kept a pet lobster, which he took for walks in the park leading it by a blue, satin ribbon, and declaring it a better pet than a dog for it never barked and knew the secrets of the deeps.

[image error]You can still get it…

Nerval wrote poems and prose, including a piece called “Isis” (1845). It appears in a collection of short prose entitled Les Filles du Feu, the “Girls of Fire.” Isis is the only Goddess among the fiery girls, though Nerval wrote poems about other Pagan Goddesses and Gods as well. “Isis” is more journalistic than poetic. Nerval writes about a party held by an ambassador in Naples. It was a costumed ball in which the life of ancient Pompeii was evoked, including the sunset rites at the Temple of Isis, which Nerval found to be the most inspiring events of the evening.

Nerval describes the temple and the “secret” rites held therein, all the while comparing them and Isis with Christian rites and Mary. This discussion then serves as a launching pad for Nerval to write about Apuleius’ tale of initiation into the Mysteries of Isis. You can feel his yearning as he describes the yearning of Lucius for Isis.

Indeed Nerval spent most of his life longing for feminine love, both human and Divine. Eventually, he could no longer function in the world, his mental illness incapacitating him. He committed suicide just ten years after he wrote “Isis”.

Sometimes we might wonder how it is that Isis, unlike so many of our ancient Goddesses, was never forgotten. From the time She was first recognized in ancient Egypt to now, Isis has never been completely out of human consciousness. Anytime we start pulling on an Isis thread—lore about ancient Isis temples in Paris or Fiery Girls Who take up residence in a mad poet’s dreams—we keep on discovering Her. For me, these discoveries, while always delightful, are no longer surprising. She is always there because She has always been there. She could not be forgotten because She is.

[image error]The Pilier des Nautes found beneath Notre Dame

*Notre Dame is not the site of an ancient temple of Isis. There is a crypt beneath the Notre Dame plaza that you can go into and see the archeological remains, all the way back to the Roman ones. For a long time, people thought that there may have been a Jupiter temple there due to the discovery of a large Roman column dedicated to Jupiter by the guild of boatmen in the 1st century AD. It has both Roman and Celtic Deities on it and is the oldest monument in Paris. Today, scholars have evidence to think that the pillar was moved from the Left Bank to the Isle de la Cité…so the question of whether the island was home to any Pagan temple remains unanswered.

The Blood of Isis

[image error] The Blood of Isis amulet, with the name of the deceased

The ancient Egyptian amulet of the Tiet (also Tyet or Tet) is also known as the Girdle of Isis, the Buckle of Isis, the Knot of Isis, or the Blood of Isis. Appropriately, the amulet was often made of blood-red jasper, carnelian, or even red glass. (Red glass, by the way, is a precious material and quite difficult to make; the red color comes from the addition of gold to the molten glass.)

When paired with the Djed of Osiris, the Tiet can be seen as the feminine symbol of the Goddess’ womb just as the Djed can be seen as the masculine symbol of the God’s phallus.

The redness of the Tiet may represent the red lifeblood a mother sheds while giving birth. On the other hand, it might represent menstrual blood. Some say the amulet is shaped like the cloth worn by women during menstruation. Others have interpreted it as a representation of a ritual tampon that could be inserted in the vagina to prevent miscarriage. In this case, it would have been the amulet Isis used to protect Horus while He was still within Her womb. For a whole post on the Knot of Isis, click here.

The Goddess’ blood that is our topic today is the red blood of menstruation, in Egyptian hesmen. A menstruating woman is a hesmenet. If the interpretation of the Knot of Isis as a menstrual cloth or tampon is correct, we may be well within our rights to consider Isis as the patroness of women during their monthly menstruation as well as a special patroness of women during the fertile period of their lives, this is, while they are still menstruating regularly.

[image error] Women and girls preparing for a banquet from the Tomb of Rekhmire

A young woman’s first menstruation is a sign that she is now mature enough to become pregnant, thus the ancient Egyptians considered menstrual blood to be very potent. One of the methods a woman might use to encourage her own pregnancy was to rub menstrual blood on her thighs. The Ebers papyrus notes that the blood of a young woman whose menses have just come could be rubbed on the breasts, belly, and thighs of a woman whose breasts were too full of milk, “then the flow cannot be to her disadvantage.” Menstrual blood might also be used to anoint infants to protect them from evil. Could it be that the Tiet amulet was developed as a more convenient way to protect children, and by extension adults, from harm through the menstrual Blood of Isis?

We have very little from ancient Egypt about women’s menstrual customs. There is one precious mention on an ostracon (piece of pottery used as a writing surface) that scholars believe originated in Deir el-Medina, the workers’ village outside the Valley of the Kings. It says,

Year 9, fourth month of inundation, day 13. Day that the eight women came outside [to the] place of women, when they were menstruating. They got as far as the back of the house which […long gap…] the three walls …

[image error] The Tiet and the Djed, symbols of Isis and Osiris

From this reference, scholars infer that ancient Egyptian women, like many women throughout the ancient world (as well as some in the modern world) separated themselves from the rest of the village during their menstrual periods and went to “the place of women.” What’s more, at least eight women from this village were on the same cycle. But I wonder why this common, monthly event was significant enough for someone to write it down? As far as I can tell, no one has a guess.

None of the “places of women” have been found for certain, though there are several small structures on the outskirts of Deir el-Medina that could possibly fit the bill. Interestingly, at Deir el-Medina, the menstruation of wives or daughters is sometimes given as a reason for the man’s absence from work. The weird thing about this is that, if a man could be absent every time a wife or daughter had her period, he’d be absent at least two extra days per month…and we don’t find that many absences recorded. This has led some researchers to suggest that only in exceptional cases, for example if the woman was incapacitated by her period, could the man be absent to take care of the regular household chores.

[image error] Model of a home at Deir el-Medina; looks pretty pleasant

The other reference to a place of menstruation comes from much later—in the Ptolemaic period—when we find a reference to a “place beneath the stairs,” actually within the home, as the place of menstruation. This room must have been reasonably common for we find reference to it in a number of documents related to the sale or purchase of a home. I am imagining some ancient realtor noting the lovely little “place beneath the stairs” as a selling feature of the house. (It should be noted that a woman was the seller in at least one of these real estate transactions and in another, a woman was the buyer; more evidence of women’s relatively high status in Egypt.)

In a house in Amarna, in just such a place beneath the stairs, archeologists found two model beds made of clay, parts of two female figurines, and a stela depicting a woman wearing a cone on her head while leading a young girl before the Goddess Taweret. That all seems pretty clear to me; this is where women go to menstruate and where they celebrate the coming of age of young women, who are being introduced to Taweret, the hippopotamus-form Goddess of pregnancy and childbirth.

[image error] Egyptian woman and man taking food & drink from the Tree Goddess  in the Otherworld

These special places for menstruating women seem to indicate a taboo around menstruation; the women absented themselves from the village or stayed in a special room. We also have lists of bwt, prohibitions or “evil”, in the 42 Egyptian nomes and some of them include menstruation and menstruating women—along with things like a black bull, a heart, and a head. We’re not sure in what way any of these things were to be prohibited; perhaps by keeping them out of the nome? At any rate, menstruation in these cases was seen as something negative.

There does not seem to have been a notion of actual pollution around menstruation or menstruating women, however. Contact with a menstruating woman was not dangerous to a man, even though she was bwt in some nomes. In fact, some scholars think it was the menstruating woman who needed protection during her period. Thus, in the case of the absent workers of Deir el-Medina, the workers stayed away from the death-touched tombs in which they were working in order to protect their menstruating female relatives. Conversely, the Egyptians may have wanted to prevent the non-pregnancy/fertility of a menstruating woman from touching the cosmic womb of the royal tomb through her male relative, and thus rendering it magically ineffective.

[image error] May the Blood of Isis protect you

Interestingly, it may be that menstruation was also associated with cleansing. Hesmen is not only the word for “menstruation,” but is also found with the meaning “purification.” It was also a term for the ritual cleanser par excellence, natron.

From the evidence, menstruation in ancient Egypt had both positive and negative connotations. On the one hand, it was a sign that a woman could become pregnant—something most women desired—and it was used as a potent protection or cure. On the other hand, if one was menstruating, one was clearly not pregnant at the time, so menstruation might be incompatible with work on the magical womb of the tomb, which must be kept fertile at all times.

I think many women would agree with this ambivalent attitude toward their periods. Having a period is at once a beautiful confirmation of connection with the cycles of Nature and the Great Goddess, and it can be a painful and messy time, too. In whatever way we are currently experiencing those cycles, we can be sure that the protection, as well as the shared female experience, of the Holy Blood of Isis is with us. I don’t know about you, but I think I may put on my Tiet amulet today.