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God was female for the first 200,000


GoddessWhispers

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God was female for the first 200,000 years of human life on Earth

linked-image Wiccas are amongst the wise ones who participate in the work of creation in order to nourish the people and protect the EARTH. Magic belongs to no one culture, society or tribe -- it is a part in every culture. Whether they were called Wiccas, shaman, priests, priestesses, sages, medicine people, or mystics they knew how to heal the sick, summon the herds, grow crops, assist at births, track the influences of the stars and planets, build the temples and sacred mounds, they knew the secrets of the earth the powers of the moon, and the longings of the human heart. They created language, writing, metallurgy, agriculture, and the arts. Their rituals and ceremonies, their spells and incantations, their prayers and sacrifices were expressions of their oneness with the source of all life, the Great Mother of all living things.

If you study Akkadian, Assyrian and Sumerian ancient history you will discover that most of the stories in the Bible come from far more ancient stories. Ancient cuniforms have been found to prove this. The Bible is a recounting of these stories. Wiccas have always been able to interpret omens. Long before written word the wise ones were master storytellers. They knew all the ancient myths and they passed the word down from generation to generation. Many truths come from a subconscious level. Wiccas have always believed all things are filled with gods and goddesses. The Druidic leaders of the Celts stood as shining models for the Wiccas. A Wiccas knowledge is ancient, as is her worldview. The craft has always thrived both in the past and in highly developed cultures. In ancient Egypt nothing was decided until a sooth sayer was consulted. Numerous presidents of the United States had their own personal astrologists. There is no where one can go and not see the influence of the craft. linked-image

Wiccas have never forgotten the basic truth about creation. The Earth and all living things share the same life force and are composed of Divine Intelligence. All life is a web of interconnected beings, and we are woven into it as sisters and brothers of the All. Wiccas believe the ageless wisdom of the soul will survive. For we are the embodiment of the gods and the goddesses... again we go back to the Genesis story: We created man in our image and our likeness.

The craft deals with natural rhythms. As women are biologically more engaged than men, it makes more sense that the Goddess would be the creator of life, more so than the God; however, his fertilization was indeed needed, of course. The ancient tablets tell of a creation story that challenges every major religion: When the Gods came to earth, and every ancient civilization speaks of this, man was still pretty much an ape. The Gods decided to create man and woman in their image and likeness. The Gods and Goddess, this is on Sumerian tablets, decided to genetically produce a race more like themselves. They took the egg of the apewoman, fertilized it with a male God and a surrogate Goddess carried the child to term and called his name Adam....sound familiar?

Deeper inner knowledge from the unconscious cannot always be expressed in words, it often requires poetry, song or ritual. Guarded in the centre of your being is the secret of who you are and how you personally connect to the rest of the universe. To a Wicca life's mysteries have created great wonder and worship came from understanding and from that understanding came meaning. All religion is about creation, not simply the tales and legends but of how a creator or creators brought forth the universe. Therefore religion is about creation and for that reason religion should be about the earth. The pagans believed that biological processes are spiritual processes and there is divine meaning in every natural event.

To our ancient ancestors, the great mysteries of life were the mysteries of transformation: how things turn into other things, how things grow, die, and are reborn. Nowhere are these events more personal than the transformation of a woman. The ability to conceive a new life, give birth, produce milk, and bleed with the phases of the moon. These cycles did not go unnoticed by early man that woman and nature shared the great role of motherhood. Men were awestruck... no wonder they took so much from us, including our lives, when they felt threatened.

Venus figurines dating back to 35,000 BCE have been found depicting the Great Mother. Oddly, there are no male depictions dating back that far. To ancient man, woman was the source of life. God was female for at least the first 200,000 years of human life on earth! The Old Religion was a religion of ecstasy. Archaeological evidence of primal religious experiences show in cave drawings: women with awestruck eyes dancing with wild animals, flying with birds and sharing the watery realms with the fishes. Religion should be ecstatic, dancing, drumming, chanting reenacting primal creation stories. Followers of the Old Religion believe the universe was created in ecstasy out of the body and mind of the Great Mother of all living things. Around the world stories recount the many ways that humans have perceived the original birth of the Earth, sky, plants, animals and humans, but they all recount how the Great Mother created the world.

Hebrew legends tell of the all powerful Yahweh was originally the Goddess Iahu-'Anat, a Sumerian Goddess. Actually the word God is a plural noun translated as creative nature spirits. Around the world the Great Goddess is referred to as the Great Moon Goddess. She is the great female trinity of the Maiden, Mother, and Crone. A Wicca's spells and rituals are always performed in conjunction with the phases of the moon. We discover the special powers and mysteries of the moon and the unique wisdom it teaches us about the Divine Mother of the universe.

In mythologies and sacred literature written around 2500 to 1500 BCE, there is a noticeable change in sensibilities. The strong Goddess who dominated thought and feeling for several thousand years was slowly replaced by the powerful male Sky Gods. The Son/Hunter/Lover who as a child and consort to the Great Mother always had a subordinate position now became the primary deity. Sky Gods reining with the power of the sun challenge the older Goddesses of earth and moon. The Goddesses became villains and many old tales were rewritten. Among the revisions was the Old Assyrian story of Adam and Eve. It was rewritten so that Eve is born of Adam's rib -- rather than the reverse, as it appeared in the older versions. In Mesopotamian legend, Eve creates a male, Adam, and makes him her mate, following the usual Goddess/Son myth.

A point of great interest here is that the Gods and Goddesses had sexual relations within their family members to keep their genes pure. Mothers with sons and brothers, fathers with daughters and even with sisters and granddaughters. It is quite interesting.

In a Gnostic text, Eve is the Mother of All Living and actually creates Jehovah. One of Christianity's best-kept secrets says the Mother of All Living was the Creatress who chastised God. Jehovah is formed by the four Hebrew letters Yod-He-vau-He. The first Yod means I and the next three, He-Vau-He means both life and woman. In other words the name of Jehovah is feminine and it means: I am woman; I am life.

As the mythologies drifted further and further away from the original religious view of the Great Goddess, the dualism that has come to dominate so much of Western thinking grew stronger and stronger. Life was seen primarily as a struggle between the forces of good and evil, rather than a dynamic dance of all things working together for the Good. Life on earth became less important than the life to come. The old saying that "Cleanliness is next to Godliness" sums it up pretty well: everything associated with this life, Earth, the body, sex, women became suspect, if not down right evil. Woman was to be rejected as a spiritual leader who reflected the image of the divine Feminine, dirty and impure. Then a curious thing happened to the male Gods: as they consolidated their hold over the human imagination, they lost their animal identities.

God became completely human and completely male. The arrival of monotheistic thinking with it's rigid and inflexible form was the mark of advancing civilization. With the arrival of the Father Gods came the degradation of the earth, woman, the body, sex and the most natural tasks in which earlier people found joy and happiness. Actually the Goddess cultures of the southern more warmer climates were invaded by the Sky Gods or Thunder God cultures of the less hospitable climates from the north.

Survival depended on stockpiling food and resources. They gave way to the warrior classes which simply took what they wanted by force. Curiously this coincides with the smelting of iron around 2500 BCE when the patriarchal technology began to fashion weapons. Matriarchal cultures were relatively peaceful. During these times women and children were amongst the spoils of war, raped and held prisoner. Later in time the status of women and children fell to that of slaves. A woman became subservient to her husband who legally owned her life, she was merely property. Men emerged socially, economically and politically dominate and eventually patriarchal institutions, laws and values reflected the myth of male superiority. Patriarchal societies organized around warfare were based on violent, militaristic values and coincide with written history.

Patriarchy is a rather recent development over the last four thousand years and is still a new experiment when it comes to the hundreds of thousands of years that human beings lived in matriarchal societies. It is certainly a mere drop in the bucket when compared to the 3.5 billion years that other forms of life have existed on the planet known as Earth. With the dawn of the New Age, women are regaining their lost stature. The earth and its creatures are in deep peril because we have lost touch with the old ways which were built around worship of the life on earth. If we are to have any hope, we must set our paths in new directions. We must incorporate the old with the new. For only through knowledge can we make the necessary changes. Each and every one of us can make a change like the ripples in a pond. Nothing goes unnoticed and nothing is forgotten. Today is the first day of the rest of your life. Take hold of that, respect all life in its great diversity and remember that the Earth is not inherited from our ancestors, but borrowed from our children.

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Well.. yeah. Goddess worship was one of first deity worship once humans began to cultivate the earth. While Animism delt with the spirit of things and of nature, when humans realized the Earth was feminen spirit, She became the Goddess. (And in actuality, Earth is named after a pagan German Goddess Ertha, sometimes seen Hertha)

Women were held in high honour at that time... But then the men realized they could treat women as property and that's when you start to see the masculine gods becoming the heads of pantheons... and even the isrealite gods being shuffled off and the war god remains to be moulded into what people think he is now.

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It makes sense doesn't it, that all life should come from a goddess rather than a god. But can you imagine men waging wars in the name of a loving mother goddess? Nope. You need a beefy big male god who's vengeful and prone to smiting people. :rolleyes:

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Which is what.. according to the Torah... what the monotheists have today. Only they want to hope and pray that he's a loving god... Thus the compationate spin when the New Testiment was added to make the Bible.

And I see Mugen.. so he can probaly tell us abit more about how the Koran makes this god out to be. =)

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THERE IS NO GOD! ......but if there is she was female for the fist 200,000 years!.....oye you ARE just like my X :D

also from your own link GW.....

Wiccas have always believed all things are filled with gods and goddesses.

I be Wicca illiterate as well........B

Edited by Barek Halfhand
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We have know way knowing for sure if the first God was female or not until we had writing. The Willendorf Goddess could be anything form a toy to a joke or a cute decor. It might be a Goddess or it might not and we can't go back and ask the maker.

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There are huge resources available that record the first cultures were female oriented, and goddess was the power of all creation. Sadly, I doubt there's that many people that would know this if they weren't somehow compelled to search on their own. Everything, it seems, is relegated to the ideology of a male dominated world now and in the ancient times. From the god of the monotheist faiths, to the history that predominates the text books our children read today. But, as we can read, in the beginning god was a woman and communities were matriarchal. I love that. :wub:

You know how they say those that don't learn from history are condemned to repeat it!? Well, in this instance I think if women don't remember their history we're condemned to feel dis-empowered by the Patriarchy that usurped the female powers, on Earth and in the heavens, and remain imprisoned by the lie of father gods and male dominated politics. Not that those two factions haven't made a much better world for us all, after they relegated feminine energy to be the subservient class. :rolleyes:

:) For you Silver C. Goddess Culture in Early Celtic Literature

The Guiding Feminine:

Goddesses of Ancient Egypt ~ Neith: Ancient Goddess of the Beginning, the Beyond, and the End

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no she was ignorent of the chamber of marrige for the first 200,000,000 years and that marrige was with the father our god because the prior 50,000,000 to that there was some sort of harmonie but i'm shore there was a spat along the way.

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There are huge resources available that record the first cultures were female oriented, and goddess was the power of all creation. Sadly, I doubt there's that many people that would know this if they weren't somehow compelled to search on their own. Everything, it seems, is relegated to the ideology of a male dominated world now and in the ancient times. From the god of the monotheist faiths, to the history that predominates the text books our children read today. But, as we can read, in the beginning god was a woman and communities were matriarchal. I love that. :wub:

You know how they say those that don't learn from history are condemned to repeat it!? Well, in this instance I think if women don't remember their history we're condemned to feel dis-empowered by the Patriarchy that usurped the female powers, on Earth and in the heavens, and remain imprisoned by the lie of father gods and male dominated politics. Not that those two factions haven't made a much better world for us all, after they relegated feminine energy to be the subservient class. :rolleyes:

:) For you Silver C. Goddess Culture in Early Celtic Literature

<a href="http://www.geocities.com/skhmt_netjert/neith.html" target="_blank">The Guiding Feminine:

Goddesses of Ancient Egypt ~ Neith: Ancient Goddess of the Beginning, the Beyond, and the End</a>

But all those references pertain to writing which did come along until maybe 5000 years ago. Until then we don't really know what they were thinking. We assume, but we can't know for sure. They may have worship a Goddess or they may have worshiped a dear. 200,000 years ago, we may have been into a fire god.

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So is this post an objection to patriarchy and a desire to turn to matriarchy? Though I must say that's kind of a cool historical thing to know, but I see it as kind of obvious. People saw that women give birth to children: women were and are the source of human life! And how awesome is that. Of course, when men finally wisened up to the fact that they could dominate women and women could do little about it, things changed. And even still... how is matriarchy that much different from patriarchy? Instead of males being dominant, females are dominant, so the only difference is who would be discriminated against - unless you're proposing that the ancient cultures valued men and women exactly the same. Either way, cool article.

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And yet DW, there aren't any ancient Neolithic figurines of fire gods, yet found. However there are figurines of the Willendorf goddess, as you mentioned, that dates back to 24,000-22,000 BCE. There's the sitting mother goddess of Catal Hoyuk (Goddess of the Beasts that later transformed into Artemis) that dates back to the 6th century B.C. The Neolithic Snake goddess of Crete dates to 6000 B.C.E.

And then we have the Goddess figurines from Tell Halaf (todays Syria) in what was then ancient Mesopotamian region. Discovered in 1899 by the German Engineer Baron Max von Oppenheim, they've undergone Xrays and extensive study and have been dated to 5000 B.C.E.

So, while there aren't writings from 200 thousand years ago, there are figurines and they are predominantly that of the female form. Pendulous breasts, swollen stomach, indicating the pregnancy stage of woman. Something that the ancient peoples would surely have marveled at, to say the least. And this indicates, as do numerous other discoveries of implements, cultural identities, etc... that the ancient tribes revered woman as goddess, or she that brought forth life and nourished it from herself. And also, the matriarchal cultures, which when discovered, were absent one noticeable thing that was not omitted in the finds of ancient patriarchal cultures. Weapons!

Leading researchers to surmise that the warrior tribes of ancient times that were patriarchal (male rule), worshiped male gods that embodied/represented that offensive visage. But the matriarchal cultures were agrarian and honored the sacred feminine, without the implements of war, as they predated the patriarchy.

Goddess worship in ancient times:

Most researchers currently accept the belief that modern humans originated in Africa about 200,000 to 250,000 years ago. Until about 8000 BCE, our ancestors organized themselves into hunter-gatherer societies. Humans alone had developed the realization that their life was finite; that they would all die. This resulted in the development of the primitive religious beliefs. Societies which relied mainly on hunting by men naturally developed hunting gods to worship. Those in which gathering was more reliable generally created vegetative Goddesses. The importance of fertility in crops, in domesticated animals, in wild animals and in the tribe itself were of paramount importance to their survival. The female life-giving principle was considered divine and a great mystery. Some Goddess statues still survive from this era. One web site contains photographs of Goddess statues from circa 30,000 BCE to 1987 CE. 1

It is important to realize that many of these findings by archaeologists and historians are speculative in nature. For example, the interpretation that the old European culture stressed the female as divine is largely based on the number of carvings of a female shape found from this era. Some point to the relative lack of equivalent male statues as evidence of a Goddess culture. Others suggest that the female statues might have been the old European culture's equivalent of modern-day erotic photographs.

This "old European" culture lasted for tens of thousands of years in what is now Europe. They generally lived in peace; there is a notable lack of defensive fortifications around their hamlets. As evidenced by their funeral customs, males and females appear to have had equal status. Many historians and archaeologists believe that:

Their society was matrilineal; children took their mothers' names.

Life was based on lunar (not solar) calendar.

Time was experienced as a repetitive cycle, not linearly as we think of it.

Many academics believe that the suppression of Goddess worship in Western Europe occurred a few thousand years BCE, when the Indo-Europeans invaded Europe from the East. They brought with them some of the "refinements" of modern civilization: the horse, war, belief in male Gods, exploitation of nature, knowledge of the male role in procreation, etc. Goddess worship was gradually combined with worship of male Gods to produce a variety of Pagan polytheistic religions, among the Greeks, Romans, Celts, etc. Author Leonard Shlain offers a fascinating alternative explanation. He proposed that the invention of writing

"... rewired the human brain, with profound consequences for culture. Making remarkable connections across a wide range of subjects including brain function, anthropology, history, and religion, Shlain argues that literacy reinforced the brain's linear, abstract, predominantly masculine left hemisphere at the expense of the holistic, iconic feminine right one. This shift upset the balance between men and women initiating the disappearance of goddesses, the abhorrence of images, and, in literacy's early stages, the decline of women's political status. Patriarchy and misogyny followed."

Goddess Worship during Biblical times:

Further south, as Judaism, Christianity & eventually Islam evolved, the Pagan religions were suppressed and the female principle was gradually driven out of religion. Women were considered inferior to men. The God, King, Priest & Father replaced the Goddess, Queen, Priestess & Mother. The role of women became restricted. A woman's testimony was not considered significant in Jewish courts; women were not allowed to speak in Christian churches; positions of authority in the church were limited to men. Young women are often portrayed in the Bible as possessions of their fathers. After marriage, their ownership was transferred to their husbands. Yeshua of Nazareth (a.k.a. Jesus Christ) rejected millennia of religious tradition by treating women as equals. Women played a major role in the early Christian church. Later, epistle (letter) writers who wrote in the name of Paul, started the process of suppressing women once more.

A feminine presence was added to Christianity by the Council of Ephesus in 431 CE when the Virgin Mary was named Theotokos (Mother of God). But her role was heavily restricted and included none of the fertility component present in Pagan religions. A low point in the fortunes of women was reached during the very late Middle Ages, when many tens of thousands of suspected female witches (and a smaller proportion of males) were exterminated by burning and hanging over a three century interval. Today, respect for the Virgin Mary as a sexually "pure," submissive mother is widespread, particularly in Roman Catholicism.

odern Goddess Worship:

A renaissance of Paganism, with its worship of Goddesses and Gods occurred in the middle of the 20th century with the re-emergence of Wicca (popularly called White Witchcraft, the benign religion of the ancient Celts) and other Neopagan traditions. Author Leonard Shlain believes that an "Iconic Revolution" has been made possible by the invention of imaged-based technologies, such as photography, movies, television, the Internet and graphic advertising. "Shlain foresees that increasing reliance on right brain pattern recognition instead of left brain linear sequence will move culture toward equilibrium between the two hemispheres, between masculine and feminine, between word and image." 1

Most Neopagan traditions worship the Goddess and God in balance. However, with the rise of feminism, new Neopagan traditions Wicca have been created in which the Goddess grew in importance, and the role of the God shrank into obscurity. One such tradition is Dianic Wicca.

The Goddess in both Goddess Worship and Neo-Paganism is often visualized in three aspects: Maiden, Mother and Crone. Her aspects are mirrored in the phases of the moon: waxing, full and waning.

The Maiden represents youth, emerging sexuality, the huntress running with her hounds. The Mother symbolizes feminine power, fertility, and nurturing. The Crone is wisdom, the compassion which comes from experience, and the one who guides us through the death experience.

Goddesses have been called by many names by different cultures and ages: Anat, Aphrodite, Aradia, Arianrhod, Artemis, Astarte, Brighid, Ceres, Demeter, Diana, Eostre, Freya, Gaia, Hera, Ishtar, Isis, Juno, Kali, Lilith, Ma'at, Mary, Minerva, Ostare, Persephone, Venus, Vesta, etc. (Source)

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And even still... how is matriarchy that much different from patriarchy? Instead of males being dominant, females are dominant, so the only difference is who would be discriminated against.

I suppose that depends on how women were seen by men. Men dominate now whether women like it or not, but that's not to say that way back in the days of goddesses that women dominated whether men liked it or not. In general females are thought to be more prone to peaceful behaviour and less likely to wage war (I'm not counting Amazons and Margaret Thatcher here). If women were revered then that's quite a different thing... if they were admired and raised up in the minds of men then that's not the same as a society where men say "do as you're told woman or I'll bash you with a big stick".

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excellent post. not to mention the early leaders of the christian church were women and so might there have even been a pope - pope joan.

http://www.usnews.com/usnews/doubleissue/mysteries/pope.htm

of course the church calls it a fable and fails to mention the bishops that were female.

Examples of Female Christian Leaders from the Archaeological Record

Author Karen Jo Torjensen cites: 6

An ancient mosaic which shows four female figures. One is identified as Bishop Theodora. The feminine form for bishop (episcopa) is used.

A 3rd or 4th century burial site on the Greek island of Thera contains an epitaph referring to Epiktas, a "presbytis" (priest or presbyter). Epiktas is a woman's name.

A 2nd or 3rd century Christian inscription in Egypt for Artemidoras, whose mother is described as "Paniskianes, being an elder" (presbytera)

A memorial from the 3rd century for Ammion the elder (presbytera)

A 4th or 5th century Sicilian inscription referring to Kale the elder. (presbytis)

and

Prohibition of Women from Positions of Power by the Early Church

During the 4th and 5th century, the Christian church gradually extinguished women's access to positions of power in the church:

Council of Laodicea (352 CE): Women were forbidden from the priesthood. They also were prohibited from presiding over churches. They decided that "One ought not to establish in the church the women called overseers (presbutidas)....women must not approach the altar."

Fourth Synod of Carthage (398 CE) "A woman, however learned and holy, may not presume to teach men in an assembly...A woman may not baptize."

Council of Chalcedon (451 CE). Canon #15 of the Council states: 7 "No woman under 40 years of age is to be ordained a deacon, and then only after close scrutiny." Apparently, the council wanted to start restricting the ordination of deaconesses, which must have been a common practice at the time. And, of course, anyone ordained to the Holy Order of Deacon would be eligible for later ordination to the priesthood as well. 8

men(not all) can't handle equality. it scares them. ? or do the inately hate women? or do they need to have power over something or someone in order to feel like men?

Edited by Lt_Ripley
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That is not going back 200,000 years and do we really know the statue is a Goddess. Might go on a Wedding cake. Might have been porn kind of like a ancient Playboy.

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:) Further links for your reading pleasure. Pre-Historic Goddesses

linked-image

3600 BC Ggantija Temples on GOZO

millennium before the pyRamids or stonehenge

^The Ggantija Temples are thought to be the oldest free-standing structures in the world. They are among the best-preserved temples on the Maltese Islands, and are certainly the most visited historical site on the Maltese Islands.

The complex comprises two Neolithic temples dating from the third millennium BCE (3600 to 3000 BCE), and are situated on the northern side of the hilly plateau known as ix-Xaghra in Gozo. The temples are made up of two separate units enclosed by a wall and sharing a common facade. Some Goddess tours refer to them as the the Mother & Daughter Temple.

The ruins had been noted since 1772 and the remains were 'cleared' (not excavated) in 1827 under Colonel Otto Bayer. A small amount of pottery, vases and statuettes are now displayed in the archaeology museums in Victoria and Valletta.

Two years later, in 1829, a German artist by the name of Von Brockdorff painted a series of watercolors of the temple area. These pictures are very important as they show stones and reliefs that have since been destroyed.

All the Maltese temples were built without the benefit of metal tools, or the wheel. They are comprised of a mixture of coralline and globigerina limestone. The temples have a concave facade, with a platform outside for the worshippers. They laid large stones and then covered it with crushed earth (torba).

The south temple contains five apses and a middle passageway leading to the innermost trefoil section. It is the older of the two (dating as far back as 3600 BCE), as well as being the larger and better preserved. It contained elaborate furniture, and a variety of important features such as altars, relief carvings and libation holes. Some suggest the left apse in the second pair capstones might refer to a triple divinity or simply the intuitively understood fundamental known as the cycle of life; that is, life, death rebirth.

The outer wall of limestone encircles both temples, rising to a height of 6 meters. Some blocks weight 50 tons and are among the largest used anywhere on Malta for temple building. The plan of the southern temple incorporates five large apsidal chambers, with the inner one to the left being the most striking for its area and height - 85 square meters within 6 meter high walls. These walls are slightly inclined inwards as if intended to form a vaulted roof. The rough walling of the temple interior was originally smoothed by an application of clay and coated with a thin layer of lime plaster.

The Temple People disappeared abruptly and without a trace, around c. 2300 BCE, (give or take a few centuries) leaving future generations to speculate and hope

for additional discoveries to shed light and understanding on

this veiled period of our past.

The north temple is considerably smaller, but with a more evolved plan in which the rear apse is replaced by a shallow niche.

Local legend says that a great giantess Sansuna, who lived on a diet of broad beans and water, constructed one of the temples in a single day carrying the megaliths on her head as she carried her baby under her arm.

After the disappearance of the temple people, the islands were repopulated by an entirely different race.

"The construction of these buildings demonstrate a mastery of quarrying, stone working, building and engraving techniques and must be the work of a mature, confident culture. Like stone circles in the British Isles some appear to be concerned with the passage of the seasons as indicated by the position of the Sun. " Archaeology and Prehistory of Malta

Source: Goddess History ~ The Scholarship of the Ancient Mother via/ Marija Gimbutas (1921-1994)

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We are still not going back 200,000 years and we are still assuming that the pictures on the walls are Goddesses give birth. They might be from a sex education class.

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If the theory of a proto-indo-european civilization is true, then there was a sky-father ("Dyeus") to go with the earth-mother, and this would be pretty old. Though maybe they didn't build many statues to him.

They've found ancient bipedal humanoid footprints in europe, those date from 385-325 thousand years ago. They aren't calling it modern man, but I wonder if pre-homo-sapiens had faith or religion?

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/20...irsttracks.html

There's also a 1.8 million year old humanoid jaw they found in Africa, along with stone tools and signs of hunting. Who did these pre-sapiens believe in before the goddess arrived 200k years ago?

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/20...olduvaijaw.html

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I think, for the sake of clarity in this discussion, we should understand the Paleolithic and Neolithic time tables, with respect to the discoveries of the ancient feminine.

Periods:

Stone Age--lithic (stone), paleo (upper), meso (middle), and neo (new)

Upper Paleolithic Period (35,000-10,000 B.C.)

Mesolithic Period in Europe (7,000-4,000 B.C.)

Neolithic Period in Europe (4,000-1,500 B.C.)

Neolithic Period in Near East (6,000-3,500 B.C.

The Paleolithic era refers to the "old stone age," the entire time period during which human beings were making tools of stone, art begins at approximately 35,000 bce a time at which human beings seem to have circled the globe. The time frame for "Paleolithic art" can be described from 35,000 bce to approximately 12,000 bce when people lived in hunter-gatherer nomadic tribes and prior to the development of agriculture.

linked-image

This is popularly known as "The Venus of Laussel. A 17inch (43cm) tall cave etching discovered in the Dordogne not far from Lascaux in France, and dating to circa 20,000 bce.-18,000 bce. (Upper Paleolithic era) It was Discovered in 1911 by J. G. Lalanne on the wall of a limestone rock shelter named "Laussel". Hence the name "Venus of Laussel". In her right hand she holds what appears to be a horn, with 13 cuts in it's surface. Researchers believe these depict the 13 cycles of the moon phase in a year. With her left hand she points to her distended stomach, as if there is a correlation between the Moon cycles and fertility.

Then there's the Venus of Lespugue(France) . Carved from a Mammoth tusk, she is 53/4 tall and dates between 25,000-18,000 BC. ((Aurignacian Period aka / "Upper Paleolithic Period" )) linked-image This is often referred to as "Art of the Ice Age".

The venus reference, for many of these female deific figures, is obvious. But that they are often referred to as "fertility" symbols, or the temples wherein they are found are called, "fertility cult centers", I think is in part to detract from the importance of the discovery of ancient feminine divinity or worship. As if they were solely recognized as sex symbols and thereby are not as important in the history of ancient civilizations artifacts that reference later male imagery.

In ancient Paleolithic cave renderings, it is believed the Bison were used to represent the male aspect.

Furthermore, there is evidence found in numerous ancient caves, of artifacts like drinking vessels, and jewelry in burial pits lined with red ocher, that suggest the ancient people, during the fourth phase of the Pleistocene Ice Age, about 70,000 BC. recognized something in childbirth relative to the origins of life, and so buried their dead in pits lined with the red ocher, as if to imply re-birth. Many of the skeletons discovered were arranged in the fetal position. The grave itself, shaped as if it resembled the portal of childbirth from the mother. (Link< A fascinating read! :) )

I think it's something one could study for a lifetime, from this moment on, and still not have fully read and absorbed the immensity of what is implied with the discovery (as they still continue) of ancient Matriarchal cultures and goddess imagery. It certainly empowers women today, especially in the age where "glass ceilings" still exist, to know that at one time the world was quite different and women were venerated as opposed to today when they still strive for equality on many levels of contemporary 21st century society.

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If the theory of a proto-indo-european civilization is true, then there was a sky-father ("Dyeus") to go with the earth-mother, and this would be pretty old. Though maybe they didn't build many statues to him.

They've found ancient bipedal humanoid footprints in europe, those date from 385-325 thousand years ago. They aren't calling it modern man, but I wonder if pre-homo-sapiens had faith or religion?

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/20...irsttracks.html

There's also a 1.8 million year old humanoid jaw they found in Africa, along with stone tools and signs of hunting. Who did these pre-sapiens believe in before the goddess arrived 200k years ago?

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/20...olduvaijaw.html

Thank you for the article links. :)

Dyeus Pita, was a male god aspect well after that of the Venus of Willendorf , et. al, as discussed in the OP and the subsequent replies thus far. He was a Vedic Deity. Vedic period ranging from 1700–1100 BCE (Dyeus Pita (Pronounced= dowse pee-ta/ aka - "sky father")

Dyaus Pita Hindu The original sky father of Vedic myth. He is the counterpart of the Earth goddess Prthivi. The two were originally one deity known as Dyavaprthivi. He is pictured as a great red bull who bellows thunder, or as a black horse covered in pearls. In this form he is the night sky, with the pearls as stars.

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zup!

first:good thread,

second:I think we, as men,are instictually compelled to worship and protect our "goddssesssses "

that goes back longer than 200,000 years....

cool reading material ....btw.......B

Edited by Barek Halfhand
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a bit more about the Venus of Willendorf -

Images of women, mostly figurines of the same type as the "Venus" of Willendorf, all dating to the Paleolithic period, far outnumber images of men. This has lead to speculation about the place of women in Stone Age society.

Some have argued that these female figures denote the existence during this period of a prominent female deity identified usually as the Earth Mother or the Mother Goddess. On the basis of this assumption, it has been suggested that, unlike today, women played a considerably more important, if not dominant, role in Paleolithic society; that possibly a matriarchy existed and women ruled. *( they did rule on the russian steps later)*

The "Venus" of Willendorf may be a representation at once of the Mother Goddess and a special living woman; one represented in the form or guise of the other, although which came first is impossible to know. Lacking written documentation, such claims are difficult to support or refute.

linked-image

Venus of Willendorf

c. 24,000-22,000 BCE

Oolitic limestone

43/8 inches (11.1 cm) high

(Naturhistorisches Museum, Vienna)

Edited by Lt_Ripley
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According to another article at the National Geographic site, the earliest finds in Australia can be dated to 50k years. There might be enough artifacts to decide whether they worshipped a fertility goddess, though that wasn't mentioned.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/20...4_mungoman.html

The idea behind the proto-indo-european theory isn't that Dyeus originated as a Vedic god, it's that the Vedic pantheon descended from an original PIE culture. And that the PIE culture spawned other descendent languages and gods in their image. Maybe not older than Willendorf, but older than the Vedic 1700 bce and the familiar patriarchal religions.

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Excellent! Thank you Lt_Ripley and Starry-Eyes for adding to this thread. :)

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Here is a time line of man form 200,000. You see 200,000 years ago we weren't homo sapiens, we were homo erectus. We shared the world with Neanderthals. We really didn't get art going until about 40,000 years. What did we worship, will if we could figure out what chimps worship we might have chance to see what is going on our own ancestors heads.

Timeline

I will concede at around 35,000 there is evidence of Goddess worship in Europe.

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