Showing posts with label Asherah. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Asherah. Show all posts

Thursday, December 26, 2024

Asherah Re-visited

"Asherah V", ceramic mosaic, 2024 by Lauren Raine

ASHERAH:  THE ONCE AND FUTURE GODDESS

                                                         By Lauren Raine MFA

“The Divine Feminine aspect of God was deleted from the image of deity. The only place where the concept of the sacred marriage survived was in the mystical Jewish tradition of Kabbalah, known as the “Voice of the Dove.” The Divine Feminine was not only banished from Judaism, but also from Christianity which took its image of God from Judaism. Islam also had a sole male creator god. The end-result of this cosmology was that life on earth was split off from the divine world; nature was split off from spirit.”

 Anne Baring from A Crucial Time of Choice (2020) (1)

Since I was a child I've made images of women who were trees. I'm not sure where it came from, certainly I had not heard of the Tree of Life, or Goddesses associated with trees. I had never heard of Goddesses. But women with roots and leaves became a personal iconography for me. In early drawings friends somehow grew leaves. In later lithographs  there She was.   A 9-foot-long painting I called "Gaia" (1986) for my MFA program showed the Goddess as a Trinity before the barron Tree: I wanted them to confront the viewer with the loss, destruction and disrespect our civilization has wrought on the Tree of Life that sustains us. And there are many other works that show female figures rooted and, importantly for me,  intertwined within the Earth.  

I realize now it was Asherah, the Great Mother, I was seeking. Asherah who was banished from the Judeo-Christian Bible. Banished from what became the religious underpinning of Western civilization as the Patriarchs of Jerusalem created the first monotheistic  religion – which uniquely featured a solitary male deity with no female counterpart. 

Yet it is not easy to eliminate half the human race from sanctity, although the his-story of  Western religion demonstrates a long and continuing effort to do just that, sometimes by erasure or demonization, sometimes by mythic co-option.  It is interesting, for example, to note that the ubiquitous ancient “trinity” of a 3-part Goddess, such as the Greek  Persephone/Demeter/Hecate, a Trinity that represented the cycles of nature as personified within the ancient Great Mother. This Trinity re-occurs, probably as a result of Patriarchal re-assignment, as the masculine Hindu Brahma/Vishnu/Shiva Trinity (Creator/Sustainer/Destroyer) in Hinduism. Certainly, the European Pagan Trinity was absorbed into Christianity, masculinized as the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. 

Climate change has brought, along with globalization and the possibilities of nuclear war, the great evolutionary Crisis of our time. And that, I believe, is why the Great Mother is arising from the depths of humanity's collective unconscious, from shards and archives of the deep past, from the violence and erasures of patriarchy. Her time has come. And the Tree of Asherah, with its inter-woven roots deep in the dark Earth, and its seasonal leaves  and sustaining fruit, is Her perfect metaphor. 


Anthology by Girl God Books becoming available in 2025

Asherah, the ancient Goddess of pre-monotheistic Judaism, has very early origins.  Certainly among the Canaanites and neighboring civilizations, and possibly going back as far as Samaria. Sacred Groves were planted for Her. She was called “the Wife of Yahweh,” the Feminine aspect of God. Ubiquitous  "Asherah poles" (ashirim) mentioned in the Old Testament may have been made of wood, possibly cut from  trees dedicated to Asherah. Asherah poles were apparently household icons meant to invoke prosperity and fertility. (2)

The reforms of King Josiah’s reign in Jerusalem, along with the later reforms of the Prophet Jeremiah, revised and centralized  Judaism to have only God, Yahweh. All other Gods and Goddesses were banned. Asherah was called “the great abomination.”  Thus women became diminished and disempowered, as they were also Biblically blamed for the now monotheistic  God’s wrath. In the Old Testament we read that   Asherah poles were banned,  dedicated groves cut down, and Yahweh now had no wife.

 With the early advent of Gnostic Christianity, Asherah, the feminine face of Deity,  returned in the form of Sophia (which means “Wisdom” in the Greek language). The great Basilica in Istanbul, for example,  was named Hagia Sophia (Holy Sophia – Holy Wisdom). The emblem for Sophia was a dove – a symbol that Christianity retained to this day when it created the Trilogy of Father, Son, and “Holy Ghost.”  Replacing the Divine Feminine (Sophia) with the ambiguous “Holy Ghost”  once again erased Sophia/Asherah from Patriarchal Christian theology. 

"Asherah III" by Lauren Raine 2009

In their 2019 book When God Had a Wife: The Fall and Rise of the Sacred Feminine in the Judeo-Christian Tradition  (3) Authors Lynn Picknett and Clive Prince provide a well-researched, convincing  argument for the catastrophic consequences of the suppression of the Goddess from the great Western religions of Christianity and Judaism, revealing how we have longed for the return of the Sacred Feminine for millennia. As happened before in Jerusalem, the evolving Christian Church rewrote his-story to eliminate the feminine side of deity. 

A whole lot of co-option and re-mything can go on as religions evolve. Especially, it seems,  if theologians are determined to get rid of the Feminine for millennia!  But the Goddess resides in the collective, often unconscious, heart of humanity, and will not ultimately be silenced. For myself,  I would  never have associated the Tree of leaf and root, a vision that has infused my artistic and spiritual vocabulary for more years than I remember,  with an unknown ancient Goddess named  Asherah had I not had a visionary experience years ago.  

I went to see a Reiki practitioner because of some health problems I was experiencing. As she worked with me I entered into a kind of trance, and with my eyes closed I vividly saw a white dove. But it was not a literal kind of bird - it was a sacred emblem such as  one might see in a church. I thought of the "Dove of Sophia" which I had vaguely heard of (Many years later I learned that Sophia  was another name for the earlier Asherah).  Associated with this image of a “Dove Icon” in that visionary moment was, I remembered, also a backdrop of branches and tree roots. 

After our session was over the healer told me she saw a Goddess form present during the healing. She said that she heard what sounded like “Ashara". I didn’t know what that meant at the time, but later I learned it was the name of the Hebrew Goddess. Asherah/Sophia. And I’ve been dedicating myself to Her ever since.

We are living, right now, in a crucial time indeed. The Paradigm that is trying to arise in this time of Evolutionary Crisis is, I believe, two-fold:  the collective “return of the Divine Feminine” to re-ensoul a fragmented humanity, and the urgent need to envision  a sustainable civilization that will have to be founded upon the inter-dependency and spiritual ecology of, well, everything.  

That’s our challenge now, to restore the Tree of Asherah. Roots below, Leaves touching the sky.


Lauren Raine MFA

(This article will be included in  a forthcoming Anthology ASHERAH:  Roots of the Mother Tree by Girl God Books.   Edited by Claire Dorey, Janet Rudolph, Pat Daly and Trista Hendren with a Preface by Miriam Robbins Dexter, Ph.D.  Cover art by Lauren Raine, Scheduled for 2025.)

 Reference: 

(1) Baring, Anne Ph.D. Excerpt from  “A Crucial Time of Choice “,  talk given for Humanity Rising August 11, 2020  www.annebaring.com

(2)  Wikipedia, “Asherah Poles/Asherim”  

*Deuteronomy 16:21 states that YHWH (rendered as "the Lord") hated Asherim rendered as poles: "Do not set up any [wooden] Asherah [pole] beside the altar you build to the Lord your God" or as living trees: "You shall not plant any tree as an Asherah beside the altar of the Lord your God which you shall make"………..King Josiah's reforms in the late 7th century BC included the destruction of many Asherah poles (2 Kings 23:14).  Exodus 34:13 states: "Break down their altars, smash their sacred stones and cut down their Asherim [Asherah poles]." 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asherah_pole

(3) Picknett, Lynn and Prince, Clive,  When God Had a Wife: The Fall and Rise of the Sacred Feminine in the Judeo-Christian Tradition , Paperback – Illustrated, December 10, 2019, Bear and Company publishers

Wednesday, September 13, 2023

Asherah - a New Sculpture

Another in my "Our Lady of the Shards" series of ceramic mosaics.  Thanks to Lauren Losue for the cast of her beautiful hands!  


Tuesday, February 16, 2021

A PAGAN ICON: "Asherah"


 

I've been interested in Catholic Icons for a long time, as well as Hindu and Buddhist Icons.......so I thought, since I'm having a lot of fun experimenting with painting again after so many years of not touching the scary gessoed  surface...........that I'd make some Icons of my own.  This one, dedicated to Asherah, or the "World Tree", is my first attempt, although I've done this image so many times in the past, the woman who is rooted in the Earth, the Tree of  Life, the great primeval Mother Earth.  But it was fun doing this because I could just paint from my imagination, unconstrained by the sometimes tedious process of being skillful, realistic, commercially viable, etc.  I look forward to doing more, these Icons for just myself!

Concerning Asherah, I copy below from a previous post:

                              Asherah and the Tree of Life







 Asherah  was often represented as a tree, among them the ubiquitous  "Asherah poles" (ashirim)  associated with Her worship in early (pre-monotheistic) Judaism. *** There is evidence that these wooden icons, and possibly, actual trees intentionally planted as icons or shrines)  were meant to be representations of Asherah.  Asherah is  sometimes  referred to as the wife of Yahweh,  whose name became something that could not be uttered, only represented as "the Lord".  The Asherah poles, and eventually the name of Asherah, were banned from worship as Judaism became monotheistic and established the sole deity as male.

Interestingly, with the early advent of Gnostic Christianity, Asherah is perhaps re-born in the form of Sophia, the feminine face of deity, often called the "mother" or sometimes "wife" of Yaweh.  The emblem for Sophia was often a dove.   

I never would have associated the Tree of Life archetype,  which has been a part of my spiritual vocabulary for more years than I remember,  with  Asherah had I not investigated just recently  because of a visionary experience during a healing session.  

I had some energy work done last week with an alternative  healer. Not unlike Reiki practitioners, although her system had a different name, she worked with me for over an hour, helping me to enter into an altered state of consciousness, kind of like a meditation, while she, in channelling energy to work with me, also entered into an open, meditative  state.   As I closed my eyes, the session began for me with the appearance of a white dove that visually manifested right  before my (closed) eyes.  But not a literal kind of bird, more like a sacred emblem, what one might see in a church.   I immediately thought of the "Dove of Sophia",  which is of course associated with  Peace to this day. And as a Christian icon representing the Holy Spirit, it may very well be that the origins of the Dove go all the way back to Gnosticism and Sophia. 

Who, like Asherah, was removed from patriarchal monotheistic theology, Her symbols often co-opted to support the later mythos of a strictly male deity without a wife, mother, or, for that matter, a daughter either.

The healer, after the session was over, told me that she clearly saw a Goddess form present during the healing.   The healer, who is not much familiar with Goddess archetypes,  said that the name she got was "Ashara".  She also mentioned that somehow trees or wood were associated.  I couldn't think of what that meant, until I looked it up on the Internet later, and then (of course!) discovered the Hebrew Goddess  "Asherah".   

Visions, like dreams, have multiple layers of meaning, and like dreams, exist outside of time.  In my experience Spirit communicates in visionary, symbolic, mythic ways, often from the great "library" of  human archetypes.  This visioning was a blessing for me, and something I will continue to contemplate and ask to understand.  


"Asherah" (Artist unknown)


*ASHERAH POLE
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia   *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asherah_pole

An "Asherah pole" is a sacred tree or pole that stood near Canaanite religious locations to honor the Ugaritic mother-goddess Asherah, consort of El. The relation of the literary references to an asherah and archaeological finds of Judaean pillar-figurines has engendered a literature of debate.  The asherim were  objects related to the worship of the fertility goddess Asherah, the consort of either Ba'al or, as inscriptions from Kuntillet ‘Ajrud and Khirbet el-Qom attest, Yahweh, and thus objects of contention among competing cults. 

In translations that render the Hebrew asherim into English as "Asherah poles," the insertion of "pole" begs the question by setting up unwarranted expectations for such a wooden object: "we are never told exactly what it was", observes John Day.[4] 

Though there was certainly a movement against goddess-worship at the Jerusalem Temple in the time of King Josiah, (2 Chronicles 34:3) it did not long survive his reign, as the following four kings "did what was evil in the eyes of Yahweh" (2 Kings 23:32, 37; 24:9, 19)[citation needed]. Further exhortations came from Jeremiah. The traditional interpretation of the Biblical text is that the Israelites imported pagan elements such as the Asherah poles from the surrounding Canaanites. In light of archeological finds, however, modern scholars now theorize that the Israelite folk religion was Canaanite in its inception and always polytheistic, and it was the prophets and priests who denounced the Asherah poles who were the innovators (of monotheism with an exclusive male god).

Asherim are mentioned in the Hebrew Bible in the books of Exodus, Deuteronomy, Judges, the Books of Kings, the second Book of Chronicles, and the books of Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Micah. The term often appears as merely אשרה, (Asherah) referred to as "groves" in the King James Version, which follows the Septuagint rendering as ἄλσος, pl. ἄλση, and the Vulgate lucus, and "poles" in the New Revised Standard Version; no word that may be translated as "poles" appears in the text. Scholars have indicated, however, that the plural use of the term (English "Asherahs", translating Hebrew Asherim or Asherot) provides ample evidence that reference is being made to objects of worship rather than a transcendent figure.

The Hebrew Bible suggests that the poles were made of wood. In the sixth chapter of the Book of Judges, God is recorded as instructing the Israelite judge Gideon to cut down an Asherah pole that was next to an altar to Baal. The wood was to be used for a burnt offering.

Deuteronomy 16:21 states that YHWH (rendered as "the Lord") hated Asherim whether rendered as poles: "Do not set up any [wooden] Asherah [pole] beside the altar you build to the Lord your God" or as living trees: "You shall not plant any tree as an Asherah beside the altar of the Lord your God which you shall make". That Asherahs were not always living trees is shown in 1 Kings 14:23: "their asherim, beside every luxuriant tree".  However, the record indicates that the Jewish people often departed from this ideal. For example, King Manasseh placed an Asherah pole in the Holy Temple (2 Kings 21:7). King Josiah's reforms in the late 7th century BC included the destruction of many Asherah poles (2 Kings 23:14).

Exodus 34:13 states: "Break down their altars, smash their sacred stones and cut down their Asherim [Asherah poles]."  Some biblical archaeologists have suggested that until the 6th century BC the Israelite peoples had household shrines, or at least figurines, of Asherah, which are strikingly common in the archaeological remains.

Raphael Patai identified the pillar figurines with Asherah in The Hebrew Goddess.

Sunday, December 1, 2019

Asherah ..... new Mosaic


I continue to be fascinated with the lost (but re-surfacing) Hebrew and Canaanite Goddess Asherah.  This new piece shows the leaf and body of the Goddess, and at the base, the eyes represent for me the intelligence of nature, at the roots and foundation of all life.  

I see that I have been creating Her image for many years in many ways.  She may be much older than the early Hebrew tribes that worshipped Her and carried "Asherah poles" to represent this Great Goddess who manifested as a Tree, Her origins going back to prehistoric, primal roots. 

Asherah may very well be "The Tree of Wisdom" found in the Garden of Eden, or the Tree of Life in the Kabbalah.  I don't know, I just know that I have been making "the Woman who is a Tree" image for many years, going back to before I began to even learn about the evolving Goddess culture and Women's spirituality/Eco Feminism of the 70's and 80's.  The Tree was always important to me, because "As above, so below"..........the branches that reach to the stars, the roots that touch the heart of the Earth.  But so often, I found myself placing the heart of a woman within the body of the tree - no "Daphne" this, escaping the lust of an Apollo, but a great intelligent maternal Being that belonged, and flowered and leafed and rooted, within the Great Cycles of the planet.

I did some writing about Asherah a year or so ago, after a visionary experience when working with a healing session.  She lingers with me, and I hope that I will continue to dream and develop with Asherah..............

http://threadsofspiderwoman.blogspot.com/2017/09/asherah-and-tree-of-life.html


Monday, July 22, 2019

Asherah: "If Women Rose Rooted"

"Gaia Shrine" (2003)

"Asharah" (2015)
“It’s no accident that the systematic suppression of the feminine has been accompanied down the centuries not only by the devaluation of all that is wild and instinctual in our own natures, but by the purposeful destruction of natural ecosystems. We long ago turned our backs on the planet which gives us life.” 
― Sharon Blackie, If Women Rose Rooted

I seem to be obsessed these days with ASHARAH, the ancient  "Tree of Life" motif.  Everything I've been doing for years seems to be "rooted" anyway, as I review work that goes back 10,20, even 40 years.  It is kind of amazing, actually........you look back at your journal, or in my case, my body of artwork, and you see that there is a "life theme" that has followed and defined you.  Where did it come from?  I don't actually know.  My drawings and paintings and sculptures (and yes, even my poetry) is always ENTWINED, ROOTED, WEBBED, LEAFED, BRANCHED.  Roots entangled among bodies, hands that sprout forests, trees with eyes that peep between leaves, going back to drawings I did when I was 18 or 19.  


"Kathy" (1974)


I want to explore this "discovery of myself".  Because now that I've concluded my 20 year "Masks of the Goddess Project", I am seeking a new direction, and what I am finding my dreams full of is actually a very old direction.  Source. Archetype. Hope. Entwined.

 So forgive me if I get a bit personal here................

"Gaia" (1986)

Above is the most ambitious painting I ever did, and I might add, I put the most passion into it.  It was an oil painting nine feet by 5 feet.  I only showed it once.  It was finally destroyed, as big paintings end up usually end up  being, because they get stored and carted around, unless you happen to be one of the few artists who is either famous, or independantly wealthy, which I am not.  I still love it........it represented the Great Mother and the Great Tree, both angry, wounded, made barren by patriarchy and contemporary industrial civilization.  It almost got included in a book called "The Once and Future Goddess" by Elinor Gadon, almost except the author had gone to the publisher before she saw my painting.  

"Past Desire, Hope or Faith, I Rest in You, a Dream" (1993)


"Earth Hands" (2003)
Above is a painting I did in 1993, during the going-into-the-dark time of the Fall, when I was living in upstate New York.  So many images  with roots and branches entangled, entwined, sometimes with hands, sometimes with EYES.  At the top of this Post  is a new variation on the "Asherah" Tree Mother sculptures I've done in the past 10 years.  Below is the first clay sculpture I did in 2007 when I had a Fellowship at the Alden B. Dow Creativity Center to explore my "Spider Woman's Hands" Community Arts Project.  











Over and over and over this them of being rooted, connected, part of nature, the Tree.  So I think that is what my work now will be devoted to.  To all that is rooted, woven, to Gaia, to Asharah, to what we urgently need to reclaim and remember. 

WOVEN.  ROOTED.  A WEBBED VISION.  






"A man lies spread eagled on the cliff between sky and sea and land,  sand sunk, leaf-molten, blackberry crowned:  Toes, fingers, flesh reaching into the green redeeming Earth.  He is rooting himself.  He is taking himself back.  I lie down in grateful imitation, sharing this rite of re-membering."

........"On the Beach" (2001) Lauren Raine

 A garden thrives through a network of inter-dependant relationships.  Trees communicate  with each other through a vast underground weaving of roots and fungi.  The bees and other pollinators bring new life; the worms, microorganisms and  and other insects  assist in the decay process.  And the birds  assist in distributing seed as well.  We are no less part of that great Weaving.


The Black Madonna (2003)
Asharah  is a very ancient Goddess from the Middle East, with origins that are found in  Canaanite religions, certainly among the Semite tribes in the early days of the Old Testament before the imposition of a male monotheistic god (Yaweh).  It was written that in the Ark of the Covenant, among other items, was found Aaron’s  "rod that blooms".....which I suggest was originally an "Asherah Pole".  Asharah was often  represented as a tree or a rod/pole.  The  practice of carrying "Asherah poles" was apparently fairly common, until the later Patriarchs  eliminated this custom, along with the Hebrew Goddesses, as the deity became exclusively male and Goddess forms became "the great abomination".  

I take the liberty of copying a comprehensive article about Asherah by Susan Ackerman.


"Gaia Shield" (1995)

https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/asherahasherim-bible

Asherah/Asherim

by Susan Ackerman


Asherah was one of the three great goddesses of the Canaanite pantheon. In Canaanite religion her primary role was that of mother goddess. In mythological texts from the Late Bronze Age (c. 1550–1200 b.c.e.) city-state of Ugarit, she is called “the creatress of the gods”; her consort at Ugarit, the god El, is called “creator.” El is also referred to as father and patriarch at Ugarit, as Asherah, likewise, is called mother. Their children form the pantheon of the gods, who are said to number seventy; a Hittite myth similarly mentions the seventy-seven and eighty-eight children of Asherah. On occasion in Ugaritic myth, Asherah performs the maternal role of wet nurse. Ugaritic and other Canaanite materials further associate Asherah with lions (indicating power), serpents (representing immortality or healing), and sacred trees (signifying fertility). Thus Asherah’s children at Ugarit can be called her “pride of lions”; the goddess is called “lady of the serpent” in second-millennium b.c.e. inscriptions from the Sinai; the late-thirteenth-century b.c.e. Lachish ewer dedicated to Asherah is decorated with images of sacred trees.

The Canaanite association of Asherah with sacred trees is also found in Israelite tradition. For example, one of the Canaanite epithets of Asherah, elat, “goddess,” is etymologically identical to the Hebrew word for the terebinth tree (ela)Another word for “terebinth” (alla) and two words for “oak” (elon and allon) are also closely related. Gen 2:4b–3:24 may further suggest the association of Asherah with sacred trees, since the way that Eve, “the mother of all living” (3:20), is described in the Eden story mimics in certain respects the role of the Canaanite mother goddess Asherah. If a correspondence holds, then the trees of life and of knowledge in the Eden narrative may also reflect Asherah imagery.

Most significant, though, in demonstrating Israel’s association of Asherah with sacred trees are biblical materials that describe the asherah (singular) or asherim (plural), the cult object(s) that are associated with the goddess Asherah more than thirty times in the Hebrew Bible. These cult objects are generally described as being in the shape of a pole or stylized tree. Like a pole or tree, they can be said to be planted, stood up, or erected. Conversely, when destroyed, these cult symbols can be described as being cut down, hewn down, or uprooted; they can also be said to be burned, overturned, or broken. Both the Greek and Latin translations of the Bible, moreover, render the words asherah and asherim as “grove” or “wood.”

According to the biblical record, these sacred poles or stylized trees associated with Asherah were erected by the Israelites throughout most of their history, especially during the premonarchic (tribal) period (Judg 6:25–26, 28, 30)) and during the period of the divided monarchy, both in the northern kingdom of Israel (1Kgs 14:15; 16:33; 2 Kgs 13:6; 17:10, 16; 23:15; and parallel references in 2 Chronicles) and in Judah, in the south (1 Kgs 14:23, 15:13; 2 Kgs 18:4; 21:3, 7; 23:6, 14; and parallel references in 2 Chronicles). These sacred poles were situated in various locations. In Judges 6, a sacred pole of Asherah is said to have stood beside the altar of the Canaanite storm god, Baal. The Bible also connects sacred poles with the “high places” (open-air cult sites?) and frequently mentions that they stood “on every high hill and under every green tree” (1 Kgs 14:23; 2 Kgs 17:10; 18:4; 21:3; 23:13–14; 2 Chr 14:3; 17:6; 31:1; 33:3, 19; 34:3; Jer 17:2). Both of these phrases are stereotypically used by the biblical writers to describe sites of idolatrous worship, implying, as does Judges 6, that the worship of Asherah was an apostate behavior in Israel and improper for followers of YHWH.

Yet despite these and other references associating Asherah with apostasy and despite the fact that the Israelites are explicitly forbidden to erect one of Asherah’s sacred poles beside an altar of YHWH, there are multiple indications in biblical tradition that many in ancient Israel did regard Asherah’s icon as an appropriate sacred symbol within the religion of YHWH. For example, one of Asherah’s sacred poles stood in the northern kingdom's capital city of  Samaria. The sacred pole of Samaria, moreover, which was erected during the reign of King Ahab (reigned 873–852 b.c.e.) was allowed to remain standing by the reformer King Jehu in later days even though he was at pains to remove all non-Yahwistic  imagery from the land otherwise.

Archaeological discoveries from the late 1970s and early 1980s have further indicated that, at least in the opinion of some ancient Israelites, YHWH and Asherah were appropriately worshipped as a pair. From the site of Kuntillet ‘Ajrud, in the eastern Sinai, come three ninth- or eighth-century b.c.e. inscriptions that mention YHWH and “his Asherah” (meaning YHWH’s companion [consort?], the goddess Asherah) or “his asherah” (meaning YHWH’s sacred pole that represents the goddess Asherah and that sits in his temple or beside his altar). An eighth-century b.c.e. inscription from Khirbet el-Qom, about twenty-five miles southwest of Jerusalem, contains similar language in 1 Kgs 15:13 and 2 Kgs 18:4, 21:7, and 23:6 (with parallels in 2 Chronicles) indicate that at least during certain points in the ninth, eighth, and seventh centuries b.c.e., Asherah’s sacred pole was perceived as an appropriate icon to erect in Jerusalem, even in YHWH’s temple. 

Whether women, more generally, were more likely to be devotees of Asherah’s cult is unknown. There is some biblical evidence that does see women as particularly attracted to goddess cults (for example, women’s role in the cult of the queen of heaven, according to Jer 7:18 and 44:17–19, 25), and the various female figurines found in domestic contexts at multiple Israelite sites might also suggest this, assuming, as many scholars do, that women played an especially important role in family-centered religious activities. Nevertheless, the presence of Asherah’s cult in the Jerusalem temple and in the cult city of Bethel indicates that worship of the goddess was also appealing to men, given that it was an all-male clergy that officiated at these (and at every) Israelite religious site.

The presence of Asherah’s cult in Israel also raises questions about the nature of the monotheistic confession that is often assumed to be a core principle in Israelite faith. Generally speaking, biblical scholars assume that full-blown, radical, or philosophical monotheism came to Israel fairly late in its history, during the time of the exile in the sixth century b.c.e. Prior to this, we have abundant evidence that other gods and goddesses were worshipped in Israel in addition to (or sometimes instead of) YHWH. Yet even in these earlier materials, we sometimes see evidence of a phenomenon that comes to dominate in the exilic period: the impulse to assimilate the attributes of the many gods and goddesses of older polytheistic systems to the one god, YHWH. Language that speaks of God as mother, for example (as in Deut 32:18; Num 11:12–13; Isa 45:9–10, 49:15; 66:13), probably represents the assimilation of Asherah’s maternal characteristics to YHWH.

Ackerman, Susan. “The Queen Mother and the Cult in Ancient Israel.” 
Journal of Biblical Literature 112 (1993): 385–401.

Sunday, September 3, 2017

Asherah and the Tree of Life

A relief from the palace of Ashurnasirpal II (883-859 BC) showing an Asherah Tree with male figures holding anointing oils.  The winged figure over the tree is interesting, suggesting to some the "winged Isis", or a precursor to the Holy Spirit, the third member of the Christian "trinity".



 One of the great things about making art, one discovers, is that it's a way of "writing down" one's inner "iconography".  Most of the time, it's a way of just beginning to see (literally) what that iconography of the inner self actually is.  And then the conversation can begin, because the language is being  translated............

For many years I've made  "tree of life" images.  I'm not sure where I got the image from originally.   In early lithographs there was always a woman within the tree form, or the Tree was a backdrop to everything else in the painting (not unlike the Web motif I also became fascinated by in later "Spider Woman"  pieces).  In my 1993 "Lovers" card from the Tarot, or the 1986 lithograph "Axis Mundi" the "tree" is ubiquitious, and later I started making sculptural  torsos, the Mother within the Tree. 

Recently I had reason to learn about  Asherah, the ancient Mother Goddess associated with the early Hebrews and early (pre-monotheistic) Judaism, with  the neighboring  Canaanites, and even earlier origins.  I have not studied this Goddess much, being only vaguely aware of the name.  Asherah  was often represented as a tree, among them the ubiquitous  "Asherah poles" (ashirim)  associated with Her worship in early (pre-monotheistic) Judaism. *** There is evidence that these wooden icons, and possibly, actual trees intentionally planted as icons or shrines)  were meant to be representations of Asherah.  Asherah is  sometimes  referred to as the wife of Yahweh,  whose name became something that could not be uttered, only represented as "the Lord".  The Asherah poles, and eventually the name of Asherah, were banned from worship as Judaism became monotheistic and established the sole deity as male.

Interestingly, with the early advent of Gnostic Christianity, Asherah is perhaps re-born in the form of Sophia, the feminine face of deity, often called the "mother" or sometimes "wife" of Yaweh.  The emblem for Sophia was often a dove.   

I never would have associated the Tree of Life archetype,  which has been a part of my spiritual vocabulary for more years than I remember,  with  Asherah had I not investigated just recently  because of a visionary experience during a healing session.  

I had some energy work done last week with an alternative  healer. Not unlike Reiki practitioners, although her system had a different name, she worked with me for over an hour, helping me to enter into an altered state of consciousness, kind of like a meditation, while she, in channelling energy to work with me, also entered into an open, meditative  state.   As I closed my eyes, the session began for me with the appearance of a white dove that visually manifested right  before my (closed) eyes.  But not a literal kind of bird, more like a sacred emblem, what one might see in a church.   I immediately thought of the "Dove of Sophia",  which is of course associated with  Peace to this day. And as a Christian icon representing the Holy Spirit, it may very well be that the origins of the Dove go all the way back to Gnosticism and Sophia. 

Who, like Asherah, was removed from patriarchal monotheistic theology, Her symbols often co-opted to support the later mythos of a strictly male deity without a wife, mother, or, for that matter, a daughter either.

The healer, after the session was over, told me that she clearly saw a Goddess form present during the healing.  She said that the Lady put  a kind of crown or headpiece on my head that was "light filled", and she also cast a kind of  "net of stars" over me (which perhaps means protection (?)     The healer, who is not much familiar with Goddess archetypes,  said that the name she got was "Ashara".  She also mentioned that somehow trees or wood were associated.  I couldn't think of what that meant, until I looked it up on the Internet later, and then (of course!) discovered the Hebrew Goddess  "Asherah".   

I've felt  this year is about healing for me,  healing the family karma which means understanding  familial wounds and changing them into (hopefully) wisdom instead of re-action.  I think this year, with so much chaos and divisiveness in the world as well, has been about the  difficult and disturbing rite of passage of becoming a Saga, an old woman.  A hopeful thought is that, perhaps, this is what is also going on a bit collectively.  Rites of passage, in my experience, are never particularly easy or comfortable, cozy or even predictable.  They are thresholds.

And how is it possible to talk of healing the wounds that are "personal" without seeing that they are also interwoven with what is universal?  Familial abuse is about social abuse as well as the long reach of ancestors, going back, going forward.  Roots.  And beyond that....... the Tree of Life, the roots beneath,  the leaves above.   All things woven.  

Visions, like dreams, have multiple layers of meaning, and like dreams, exist outside of time.  In my experience Spirit communicates in visionary, symbolic, mythic ways.  This visioning was a blessing for me, and something I will continue to contemplate and ask to understand.  


"Asherah" (Artist unknown)

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 *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asherah_pole

Asherah pole

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

An "Asherah pole" is a sacred tree or pole that stood near Canaanite religious locations to honor the Ugaritic mother-goddess Asherah, consort of El. The relation of the literary references to an asherah and archaeological finds of Judaean pillar-figurines has engendered a literature of debate.  The asherim were  objects related to the worship of the fertility goddess Asherah, the consort of either Ba'al or, as inscriptions from Kuntillet ‘Ajrud and Khirbet el-Qom attest, Yahweh, and thus objects of contention among competing cults. 

In translations that render the Hebrew asherim into English as "Asherah poles," the insertion of "pole" begs the question by setting up unwarranted expectations for such a wooden object: "we are never told exactly what it was", observes John Day.[4] 

Though there was certainly a movement against goddess-worship at the Jerusalem Temple in the time of King Josiah, (2 Chronicles 34:3) it did not long survive his reign, as the following four kings "did what was evil in the eyes of Yahweh" (2 Kings 23:32, 37; 24:9, 19)[citation needed]. Further exhortations came from Jeremiah. The traditional interpretation of the Biblical text is that the Israelites imported pagan elements such as the Asherah poles from the surrounding Canaanites. In light of archeological finds, however, modern scholars now theorize that the Israelite folk religion was Canaanite in its inception and always polytheistic, and it was the prophets and priests who denounced the Asherah poles who were the innovators (of monotheism with an exclusive male god).

Asherim are mentioned in the Hebrew Bible in the books of Exodus, Deuteronomy, Judges, the Books of Kings, the second Book of Chronicles, and the books of Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Micah. The term often appears as merely אשרה, (Asherah) referred to as "groves" in the King James Version, which follows the Septuagint rendering as ἄλσος, pl. ἄλση, and the Vulgate lucus, and "poles" in the New Revised Standard Version; no word that may be translated as "poles" appears in the text. Scholars have indicated, however, that the plural use of the term (English "Asherahs", translating Hebrew Asherim or Asherot) provides ample evidence that reference is being made to objects of worship rather than a transcendent figure.

The Hebrew Bible suggests that the poles were made of wood. In the sixth chapter of the Book of Judges, God is recorded as instructing the Israelite judge Gideon to cut down an Asherah pole that was next to an altar to Baal. The wood was to be used for a burnt offering.

Deuteronomy 16:21 states that YHWH (rendered as "the Lord") hated Asherim whether rendered as poles: "Do not set up any [wooden] Asherah [pole] beside the altar you build to the Lord your God" or as living trees: "You shall not plant any tree as an Asherah beside the altar of the Lord your God which you shall make". That Asherahs were not always living trees is shown in 1 Kings 14:23: "their asherim, beside every luxuriant tree".  However, the record indicates that the Jewish people often departed from this ideal. For example, King Manasseh placed an Asherah pole in the Holy Temple (2 Kings 21:7). King Josiah's reforms in the late 7th century BC included the destruction of many Asherah poles (2 Kings 23:14).

Exodus 34:13 states: "Break down their altars, smash their sacred stones and cut down their Asherim [Asherah poles]."  Some biblical archaeologists have suggested that until the 6th century BC the Israelite peoples had household shrines, or at least figurines, of Asherah, which are strikingly common in the archaeological remains.


Asherah, detail from an ivory box from Mīna al-Bayḍā near Ras Shamra
 (Ugarit), Syria, c. 1300 BCE; in the Louvre, Paris
.


Raphael Patai identified the pillar figurines with Asherah in his book (forward by Merlin Stone)  The Hebrew Goddess.