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Holy Harlot
Mesopotamian Holy Harlot
I TURN THE MALE TO THE
FEMALE. I AM SHE WHO
ADORNETH THE MALE FOR THE
FEMALE; I AM SHE WHO
ADORNETH THE FEMALE
FOR THE MALE.
The words of the goddess Ishtar.
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A great and powerful civilization once flourished in Mesopotamia (Greek for 'between the rivers'). This area, now in modern Iraq, included the kingdoms of Sumeria, Akkadia, Assyria and Babylonia, although its culture and influence spread over a much wider area of the Middle East.
The earliest evidence from Sumeria reveals a culture which accorded women equal status with men, and which principally venerated the goddess Inanna/Ishtar, lunar goddess of life and love, named as the Whore of Babylon in the Bible. The Mesopotamians held daily religious rituals, offering food and drink to their deities in the temples - which were also centers for trade and acted as banks, extending loans. Monthly rites were held to honor the moon's phases: 'on the day of the disappearance of the moon, on the day of the sleeping of the moon'. The exact observance of the moon's phases was very important for it formed the calendar from which they calculated the precise dates and times of all their religious observances. The focus and centerpiece of their year was a sacred sexual rite of the utmost significance. Every New Year, the ruling king 'married' the goddess Inanna/Ishtar amidst great feasting and celebration. This rite took place annually for thousands of years, profoundly influencing later civilizations, both symbolically and through actual ritual.
IN PRAISE OF ISHTAR
Praise Ishtar, the most
awesome of the Goddesses,
revere the queen of women,
the greatest of the deities.
She is clothed with pleasure and love.
She is laden with vitality,
charm, and voluptuousness.
In lips she is sweet;
life is in her mouth.
At her appearance rejoicing
becomes full.
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Ishtar's tides and names - like those of all ancient deities - were many and various. In Babylon, her name meant 'Star', the Light of the World. Semitic people gradually conquered the lands of Sumer, introducing changes to the earliest myths and adding further names for the goddess. She was known as Ashtoreth, to whom King Solomon returns at the end of his days; she was also named -Har, or Hora - from which the words harlot and whore sprang. Inanna/Ishtar was served by powerful prostitute-priestesses who were 'the vehicles of her creative life in their sexual union with the men who came there to perform a sacred ritual'. This goddess exhibited a rich diversity of powers, for she also had a terrifying aspect as goddess of war and storms. Her primordial origins are suggested by images depicting her with the magical Tree of Life, the sacred serpent, and numerous birds - linking her with the earliest snake-bird goddesses known to us in many cultures.
Inanna/Ishtar enjoyed many lovers. Her title 'virgin' indicated her autonomous, unmarried state. Her chief consort was the son/brother/lover Dumuzi, or Tammuz, meaning 'faithful son'. This, and the corresponding goddess roles of mother/sister/lover, reflect the phases of the moon, underlining the importance of its monthly cycle to all ancient peoples. Dumuzi/Tammuz is referred to in poems and hymns as 'Lord of Life', 'the Green One', and 'Shepherd of the People' - often sacrificed in the form of a lamb. The other totemic creatures linked to the son/lover are the ram and the magnificent 'Bull of Heaven'.
But, like all early consorts, the grain god Dumuzi/Tammuz was fated to meet an untimely sacrificial end. His ritual death, accompanied by a month of mourning, took place in high summer, after the harvests. This coincided with the reappearance of the dog star, Sirius, rising with the sun in mid-July. At this time, the goddess's lover descended to the 'Land of No Return', the underworld, and life on earth became sterile, scorched and parched by the unforgiving rays of the high summer sun.
The goddess annually mourned the loss of her beloved with piteous laments, intoned by the people in the temples. Naturally, she would eventually retrieve him so that the eternal annual round could be acted out - life affirmed, and life restored. Some scholars suggest that, long ago, an actual human sacrifice took place every Great Year - that is, every eighth year. However, written records did not begin until much later, by which time the death and resurrection of the beloved was acted out symbolically. The god was ever a cyclical deity, while the goddess, like the earth itself, endured. But by the third millennium BC the Epic of Gilgamesh had challenged this received wisdom. In this poem Ishtar desires the hero: 'Glorious Ishtar raised an eye at the beauty of Gilgamesh: "Come, Gilgamesh, be thou my lover! Do but grant me of thy fruit."'
Gilgamesh, however, responds by reciting a long list of Ishtar's previous amours and the sad fate which befell them. He says, 'Which lover didst thou love forever? Which of thy shepherds pleased thee for all time?... For Tammuz, the lover of thy youth, Thou hast ordained wailing year after year... The hero ultimately rejects the goddess's sexual invitation, slays her divine bull and celebrates his bravura with his friend Enkidu, a savage enemy in another tale. This epic poem clearly reflects gradual changes which were taking place in society at that time, for a male figure not only rejects the great goddess, but triumphs over her furious attempts at revenge.
In other poems, however, the relationship between the goddess and her lover is rapturous, erotic, and bursting with images of fertility. Here is the Sumerian Inanna, praising her 'honey-man':
He has sprouted; he has burgeoned;
He is lettuce planted by the water.
He is the one my womb loves best.
My well-stocked garden of the plain,
My barley growing high in its furrow,
My apple tree which bears fruit up to its crown,
He is lettuce planted by the water.
My honey-man, my honey-man sweetens me always.
My lord, the honey-man of the gods,
He is the one my womb loves best.
His hand is honey, his foot is honey,
He sweetens me always.
My eager impetuous caresser of the navel,
My caresser of the soft thighs,
He is the one my womb loves best
He is lettuce planted by the water.
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