Sarasvati | Kali | Morrigan | Medusa | Lilith | Astarte | Inanna | Acheulian Archetypes of women
This is not about Women's Lib, but is meant to be a reminder that qualities traditionally described as feminine, and which include such unfashionable notions as acceptance, receptivity and submission (for which read humility), can ultimately be as, if not more, powerful than the dynamic forces of action.Nevertheless, the ancient goddesses I describe briefly here, were not noted for being shy, retiring types. I suspect the key to their "power" and wisdom was a knowledge won from hard experience of when to act and when to say and do nothing. They had synthesized both the masculine and feminine aspects of their characters.
Ignore the balance, and you face the annihilatory destructiveness conceived in Kali, who also had the power to re-create, the denial of Lilith, the hell bequeathed by Inanna or the death-knell represented by Morrigan. I'm not so sure about Astarte, (Ishtar) who strikes me as a masculine symbol closer to Lara of Tomb Raider. Maybe because by the time in history that she came to prominence, men began to attribute more masculine characteristics to their goddesses as opposed to the previously all-powerful feminine principle.
Note that goddesses such as Medusa and Maat were associated with justice and order, not in the sense of legislation, but in that all things have their time and place.
Fricka (as in Wagner's Ring Cycle) aka Frigg, wife of the chief Nordic god Wotan (Odin) and Hera (see this page for interesting observations on the power of the Great Goddess), wife of Greek Zeus, resolutely spoke out on the status of marriage, despite the waywardness of their husbands; maybe this eloquent obduracy is responsible for the negative image that attaches to them.
Venerate women, give them opportunity, and you profit from their creativity as symbolized in Sarasvati.
Each goddess is a partial manifestation of the total experience of being a woman. What gives a woman her mature identity is a freedom to be able to spontaneously choose the manifestation most appropriate for a situation.
Recurring themes in the mythology of women include the exercise of instinctive power and wisdom, cycles of self-sacrifice, death and rebirth, creativity and an optimism that yet recognizes the continual presence of death.
What do women offer?
"The (global) expansion of markets tends to penalize altruism and care. Both individuals and institutions have been free-riding on the caring labour that mainly women provide. Whether women will continue to provide such labour without fair remuneration is another matter...." UN Human Development Report 1999 - no longer on the web.
Romantics will emphasize more entirely with Oscar Wilde, who I think captured the essence of the divine gift of Woman in The Nightingale and the Rose, a story of absolute devotion to Love. Relativistically, can it ever be possible to love too much? There is no choice sometimes.
If women are to be able to assume their full potential, they must also learn to shield their sensitivities from the conflicting pressures of public life, asserting natural abilities of persistence, patience, forbearance, negotiation as well as mastering technical and managerial skills and the judgment of when to act. To be able to do that and to love fully as well, requires dedication to the process of self-understanding and self-mastery.
So must men also realize and value the innate insight, understanding and tolerance which they too possess.
Mankind’s mythology comprehends the archetypal principle of Woman in goddesses who “knew” that, in order to establish world order, not only could they regulate their relationships with men, it was necessary for them to do so. Men who ignored their power, usually by imposing patriarchal governance, did so at their own peril.
My first symbol is Kali, Hindu goddess of vengeance. Short entries on these deities may be found in the Encyclopedia Mythica. Clicking on the images on each page will link you to their source.
With acknowledgements to Hany, who felt this needed to be expressed, and to Hamid, who trained me.
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