Stories are what make the world go round.
Stories ARE the foundation of our world.
From the most effective parents to the most effective politicians - and everything in between - their ability to convey a story that connects, touches and moves the listener is how they get their jobs done.
Storytelling is a medicine, revealing the unconscious through the conscious - allowing us to digest life, the chaos, the mystery - the magic in a manageable unspeakable way.
Resurrecting stories that are within each of us from the most ancient of storytelling days, sitting around the fire and listening to our elders share their wisdom - this is my call.
One of the most ANCIENT of stories built into our subconscious is that of the Moon’s story when she was seen as a Goddess.
The Moon Goddess in our oldest stories was always triune in nature.
She birthed (new moon), brought life to its fullness (full moon) - and became the destroyer of life (Waning to Dark moon phase) in order to make the fertile fodder for the next cycle of life.
Her mystical changing cycle was noted to also mimic the yearly cycles (seasons), the growing and harvesting cycles - and women’s monthly cycles.
It was not lost on our Ancestors the mystery of how the moon’s cycle lined up with women’s time to bleed each month. Before the invention of electricity, when we lived under the moon and stars, women would bleed when the moon disappeared from sight and was “dead” to the world.
The women would seemingly “be dying” - just like the moon. Yet they did not, and neither did the moon. Both would come out stronger, healthier, more alive after their “death” each lunar month.
For these reasons and more, the Ancients based their calendar off of the Moon (and thus “Moon” is at the root of the word “month”).
Out of all the stories about this Starry Night Lover of ours - Her descent and resurrection happening in three days time - was the most mystical, powerful part of the story - packed full of mystery to unpack on how to transform death into life.
Since it mimicked the woman’s cycle of death and rebirth so closely - women were seen as the Gatekeeper’s of Life and Death themselves. For in their bodies there LIVED the truth of life needing death, and death needing life that our Ancient relatives saw reflected ALL around them on this planet.
Jesus and the Moon Goddess
What does the Moon’s story have to do with Jesus? How are they connected?
Let’s take a look to see how it probably happened.
It was a common practice in the ancient world (and even today) to borrow - or just hijack - stories from surrounding tribes. Especially if one tribe conquered the other tribe. By taking the “Other’s” story as their own, they washed out the previous tribe’s customs, heritage and uniqueness - and assimilated the tribe into their own. Making the “Others” more like them - and them more like the “Others”.
The area of the world Jesus’ lived and died in was rich with the story of death and rebirth built into their stories, their belief system and their culture.
Even Abram of the Jewish scriptures - who eventually was renamed Abraham and the supposed father of Christianity - stemmed from Sumer. Archaeological evidence from Sumer reveals an even more ancient text than the Bible: a religious text of their Goddess, Inanna.
INANNA
In Inanna’s story there is a tree in a garden, a serpent and - a choice to abandon her heavenly throne and descend into the underworld (for there was no idea of hell back then, not even in Jesus’ time). All of this is followed by a resurrection three days later.
Compare these two writings:
“My Lady...Inanna...abandoned heaven and earth...
She abandoned her office of holy priestess to descend to the underworld….
When after three days and three nights, Inanna had not returned…”
~ The Descent of Inanna: From the Great Above to the Great Below
“...Christ...was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures,"
~ 1 Corinthians 15:4
Inanna's story goes on to share that for her to be resurrected, someone had to take her place in the underworld. She found her husband (the masculine energy counterpart) to be unrepentant when she returned. She, having earned her place as Queen of Heaven and Earth through her death and resurrection - sentenced her husband.
His sister loved her brother deeply though, so it was decided that they would split the year - with Dumuzi taking six months and his sister the other 6 months.
For the people of Sumer, this story was both a story of how the seasons came to be...as well as the unexplainable work of the psyche.
It showed a map of sorts for the psyche's journey, of the descent/death, the witness that was needed, the sacrifices of old, uncooperative parts of the internal self in order to once again raise Itself back to life. to itself time and again in order to be reunited symbolic metaphorical meaning for their psyche.
For them, the symbology of the myth (a story retold over and over again, embodied in festivals, rituals and rites) about the energies of Summer(dominated by the masculine energy of productivity and the full bounty of the Full moon) to Winter (dominated by the feminine energy of rest/death/regeneration) was not lost on them when this theme moved from story to story.
This myth helped tie their understanding of both their physical and psychological realms to the understanding of the Earth. When they could see the physical manifestation of their inner world, their stories took on deeper levels of meaning - penetrating the psyche's mysteries - helping them understand how all they saw and all they were, were intimately intertwined in a never ending circle of life.
The Death of the Moon Goddess
However, over the years, as this story got passed down within the growing dominance of the new socio-political structure of patriarchy, the spiritual world that once had been rich with Feminine principles of life and death began to look more and more like the socio-political world. By the time of the historical Jesus, the tidal wave of replacing the Feminine flavored myths with male flavored heroes gained momentum.
As the first century passed after Jesus death, one can see evidence of the Jewish holidays becoming embedded into the Christian faith - i.e. Passover being the holiday closest to Easter.
As the new religious order spread across the European world via socio-political conquest, the tradition of assimilating the old into the new continued. The new rulers took the old stories and their corresponding festivals and migrated them into a unifying faith under one male god.
While we often think it was the religious that influenced the socio-political switch to one male leader over all, it was the reverse. The religious merge to one male god over the pantheon and before it the Feminie cults lagged the socio-policital by about 2000 years.
Where once we humans had multiple goddess and gods to represent our multifaceted personalities; where once we celebrated the vital body of the woman in her triune nature as key to creating, birthing and even ending life - humanity became a monotheistic culture making Jesus and Father God the masculine star of those stories.
Furthermore, as the years progressed and we started to deem the women’s mysteries - mysteries that once were the spiritual foundation of our Cosmology - as evil/sinful/shameful, we shifted away from seeing life and death as part of never ending cycle designed for the betterment of All. We began to fear death, having lost the key along with the Gatekeeper.
We replaced rites and rituals that enacted death and rebirth with stories that beat death. We replaced the cycle of life for a one way ticket to either eternal life or damnation, and gave rise to the myth of the Fountain of Youth so that we would never have to face death - either internally or externally.
TRIUNE MOON = TRIUNE GOD
Let's look at one more similarity in the story between the Moon and Jesus.
The power and nature of the triune goddess found in the Moon Goddess (as Virgin/Maiden/Child, Nurturing Mother, Wise Crone) was nicely hidden in the trinity of Jesus.
- Virgin/Maiden became Jesus
- Mother Goddess became Father God
- Wise Crone became the Spirit (which originally in the origin of Christianity was Sophia - the feminine essence. Yet even that piece got lost over time).
The Power of this story of death and resurrection, of a savior, of a trinity and of three days in the grave cannot be understated. The idea of a soul:
- Willing to sacrifice their life for humanity (whether it be Jesus or the Moon Herself),
- To go into the “underworld” where there is no light (New Moon) - just pure darkness (which is not evil as we will see)
- To face the “demons” of that world (which again are not evils as we believe they are) so that…
- The Soul (Jesus or the Moon) could be resurrected for the betterment of the Whole…
Well it is a powerful, powerful story. The idea of a Savior? Of redemption? Of someone willing to face our inner demons in place of us?
WHAT IS MISSING FROM THE JESUS STORY
Yet actually - this is where the story of the Moon and of Jesus differ.
The Ancients new and understood these myths and their rituals were for the individual - not the collective.
They would have never seen Jesus' death and resurrection as an external realty, but as an internal necessity.
They also would have never said that death could or needed to be beaten. Their understanding of the power of death to create life was so far evolved past our limited sight.
They did not fear death. Quite the contrary. They lived in a state of constant willingness to live or die as was deemed needed by the greater force that controlled all of the Universe their bodies resided in.
They understood how to harmonize their own Divine-like consciousness to enact their role as the Gatekeeper of Life AND Death - so that ALL of life in the Cosmos was in harmony with ALL of life in the Cosmos.
They understood how to be their own Savior. How to redeem themselves - each and every time they came to the Gate where Life and Death met. Knowing, understanding that they were one and the same thing - if they allowed death to work its powerful magic.
If they allowed themselves to stop fighting death and simply relax into it - then Death became the Pregnant Void of All Pure Potentiality.
If not, if they fought and resisted death - then death would become the destroyer and devour them in the most horrific way. Making them feel they needed saving from death.
Said another way: If you act as your own Savior by ACCEPTING DEATH as a necessary part of life - to create more life in you and the world - then you need no savior.
If you don’t act as your own Savior - you will fear, fight and resist death - thinking it will destroy you - and pray for a savior from it.
Do you see the circular dichotomy this picture paints?
Yes, these are BIG concepts and realities beyond what most of us even dare to allow ourselves to think about. That is why they, along with many other symbols that are meant to help us understand Death as Life, are better embedded in a modern day story that will help us gently re-awaken the power of this Gatekeeper energy within each of us.
Shall we begin?
