More suggested reading

Things to Read about Goddess Worship


1. The Metamorphoses by Apuleius.
This 2nd century A.D. novel tells the story of Lucius, who is turned into a donkey and can only recover his human form with the help of the Goddess Isis.

2. Isis in the Ancient World by R.E. Witt.
An overview of the cult of Isis in Egypt, Greece and Rome.

3. Oration to the Mother of the Gods by the Emperor Julian.
Julian's oration to Magna Mater is avialable in translation on line here.

4. Mother of the Gods: From Cybele to the Virgin Mary by Philippe Borgeaud.
A highly idiosyncratic and free-ranging discussion of the "career" of the Great Mother Goddess in the Greek and Roman world.

5. In Search of God the Mother: The Cult of Anatolian Cybele by Lynn E. Roller.
A thorough and meaty book on the Mother Goddess in Anatolia, Greece and Rome.

6. The Cults of the Roman Empire by Robert Turcan.
Chapter One is on Cybele and Chapter Two is on Isis.

7. Tantric Visions of the Divine Feminine: The Ten Mahavidyas by David Kingsley.
And excellent book on a fascinating aspect of the Goddess Kali - her manifestation as ten distinct Goddesses known as the Mahavidyas, or Wisdom Goddesses.

8. Offering Flowers, Feeding Skulls: Popular Goddess Worship in West Bengal by June McDaniel.
Goddess Worship in modern day Bengal.

9. Seeking Mahadevi: Constructing the Identities of the Hindu Great Goddess edited by Tracy Pinchtman.
How can there be one Great Goddess but also thousands of Gods and Goddesses? A collection of scholarly essays tackles this and other tricky issues.

10. In Praise of the Goddess: The Devi Mahatmya and Its Meaning translated with commentary by Kali Devadatta.
A fantastic wealth of information on Maha Devi in all Her glory - with the complete text of the central text of Saktic Hindusim.

Examples of Goddess Worship


The Great Mother

Beginning in the 8th century BC there is clear evidence of the worship of a Goddess called by the Phrygian people simply Matar, which is the Phrygian word for "mother". According to Lynn Roller, author of In Search of God the Mother, the Phrygian people had no other significant Deities other than Matar. The Phrygian cult of Matar is not a matter of speculation or conjecture - it is a well documented, uncontroversial, historical fact.

Sometime in the 4th century BC the Athenians "imported" the Goddess from Her home in Anatolia. They called Her Cybele, from the Phrygian word for "mountain" (in Phrygia she was often called "Mountain Mother"). From Athens, Her worship spread throughout the Greek speaking world, and became especially important in Alexandria.

In 203 B.C. the Romans "imported" the Goddess to Rome - they called her simply Magna Mater, Latin for "Great Mother". Livy claims that Magna Mater was already mentioned in the Sybilline Books - which were books of prophecy written in the Etruscan language and already considered ancient in the 3rd century BC. From Rome the cult of Magna Mater spread throughout the Empire - as far as Britain. The Emperor Julian composed an oration to Her around 360 AD, and She continued to be worshipped into the 5th century AD, but Her worship was eventually driven underground by the Christians.

The Goddess Isis

The Goddess Isis was worshipped by people that we would today call "Romans", "Greeks" and "Egyptians". Things were not always so simple back in the day. The author of the well-known essay "On Isis and Osiris" was named Plutarch - one of the most famous authors of the classical world. Plutarch was a native speaker of the Greek language, and he was born where the country "Greece" is today. But he was born a Roman citizen and he rose to high rank in the Roman political administration. An even more complex example is that of the philosopher Plotinus - who was born in Egypt, spoke Greek, and became famous teaching in Rome. And many of those who carried on Plotinus' teachings were "Hellenized Semites" who came from such places as Tyre and Damascus.

The worship of Isis was a truly universal Religion. Not only did She comprise all Goddesses within Herself, her worshippers comprised the entire known world in their linguistic, ethnic, geographic and political diversity. There were even Temples of Isis as far north as the island of Britain.

The worship of Isis is, however, clearly Egyptian in origin. The spread of Her cult through the lands of Greece, Rome and beyond is an indication of the high regard that all ancient peoples had for Egyptian culture in general - and Egyptian spirituality and philosophy in particular. The name "Isis" appears over two dozen times in the "Pyramid Texts" which date from before 2,000 BC. By the time Her worship spread to the the rest of the world, Her cult was already a very "old religion" indeed!

The Maha Devi and Kali

One of the great spiritual books of the Indian subcontinent is the "Devi Mahatmya" - which tells the story of how the Great Goddess (which is the literal English translation of her title/name: "Maha Devi"), triumphed over the evil Demonic powers that even the Gods (including Brahma and Vishnu) were powerless against. The Devi Mahatmya, also called "Chandi Path", is still recited in Hindu temples all over the world, including throughout North America.

The Devi Mahatmya was composed sometime around 600-700 AD - but it is widely assumed that it existed as an oral tradition long before this. The Great Goddess of the Hindu tradition has Her roots in ancient traditions of Goddess worship found in both the "Aryan" traditions (Sanskrit) and in the Tamil ("non-Aryan") traditions of southern India.

The Goddess traditions of India assert that She has the ability to manifest herself in infinitely many ways - but that She is nevertheless One. A perhaps startling instance of this was the "appearance" of the Goddess "Santoshi Maa" in 1975 .... in a movie! Prior to the release of the movie, entitled "Jai Santoshi Maa", few people had ever heard of this Goddess - but She became a major religious figure when the movie became a hit. Her devotees insist that Santoshi Ma has always existed, and that there is no essential difference between Her and other Hindu Goddesses. It is said that during public showings of the film, the theatre "is transformed into a kind of temple, and the act of seeing the film is often taken as an act of worship." (Stanley Kurtz, All the Mothers Are One: Hindu India and the Cultural Reshaping of Psychoanalysis, 18)

One of the most intriguing and important manifestations of Maha Devi is the Goddess Kali. Many of the most important figures in modern Hinduism, including Swami Vivekananda and the Saint Ramakrishna, have been devotees of Kali. Also the great Medieval sage whose name is synonymous with the nondualistic Advaita school, Sankaracarya, was a Kali worshipper as well. Kali is inseperable from Hindu Tantrism - and with everything implied and suggested by the word Tantra. Her most common iconography is as a naked woman with jet-black skin, wearing a necklace of human skulls, waving a bloody sword over Her head as she dances on the entranced body of Her husband - the God Shiva. The non-dualism associated with Kali respects no boundaries.

The Buddhist Cults of Tara, Juntei and Kwan Yin

The Devi Mahatmya became a central text of Indian spirituality at a time when Buddhism was still a major religion on the sub-continent. It is far from certain how or why Buddhism eventually disappeared as a distinct religious movement in India - the land of its birth. Part of the explanation probably lies in the intimate interactions that occurred between what are today considered the two separate religions of "Hinduism" and "Buddhism". During the "Medieval" period of Indian history, these two religions overlapped a great deal. The Buddhism of today actually is greatly influenced by Hinduism - and vice-versa. It's very likely that in India the two religions simply merged together.

The forms of modern day Hinduism that are the most similiar to Buddhism are those closely associated with Maha Devi - especially in Her form as Kali. And the forms of modern day Buddhism that are the most similar to Hinduism are those in which the Goddesses Tara, Cundi and Kuan Yin are very prominent.

Buddhists during the Medieval period both imported many of the Hindu Gods and Goddesses, and also invented some new ones of their own. Technically these Beings were called Bodhisattvas rather than Gods. One of the most important of the Buddhist "Celestial Bodhisattvas" was the Bodhisattva of Compassion, Avalokitesvara. Originally Avalokitesvara was a "male" God, and in Tibetan Buddhism Avalokitesvara is still portrayed like this. But in Chinese Buddhism Avalokitesvara became a Goddess known as Kuan Shih Yin or simply Kuan Yin. Kuan Yin has also been historically revered by Taoists and Confucianists as well as Buddhists. From China worship of Kuan Yin spread to Korea, Japan and Vietnam. Her name literally translates as "She who hears the cries of the world" - a reference to Her embodiment of the Buddhist ideal of Compassion.

An example of a direct "borrowing" of a Hindu Goddess by Buddhism is that of the Goddess Cundi found in Chinese Buddhism. Cundi is simply the Chinese form of the Sanskrit Candi, which is one of the names of the Maha Devi. In Korea Cundi is called "Junje Bosal", while in Japan she is called Juntei, or sometimes simply "the Japanese Durga". Durga is another name given to the Great Goddess of the Devi Mahatmya. The Buddhist Goddess Cundi is often referred to as "the Mother of all the Buddhas" and "the Bodhisattva of magical powers."

Tara is an example of a Goddess having the same name whether She is being worshipped by Hindus or Buddhists. The Buddhist "version" of Tara is very similar to Kuan Yin - a Bodhisattva/Goddess who exemplifies the ideal of Compassion. Her Hindu counterpart, on the other hand, is a little edgier. The Hindu Tara has a fierce side, and She is closely associated with the ferocious and powerful Goddess of the Devi Mahatmya. The Buddhist Tara is found primarily in Tibetan Buddhism, where She is said to have been born from a tear streaming from Avalokitesvara's eye.



 
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