When God Was A Woman

Two husbands anyone? Priestesses as clergy? A God with a Vagina?!

Yes, this is what the world might have looked like 4000-8000 years ago.

Do you ever wonder why women are subservient to men according to most of the "civilized world"? Do you hear references to Goddess worshiping cultures, only to have them dismissed as sex cults unworthy of intellectual discussion?

I will show you, through a brief summary of the chapters of the book When God Was A Woman, what I learned about how humanity REALLY developed (sorry, I am a spiritual person but I don't buy that Eve, was the mother of all women, and was foolish, disobedient, and responsible for the fall of all mankind)....Let's see what might have really happened according to archeological evidence....

(Disclaimer: Allowing for human error, I am not swearing by every fact presented in this book, however, I do think that some interesting questions are raised, and perspectives that need to be examined are put forth. And I still know and love the 'God' that I was raised with. I just wonder what His former identity might have looked like..)

A truly life-changing book for women! (and men)

When God Was a Woman is a book that deserves a web presence. I can't believe that there aren't lively, dynamic discussion groups all over the web about this book! Maybe they've been deleted by 'the Man', who knows. In any case, I've just read this book and my passion for it's message has inspired me to write this summary for you.

When God Was a Woman - by Merlin Stone

This book was paradigm shifting and I highly recommend it for any woman who wants to know who she is and where she comes from.

When God Was a Woman

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Chapters 1-3 Summarized

1.Tales with a point of view

2.Who was She?

3.Women-Where Woman Was Deified

1- Tales....The author speaks of her own history, skepticism about the Adam and Eve origin of humanity and the subsequent oppression of women

2- Who Was She?....The author gives some strong archeological evidence that in the regions of the mediterranean and thereabout ancient cultures had thought of Goddess as we think of God today

3- Woman... Here she gives us an idea of what life was like for women in these many matrilineal societies (where property and inheritance were passed down through the female line). It seemed like opposite land as I read it, a land where women had authority, and men stayed home. Women were economically independent, sexually independent-they might have had 2 husbands or no husband, but wedded or not they still had legitimate children that were respected by the community! They were holders of the land, the religion, the family. Incredible.

Chapters 4-6

4.The Northern Invaders

5.One of Their Own Race

6.If the King Did Not Weep

4. The Invaders....This chapter explains the incredible evolution from female to male Diety. It appears that historically, there were multiple invasions from northern groups over time, and these groups aimed to take the property and rule over the indigenous peoples. To do this, they asserted that their men had gods of Light (they were lighter skinned than the indigenous peoples generally) and these masculine god figures worked their way over time into the goddess legends, at first as a younger brother/weaker consort of the Goddess (as in the Isis and Horus/Osiris story), to an equal male figure, as in some of the Indian God/Goddess legends, to then a stronger male- As Zeus dominates and cheats on his Goddess yet less powerful wife, Hera, to finally the One and only Male God that we now know.

5. One... This chapter was honestly a little wordy for me.. some of these middle chapters are heavy on the history and archeological derivations, where I am more into the theory. This chapter goes into something about how the tribes of Israel came about and follows from the previous chapter in it's questioning of the monotheistic Male God of Light... was He created as part of a plot to kill the goddess, the priestess, and her devotees, to kidnap the women of the indigenous cultures, claim them as wives (as some of the sacred texts encourage) and take their property and lives into male domination.. perhaps to this day?

6.If the King... This chapter explains how Queens ruled and were often allowed male consorts for the propagation of the female line, however these men were put to death in some cultures annually, or after impregnation. Eventually the tradition evolved to be symbolic, with the king perhaps living but being castrated, stripped of his robes for several days, or having someone sacrificed in his place. Then the tradition evolved even further, such that Kings held more power than Queens in many places.

Chapters 7-9

7.The Sacred Sexual Customs

8.They Offered Incense to the Queen of Heaven

9.And the Men of the City Shall Stone Her with Stones

7. The Sacred....Apparently historical evidence points to the fact that priestesses and women could live in the temple, or visit the temple during special holidays, or perhaps at other times, and have intercourse, or sacred sex, with various men. They were considered pure, and it was a holy act that had been given as a gift from the Goddess. She contrasts this with todays religions often view sex as unclean, punishable, or punishment worthy in many circumstances (esp. those involving free expression of female sexuality), and shameful.

8. They Offered Incense...This chapter was about how the Isrealites found goddess-worshipping women still among them as evidenced from certain quotes in the bible.

9. And the Men... This chapter spoke of the punishments aimed at oppressing the women who still worshipped the goddess and wanted sexual rituals or freedom- this in turn threatened the patriarchical system that was trying to establish itself where men ruled and owned the land, the religion, God, the women, children, property etc.

Chapters 10-11

10.Unraveling the Myth of Adam and Eve

11.The Daughters of Eve

10. Unraveling...This chapter goes deeply into the symbolism of the serpent, explaining that the serpent had been used as a symbol of the goddess religions of the past (thus the deception of woman by the serpent, in the Adam and Eve creation story, symbolizing the old religions threatening the new order.)

11. The author speaks of modern efforts (the past 200 yrs) by women to point out and combat the gender inequalities purported by major religions. Women included are abolishionists of slavery, Susan B Anthony, writers, scholars and others.

I hope this opened your minds- please leave comments! - I'm particularly interested in ideas about what we can do with this knowledge....

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