This time, I’d like to talk about the Isis myth that is, for many, the most unsettling when we are first learning our Isis lore; and that is the tale of how Isis tricked the Sun God Re into revealing His most secret name and thereby gained additional power for Herself and for Her son, Horus. Know that story? If not, here’s a link to Isis Magic on Googlebooks; go to page 61 and start reading there. That way I can leave space in this post for another intriguingly similar story I want to tell.

The Sun God, Re, Who Isis knew by His own name.

On the basis of this tale, some have decided that Isis is an evil magician. I have even seen the story—recently, I might add—used as an argument to show how naturally underhanded all women are. And, on the face of it, the tale is troubling. Isis decides to gain power. She deliberately poisons Re, then cures Him only after He reveals to Her His most secret, hidden, and powerful name. The name gives Isis Divine power equal to Re’s and She secures from Re a promise that He will give His Two Eyes, the sun and moon, to Her son Horus.

What are we to make of this? Is Isis just another underhanded and tricky female? Perhaps we should consider Her as one of the Trickster Deities. She’s a Divine Magician, after all, and magicians are always tricky. Or maybe Isis was forced to resort to magical artifice to break through a Divine glass ceiling. Think of royal women in the Egyptian court. Because they did not have outright power equal to men’s, they would have used tricks, subterfuge, perhaps even poison, as a path to power. We must remember that it is always human beings who tell these stories, thus all stories come through a human filter.

As you might guess, none of these explanations satisfy me. I do have one that does, but it will take me a little while to get to my point, so I hope you’ll bear with me.

Background Info

There are several things you should know about this story. First, the version of the tale that has come down to us is from a papyrus known as the Turin Papyrus. It has been dated to Egypt’s 20th dynasty, about 1186-1169 BCE. No doubt, the story itself is much, much older, but the version we have comes from the later time. Second, the story is part of a healing formula to cure snakebite. Egyptian medicine always had a magical prescription as well as whatever herbal or surgical therapy was given. Such prescriptions often included a myth that related to the problem, followed by a statement that just as so-and-so was cured in the myth, so shall the sufferer be cured. In this case, just as Re was cured by Isis, so shall the snakebite sufferer be cured. Instruction is given at the end of the formula to recite it over images of the main characters in the story.

The Sun God grew old...

Elements of the Myth: the old king

The papyrus tells us that Re was so old that He drooled. In a time when the pharaoh was considered a God, and therefore should be the epitome of physical, mental and spiritual perfection, it would hardly be acceptable to have a ruler so old He drooled. Myths such as the death of the Holly King in Celtic countries, ritual combat to the death between the outgoing priest of Diana at the grove of Nemi and an incoming hopeful, and Arthurian legends of the Wounded King of the Wasteland—all point to the archetypal nature of this theme.

Elements of the Myth: the Goddess of Renewal

If you know anything about Isis, you know that one of Her key powers is the ability to renew and resurrect. The Turin papyrus tells us that Isis came to Re with Her magic and that Her “mouth was full of the breath of life.” When Sirius, the Star of Isis, rose in late summer, it signaled the beginning of the New Year and the renewal of all things. Her magic brought Osiris back to life enough to conceive Horus and then gave Him a new existance as Lord of the Dead. Isis is the ancient Bird of Prey Goddess, the Lady of Death and Regeneration, an identity that She has never lost, even to this day. Since the failing Re does not willingly give up His power, Isis must create the conditions that force the old ruler to the point of renewal.

Elements of the Myth: the saliva of the God

In Egypt, magic might be worked by means of bodily fluids. Saliva, semen, blood, sweat, milk, and other bodily fluids were a means of creation. If it was the blood, sweat, and tears of the Deities, it was even more creative and powerful. Since Re drooled, rather than purposefully spitting (for example, when Atum creatively spit to give birth to the Goddess Tefnut), He was wasting His power.

The holy serpent of renewal

Elements of the Myth: the holy serpent

Yet, the Goddess does not let it go to waste. Instead, She mixes Re’s drool with earth, the place of renewal from which new life grows, to create a holy cobra. The cobra is a mixture of life—in that it is made partly of earth and will ultimately cause Re to be healed—and death—in that it is made from the wasted generative power of Re and is a symbol of His unfitness for His throne. And of course, the serpent is an almost universal symbol of renewal due to the snake’s ability to shed its skin and emerge new from the experience.

In the form of the holy cobra, Re’s own weakness strikes Him and brings Him more pain than He has ever before experienced. He quakes with cold and burns with fire.

Elements of the Myth: name magic

In Egyptian magical theory, to know someone or something’s name was to be able to access its essence at the time of Creation, when all heka was at its more pure and potent. In this story, Re is considered the most powerful Deity in the universe (the tale also contains a litany of Re’s great powers). Knowing His secret name confers ultimate power; including the power to heal. As Isis tells Re, “the person who hath declared his name shall live.”

If this story is very ancient, it may be that its original form, in which Isis renews Re simply because that’s what the Goddess does, was lost. Perhaps later scribes tried to explain the Mystery to themselves and their audiences by framing it as a trick to gain power. Thus what may seem like simple blackmail is actually much more profound. Re is being forced to reveal a most secret and inner part of Himself to the Goddess. To be healed, He must make Himself vulnerable to the Lady of Renewal. He must accept both Her help and Her very real power.

Once Re gives Himself over to Isis, He is healed, renewed in strength and power. He learns that He must give up in order to gain. He learns to trust the Goddess Whom He has been forced to trust. And the Goddess proves Herself worthy. In no successive myth do we ever find any evidence that Isis abuses the ultimate power She has gained.

But Wait, There’s More

In the very same papyrus in which this story is found, there is a parallel story involving Horus and Set. It, too, is a magical snakebite cure. Here’s that story:

Horus and Set as sphinxes flanking a Cow Goddess

Horus and Set were voyaging together on Horus’ golden barque. Suddenly, Set cried out, “Come to me Horus, I have been bitten!”

And Horus turned to Set and said, “Tell Me Thy name, that I may work magic for Thee. One works magic for a man through his name, and a God is greater than His reputation.”

Set replied, “I am Yesterday, I am Today, I am Tomorrow That Has Not Yet Come.”

But Horus said, “No, Thou art not Yesterday, Today, or Tomorrow That Has Not Yet Come. Tell me Thy name, that I may work magic for Thee. One works magic for a man through his name, and a God is greater than His reputation.”

So Set said, “I am a Quiver of Arrows, I am a Cauldron of Disturbance.”

“No, Thou art not,” said Horus and repeated what He had said before.

“I am a Man of a Thousand Cubits, Whose Reputation is Not Known.”

“No, Thou art not,” said Horus and repeated again what He had said.

“I am a Threshing Floor; I am a Jug of Milk, Milked from the Breast of Bastet.

“No, Thou art not,” said Horus again.

Finally, Set replied with His True Name, “I am a Man of a Million Cubits Whose Name is Evil Day. As for the Day of Giving Birth or of Conceiving, There is No Giving Birth and Trees Bear No Fruit.”

The formula concludes with the promise that the sufferer will be made as sound as Horus was by Isis, even though in this story Horus is one Who is pushing Set to reveal His true name, the cure is attributed to Isis.

What the Trickster Teaches

It seems clear to me that a key to both of these myths is vulnerability to the Divine that precedes healing. We must reveal our innermost selves, symbolized by our true name, to Goddess, to God. We must do so even if, like Set, it is a name with which we are not entirely comfortable. We must give ourselves over to the Divine, as we are, right now, with no masks. Only in this state of radical openness can we receive the renewing gifts that Divinity has for us. Like Re and like Set, we must—at least eventually—be willing to acknowledge and trust the Divine in order to bring Its power into our lives. This vulnerability and revelation of truth can be painful, like poison; and yet the truth always frees us.

Like Re especially, we must acknowledge the power of Goddess and make ourselves open to Her. If we don’t, She will find a way—perhaps a rather difficult way—to bring that lack to our attention. But when we do reveal ourselves to Her, we can know Her and be known by Her. We can enter into mystical communion with Her as we move through the natural cycle of death and renewal that is guided by Her hand.

Let me receive the blessings of Isis, let me kiss Her mouth that is full of the breath of life.

My previous shyness stems from not wanting to offend those, perhaps especially modern reconstructionists, who feel very strongly that the Hellenized, then Romanized, Isis and the Egyptian Iset are decidedly not the same Goddess. So just let me preface my remarks by saying that I respect in the extreme what such devotees are doing to resurrect the ancient Egyptian worship in its ancient forms, to the extent that that can be done. I am inspired by and admire their work.

Are Iset and Isis the same Goddess?

Yet, I must confess that, with more years of both study and devotion to this particular Goddess under my belt than I sometimes care to admit, I feel just as strongly that “Isis” and “Iset” are indeed the same Great Goddess.

This statement, of course, begs several questions. What do I mean by “Goddess?” And what do I mean by “are the same?”

I talk a bit about what I mean by “Goddess” in one of my previous, more oblique posts, which you’ll find here. For me, ultimately, Isis is the Divine. She can express Herself as one among other Divine Beings, as She did in ancient Egypt, or She can show Herself as THE Divine Being, also as She did in ancient Egypt under the epithet Ta Uaet, the Only One (an epithet used of other Egyptian Deities as well). Isis is a flow of conscious Divinity that can dance with other holy currents or subsume them all like a great river. Nonetheless, the current that She is has a particular “flavor” or feeling that is recognizable to those of us who have loved Her for a very long time.

For me, that flavor tastes of magic and wisdom, power and love. And yes, it has an Egyptian flavor, too. For that is where people first called Her by the name that has never been forgotten from the first time it was spoken to the present day. I am very fond of Her Egyptian-ness; it was one of the things that first drew me to Her. The culture from which She first emerged as a named Deity is part of Her charm and part of my attraction to Her.

But if we believe that a Deity can only be of the culture in which She or He was first honored, then we are positing a rather fragmented polytheism as the Divine reality. Certainly, there are those in the modern Neo-Pagan movement who prefer this separate-but-equal viewpoint—perhaps especially those who have been to just one too many rituals in which Odin, Isis, Quan Yin, and the Greenman were all invoked together in one great holy mashup. Believe me, I feel your pain.

But that’s not what happened with Isis in the ancient world. They weren’t trying to reconstruct the worship of Isis or create Neo-Paganism; they were living the worship of Isis as it existed at the time. More than anything else, the people who carried Isis into lands-other-than-Egypt were translating Her for people in other cultures. That’s why we find Isis assimilating so many other local Goddesses (and some Gods). “O, you’ll like Isis. She’s sorta like your Goddess XYZ, and not only that…” This was happening even inside of Egypt itself.

That’s because the ancient Egyptians, at least the learned priesthood, had a more fluid view of the Divine reality. Deities could be “in” each other. Their names could be joined in order to express certain spiritual concepts. One Deity could be the ba, or soul, of another one. Their polytheism was not fragmented, but interconnected. I believe that this underlying interconnection of the Divine influenced later Neoplatonism, which posits an underlying Divine Oneness, even though that unity expresses Itself in many Divine personalities, from Goddesses and Gods to the personal genius or spirit (or ba or ka) of the human being. That’s much closer to where I find myself on the whole structure-of-the-Divine-reality question.

The River of Isis flows through time. (Photo by Tim Laman.)

Is is possible that this flowing Divine reality could somehow be stopped by national boundaries? Obviously, my answer is no. The Divine current most certainly can cross any such boundaries. The current Itself doesn’t change. It’s the people responding to that current who provide the variables. People will always respond in ways they are used to from their own culture. Yet our perception isn’t Her reality. The River of Isis is the same river, from the same source, whether it flows through the great halls of Egypt or a shrine on the Greek island of Delos or the temple in my backyard in Portland, Oregon.

So let’s get down to some specifics of what I mean by “are the same.” Just as a great river twists, moving its channel to flow around natural features of the land, so the River of Isis turns as It moves into other cultures. Again, it it still the same river flowing from the same source, but it may look different to the casual observer. Yet if the water were chemically analyzed, there is no doubt that its true source could be detected. The River of Isis always has a little Nile mud in Its deep waters.

Often, when trying to differentiate Iset from Isis, people will point to the different personalities that Iset and Isis supposedly present to worshipers. Iset is fierce, a funerary Goddess, mother of Horus/Pharaoh, and Great of Magic; Isis is a sweet and loving Great Mother Goddess. They also point to Isis’ connection with the moon, which the Egyptian Iset did not have. I explain that here.

Yet if you look more closely at the later traditions associated with Isis, you will find that there is a great deal of continuity with Her earlier Egyptian self. I trace the history of Her worship and point out those resonances throughout Isis Magic. Indeed Isis’ Greek and Roman worshipers were concerned with maintaining Her Egyptian-ness; it was one of the things they liked about Her, too. So let’s take a quick look at some of the correspondences:

Fierceness

In the oldest Egyptian materials, Iset is ruthless in Her quest to ensure that Her son Hor inherits the throne of His father, following Usir’s (Osiris’) death and to ensure the punishment of His usurping uncle Set. She is like a mother lion protecting Her cub. Now here is the sweet Mother Goddess in a much later text from the Greek Magical Papyri:

For Isis raised up a loud cry, and the world was thrown into confusion. She tosses and turns on her holy bed and its bonds and those of the daimon world are smashed to pieces…

These papyri are dated broadly from the 2nd century BCE to the 5th century CE. In other words, they’re pretty late. And She sounds pretty fierce to me. The Greek traveler, Pausanias, writing in the 2nd century CE—at the height of Isis’ popularity in the Mediterranean region—tells several cautionary tales about those who foolishly pry into the Goddess’ Mysteries:

They say that once a profane man, who was not one of those descending into the shrine, when the pyre began to burn, entered the shrine to satisfy his rash inquisitiveness. It is said that everywhere he saw ghosts, and on returning to Tithorea and telling what he had seen he departed this life.

I have heard a similar story from a man of Phoenicia that the Egyptians hold the feast for Isis at a time when they say she is mourning for Osiris. At this time the Nile begins to rise, and it is a saying among many of the natives that what makes the river rise and water their fields is the tears of Isis. At that time then, so said my Phoenician, the Roman governor of Egypt bribed a man to go down into the shrine of Isis in Coptos. The man dispatched into the shrine returned indeed out of it, but after relating what he had seen, he too, so I was told, died immediately. So it appears that Homer’s verse speaks the truth when it says that it bodes no good to man to see godhead face to face. (Pausanias, Book X, Phocus, Ozolian Locri, 32, 10-17)

Tithorea was a Greek town with an Isis sanctuary; the Coptos tale is clearly late, from Roman-occupied Egypt. Fierce then. Fierce now; just ask Her priestesses and priests about Isis, the Ass Kicker.

A Funerary Goddess

Isis is strongly associated with the Egyptian funerary and otherworld tradition from the very beginning. And She most certainly did not lose this important connection, even as She moved into the Greek and Roman worlds. Just as Usir is glad to see Isis when He arrives in the otherworld, so the Roman initiate of the Mysteries of Isis expected to find Her in the afterlife, waiting for him:

…and when you have completed the span of your lifetime, you will pass down to the netherworld, but there also, in the very midst of the subterranean hemisphere, you shall often worship me who you now see [Isis], as one who favors you, shining in the darkness of Acheron and ruling in the Stygian depths, when you the while shall dwell in the Elysian fields. (Apuleius, Metamorphoses, Book XI, chapter 6)

Indeed Her Mysteries are an initiation into death; an inoculation so that Her initiates no longer fear, but enter into the mysterious realm of death under Her protection—just as She had always protected Her Egyptian children by wrapping Her great wings about their sarcophagi.

In the dismemberment section, he has several paragraphs about the two Egyptian words for “heart,” ib and hati. Generally, they’re considered synonyms, but as with all things in Egyptology, there are other opinions. One researcher believes he’s found evidence that ib may refer to all the internal organs as a group—the “insides”—so that, metaphorically, ib would refer to the emotional and inner life of a person; “having a gut feeling” let’s say. The insides were considered to be inherited by the child from the mother, thus “the heart that I had from my mother,” a phrase often found in the funerary texts, would refer to the physical guts as well as an emotional, internal inheritance. The “heart that I had from my mother” was also the heart that connected the Egyptian to her or his genetic heritage. The hati, in contrast, is the literal heart, the muscle itself, and metaphorically relates to things like consciousness, memory, and personal identity, which are not inherited from the mother, but developed by the individual during life. Thus it would be the hati that is weighed against the Feather of Truth in the post mortum Judgment of Osiris.

A heart amulet inscribed with magical text

On the other hand, many heart scarab amulets (worked into the mummy wrappings at the place of the heart) ask “my heart of my mother,” which, according to this this theory, would be the inherited ib rather than the individualized hati, not to speak badly of the deceased during the weighing. So this ib-hati distinction can’t be all there is to it. Apparently both hearts have their tales to tell. One of the Coffin Texts formulates it this way:

There will be given to you your heart (ib) which you had from your mother, your heart (hati) which belongs to your body, your soul which was upon the earth, your corpse which was upon the ground.

The parallelism of the sentence might provide a clue. In the same way that soul is intangible and corpse is tangible, perhaps the “heart which you had from your mother” and “your heart which belongs to your body” are intangible and tangible concepts, too. Because both the ib and the hati will be given to the deceased, it is the totality of the heart, in both physical and spiritual aspects, that is required in the otherworld; both will be needed for rebirth. It’s just a thought, but the parallel structure of this particular text seems to me to point in that direction.

Give to me my heart that I had from my Mother, my Great Mother, Isis.

All of this finally brings me to the Isis Heart, the Iset Ib, that I mention throughout Isis Magic. The Isis Heart is the intangible, spiritual ” heart that I had from my Mother,” the Great Mother of us all, Isis. It is that taste, that spark, that tiny piece of the Goddess that lives within all of us and through which we can access Her greater Divine Heart and Being.

Just as the ancient Egyptian dead needed their hearts, ib and hati, to be reborn, we, too, need our hati heart to live and our ib heart to commune with the Divine. The Iset Ib is the “heart that I had from my Mother” and through it, we can discover Her at any time.

Just be still. Breathe. Focus on your hati heart, the living muscle in your body. Relax that muscle; open your heart. Open to the love and the magic of Isis. Soon, your Isis Heart, your Iset Ib, will be awakened…and you shall be “aware in my heart,” as the Book of Coming Forth by Day says.

Enjoy and I hope you’ll give the meditation a try.

The Star of Isis is directly overhead at the New Year. "Open up your head" and let the Goddess light fill you.

Yet for devotees of Isis, there is a New Year’s treat to be had.

You see, for those of us in the northern hemisphere, Sirius reaches its highest point in the night sky at this time of year. The beautiful, glittering star of Isis reaches midheaven, directly above us, on January first and can be seen shimmering in that position for about the first week of January. Just as the heliacal rising of Sirius heralded the ancient Egyptian New Year, so the midheaven arrival of Sirius can serve as a marker for our modern New Year’s celebration.

Isis Magic offers a New Year’s ritual in which you receive guidance for the coming year in the form of oracles from Isis and Nephthys. But here, I’d like to share with you a modification of the Lotus Wand of Isis, designed to help you take advantage of the presence of the Star of Isis directly overhead.

In Formula 467 of the Coffin Texts, one of the ways the deceased prepares to meet the Deities and beings of the otherworld is that she has, “come into you, having opened up my head and aroused my body…” We, too can open up our heads and arouse our bodies for Isis so that—at this special time of year, a time of new beginnings—we may receive Isis’ magic, wisdom, power, and love, borne on the wings of Her starlight. At the New Year, the light of the Goddess is nothing less than a star to guide us.

In the standard Lotus Wand of Isis, we would work the energy from the top down through the shenu in the centers of our bodies. In this modified version, we’ll work from the bottom up so that we first “arouse our bodies” and then “open up our heads” to the beautiful light of Isis.

The Lotus Wand of Isis for the New Year

Enter the temple, face east, and give the Sign of the Wings Of Isis. Then repeat the following statement until you are certain that it is so.

Priest/ess:      I am a Priest/ess (or Child of Isis, if you are not a dedicated Priestess or Priest) of Isis. I am a Handmaiden/Servant of the Goddess.

Purification & Consecration

Purify and consecrate the temple using the general House of Isis method. When complete, return to the center of the temple and face east. Give the Sign of the Wings of Isis.

Priest/ess:      Isis is all things and all things are Isis.

Arousing Your Body

Let your attention center in the shen beneath your feet. Be aware of the energy of Isis of the Earth beneath you. With a breath, draw in that energy into the shen beneath your feet.

Priest/ess:     (Vibrating) ISIS SOTHIS. (Or, if you prefer to use Egyptian rather than Greek, ISET SOPDET).

As Her energy fills the shen, feel the Life of Isis that is the life in all things. Experience this, then with another breath, draw energy up from the shen beneath your feet to the shen between your knees.

Priest/ess:      (Vibrating) ISIS SOTHIS.

As the energy flows into this shen, it, too, fills with the light of the Goddess. When you have experienced this, take another breath and draw energy from the knee shen to the shen at your genitals.

Priest/ess:       (Vibrating) ISIS SOTHIS.

As the energy enters this shen, it too fills with Her strength and beauty. Let yourself feel this then, with another breath, energy is drawn from the genitals into the shen at your heart.

Priest/ess:      (Vibrating) ISIS SOTHIS.

As the energy flows into your heart, it fills, vibrating with life. Feel and see it shining, upheld by the energy of Isis. Experience this then, with another breath, draw energy from your heart into the shen at your throat.

Priest/ess:      (Vibrating) ISIS SOTHIS.

As the energy flows into this shen, it glows with the beauty of Isis. Feel Her Words of Power in your throat, on your lips, then, with another breath, draw energy from your throat to the shen at your third eye, or forehead. Be sure to visualize this shen in the center of your brain.

Priest/ess:      (Vibrating) ISIS SOTHIS.

Let your attention be on your mind seeded within your brain within your head. Release any tightness in your head, in your brain or in your mind. Feel your brain and scalp opening, relaxing. Let your mind expand.

Priest/ess:      O Iset Sopdet, Isis Sothis, Thou Beautiful Herald of the New Year, I invoke Thee and ask Thee to help me open to Thee. As I have aroused my body for Thee, help me open up my head that I may receive Thy light and magic and power and wisdom and love. (Vibrating) ISIS SOTHIS.

Let the energy of your prayer move from the third eye to the shen above your head. Open that shen as wide as you possibly can. Pull up the energy from the earth, all the way to your head and fling your head open wide to Isis, only Isis. 

Filling with Her Light

Visualize the star of Isis above your head. See Her light sparkling down on you, as you breathe and fill the shen above your head with Her light. Fill that shen until you can fill no more. When you are completely full, draw in breath and visualize starlight flowing down into your head, your third eye, your throat, and to your heart. Exhale and send the light to your genitals, knees, and the shen beneath your feet. Let the light pool beneath you. Then draw in breath and feel the light spiraling around the outside of your aura, protecting and strengthening. Let it spiral into the shen above your head. Exhale and let the light flow out to the star of Isis and into the heavens. 

Repeat this circulation at least twice more.

Closing

You may sit in meditation for a time. When you are ready, move to the east and make the Sign of the Wings of Isis to close the temple.

Priest/ess:    Lady of the Guiding Star, Queen of the New Year. Be Thou blessed and may Thy diamond starlight always fill me. Amma, Iset.

The Holy Mother & Her Holy Child

First, there is absolutely nothing wrong with celebrating the birth of Jesus Christ, the bringer of the light of Christianity to its believers, at that time of year when the light of the sun begins its return to the world. It is the perfect symbol and early Christians would have been silly to ignore it.

The other thing that bothered me was that I thought that the December 25th date was stretching the truth to make a point; the point being that the “real meaning of Christmas” was, in fact, the celebration of a Pagan Deity. Why—when there are so very many legitimate connections between the Deities of all the world’s pantheons—should we have to distort the truth to make that point? (Please see my previous posts, Mary Christmas and Happy Easter for some of those Isiac-Christian connections.)

Well, it finally bothered me enough that I decided to find out where that whole Horus-born-on-December-25th thing came from.

I first checked in with my pal Plutarch since I know he mentions a couple of Egyptian winter solstice traditions—and since Horus-born-on-the-25th seemed likely to have been a late Pagan tradition. Writing in the late 1st and early 2nd centuries CE, Plutarch tells us that Harpocrates (from Hor-pa-khered,  Horus the Child) is born on the winter solstice (I quote it here at length because I like the lead-in):

Thus we shall attack the many boring people who find pleasure in associating the activities of these gods with the seasonal changes of the atmosphere or with the growths, sowing, and plowing of crops, and who say that Osiris is being buried when the corn is sown and hidden in the earth, and that he lives again and reappears when it begins to sprout. For this reason it is said that Isis, when she was aware of her being pregnant, put on a protective amulet on the sixth day of Phaophi, and at the winter solstice gave birth to Harpocrates, imperfect and prematurely born, amid plants that burgeoned and sprouted before their season . . . and they are said to celebrate the days of her confinement after the spring equinox. (Plutarch, On Isis and Osiris, 65B-c)

Since Horus is a solar God, His birth at the winter solstice—even to the extent that He is “imperfect and prematurely born” at that time—makes symbolic sense. This tradition was still going strong by the 4th and 5th centuries CE, for another writer, Macrobius, famous for his book about the Saturnalia, notes that:

…at the winter solstice, the sun would seem to be a little child like that which the Egyptians bring forth from a shrine on the apponted day, since the day is then at its shortest and the god is accordingly shown as a tiny infant. (Macrobius, Saturnalia, 1.18:10

Harpocrates with His finger to His mouth in a childish gesture later interpreted as an admonition to silence

So this was an Egyptian tradition at least from the time of Plutarch. But was it so earlier? Well, I’m still looking into that. (Please see the Addendum at the end of this post.) But at least one author has noted that in the time of Pharaoh Amenemhet I (approx. 1991-1962 BCE), the pharaoh took a new title as the sun approached winter solstice in the 17th year of his reign. The title was Nem-mestu, Repeater of Births, a title also given to the dead and which may refer to daily solar rebirth or even to reincarnation. In addition to the normal pharaoh-sun connection, the king is even more strongly associating himself with the sun by taking the title, and it would seen from the timing that he is particularly associating himself with the winter solstice sun. At the very least, this points to the importance of the winter solstice to Egyptian tradition.

Just as there are today, there were other winter holy days around the time of the winter solstice. You’re probably familiar with the Roman Saturnalia (Greek Kronia) which took place from December 17th through the 23rd (at its most developed stage). It was a carnivalesque festival with plenty of partying and gift-giving on the last day, just a day or two from the astronomical solstice. The 4th century CE Christian polemicist, Epiphanius, notes two very interesting Pagan festivals that took place “on the very night of Epiphany,” which is Epiphanius’ preferred date for the birth of the Christos. He grouches that “many places deceitfully celebrate a very great festival on the very night of the Epiphany, to deceive the idolaters who believe them into hoping in the imposture and not seeking the truth.” (Epiphanius, Panarion, 22,8) Of the celebration in Alexandria, he writes:

First, at Alexandria, in the Koreum, as they call it; it is a very large temple, the shrine of Kore. They stay up all night singing hymns to the idol with a flute accompaniment. And when they have concluded their nightlong vigil, torchbearers descend into an underground shrine after cockcrow and bring up a wooden image which is seated naked on a litter. It has a sign of the cross inlaid with gold on its forehead, two other such signs, one on each hand and two other signs, one actually on each of its two knees—altogether five signs with a gold impress. And they carry the image itself seven times around the innermost shrine with flutes, tambourines and hymns, hold a feast, and take it back down to its place underground. And when you ask them what this mystery means, they reply that today, at this hour Kore—that is, the Virgin—gave birth to Aion. (Epiphanius, Panarion, 22,9)

On this protective amulet, Isis & Nephthys guard the shining solar child, Horus.

Some scholars believe that the Alexandrian Virgin was Isis (some ancient Egyptian Hymns call Isis “virgin;” in the Hermetic text, Kore Kosmou, Isis is likely the “Cosmic Virgin” of the title) and that the “crosses” on Her limbs may have been ankhs. Could be, but doesn’t have to be; Alexandria was, after all, a polytheistic city. Epiphanius goes on to mention other identical and, in his mind, deceitful festivals in Petra and in Elusa celebrating the birth of the “only son of the Lord” of a Virgin Goddess. In Petra, the Holy Child is Dusares, an Arabian God identified with Dionysos, Who was, in turn, identified with Helios, the sun. (Epiphanius, Panarion, 22,11)

Okay, so we have the solar Holy Child’s birth at or around the winter solstice. Makes perfect sense. But what about that December 25th date?

Well, you see, the Roman calendar went through a certain amount of upheaval and—bottom line—December 25th was considered the “traditional” date of the winter solstice, even if that was off from astronomical solstice. (If you want to calendar geek on that, check this out or  this.) We have from a number of sources, including Epiphanius, that “the eighth before the Kalends of January” was considered to be the winter solstice. (Epiphanius, Panarion, 22,3) Because of the inclusive way the Romans counted, this “eighth before the Kalends” was December 25th.

What’s more, the early Christians who chose that date, chose it precisely because it was the winter solstice and was connected to the return of the light. In a work attributed, perhaps falsely, to the 4th century Christian church father John Chrysostom, the writer connects the birth of Jesus with the birth of Sol Invictus, the Unconquerable Sun, which was celebrated on Rome’s traditional winter solstice, December 25th:

But Our Lord, too, is born in the month of December . . . the eight before the calends of January [25 December] . . ., But they call it the “Birthday of the Unconquered.” Who indeed is so unconquered as Our Lord? Or, if they say that it is the birthday of the sun, He is the Sun of Justice. (Chrysostom, De Solstitia et Aequinoctia Conceptionis et Nativitatis Nostri Iesu Christi et Iohannis Baptistae; “On the conceptions and births of our Jesus Christ and John the Baptist on the solstices and equinoxes.”)

Another interesting thing about the choice of December 25th is that—even just those few days after the astronomical solstice—you can begin to see that the light is indeed returning. Some scholars have suggested that the December 25th date for the solstice reflects this perceivable change, so that even though the exact moment of astronomical solstice is prior to the 25th, it becomes noticeable about the 25th.

Artist Alex Grey's mesmerizing Cosmic Christ; now we're talking Gods!

So there we have it. There actually IS reason to connect the winter solstice birth date of Isis’ Holy Child, Horus, with the traditional December 25th birth date of Mary’s Holy Child, Jesus. Yet, I don’t think early Christians “stole” the date from Horus (or any of the other solar Gods Who always were and always will be born on the winter solstice). Nor do I think the fact that the date has Pagan antecedents means Christianity was built on a lie or in any way denigrates Christianity, nor should we think that Christians merely copied their religion from the Pagans around them. For early Christians, as for ancient Egyptians—and indeed for both ancient and modern worlds—the return of the light at winter solstice is at once an uplifting environmental fact and a hopeful spiritual symbol.

And so I wish you all Many Happy Returns of the Light on this holy day of December 25th.

Addendum: I’ve reviewed my materials and confirmed that, yes—as you might expect from a sun-focused culture—the winter solstice was quite important in Egyptian culture and religion. There are plenty of inscriptions and texts to support that, and a number of temples and monuments are oriented toward the winter solstice sunrise, especially those dedicated to Re-Hor-Akhty, Re-Horus of the Horizon.

Early in Egyptian history, Isis was firmly associated with the heavens—with the star Sirius in particular, and even with the sun—but She was not considered a Moon Goddess.

The horns of the Moon Goddess rising

Moon Gods were the norm for Egypt—Iah, Thoth, Khonsu, and Osiris are among the most prominent and the moon’s phases were quite important to the ancient Egyptians. Scholars generally agree that the first Egyptian calendars, like those of so many ancient people, were lunar based. The temples marked the moon’s changes and celebrated the waxing and full phases, though they are somewhat silent about the waning moon. (If anyone knows of a good scholarly source for information on the Egyptian lunar festivals, please, please tell me…I am still searching!) But the face the Egyptians saw in the moon was masculine rather than feminine.

The Greeks and the Romans, on the other hand, were all about the Moon Goddess. In fact, the moon itself was simply called “the Goddess.” People spoke of doing something “when the Goddess rises.” They would kiss their hands, extending them toward the rising moon, “to greet the Goddess.” Magical texts give instructions for performing a certain working “on the first of the Goddess,” meaning at the new moon.

Because so much of our information about Isis came from these Moon Goddess-loving people, today when we think of Isis, the moon is one of the first things we associate with Her. Yet, interestingly, it seems to have been a third century BCE Egyptian priest named Manetho who first connected Isis with the moon. By the following century, when Plutarch recorded the most complete version of the Isis-Osiris myth we have, the tradition of Isis as a Goddess of the Moon was firmly established—even in Egypt.

A veiled Isis, looking both lunar and Madonna-like. Just a wonderful image.

Of course, it was easy to associate the fertility-bringing moon with the fertile Mother Isis. The ancient world also associated love affairs with the moon (the romance of moonlight, you know) and, in Her passion for Osiris, Isis was a famous lover. Of course, the moon and the obscuring darkness of night were connected with magic, too—and Isis was one of Egypt’s Mightiest Magicians from the beginning. One Egyptian story told how a particular magical scroll—which the tale calls a “mystery of the Goddess Isis”—was discovered when a moonbeam fell upon its hiding place, enabling a lector priest in Isis’ temple to find it.

Today, we also connect the moon with emotions, the deep, the waters, the feminine (taking our cue from the ancient Greeks and Romans, no doubt), the home, Mystery, and change (to name but a few). And Isis can definitely be associated with all of these things—from the emotional passion of Her myths to Her ancient Mysteries and Her enduring role as the Goddess of Regeneration and Transformation.

So is Isis a Moon Goddess? She certainly has been for millennia. Whether we choose to honor Her in this form has more to do with us than with Her. A modern NeoPagan will probably be quite comfortable working with Isis as a Lunar Goddess; a Kemetic Reconstructionist, less so. But Isis is a Great Goddess; She is All, and so She is unquestionably to be found in the deep and holy Mysteries of the Moon.

For myself, while I do find Her in the moon, I resonate more strongly with Isis of the Stars and Isis of the Eternities of Space. Nevertheless, I feel called to explore this aspect of Her. And someday, when a beam of moonlight illuminates my own inspiration, I fully intend to create a series of lunar rituals with Isis as their heart and soul.

]]> http://isiopolis.wordpress.com/2011/12/16/is-isis-a-moon-goddess/feed/ 2 kleaisidora Winter+Solstice+with+Moon tumblr_lsw3tnDNuN1qbbdm3o1_500 http://isiopolis.wordpress.com/2011/12/02/is-isis-a-black-goddess/ http://isiopolis.wordpress.com/2011/12/02/is-isis-a-black-goddess/#comments Fri, 02 Dec 2011 19:33:23 +0000 Isidora http://isiopolis.wordpress.com/?p=1125 ]]> Yes, indeed She is.

Egyptian woman and man in the Otherworld, worshipping.

Like most people, ancient and modern, the Egyptians depicted their Deities (at least the anthropomorphic ones) as more beautiful, more powerful, more perfect images of themselves. So, of course, Isis was shown as a strong and beautiful Egyptian woman.

Images of the Goddess show Her with the skin color and features of Her countrywomen and men. As Egypt is an African nation, Isis is an African Goddess. In at least one ancient text, She is specifically a black African Goddess when She says of Herself, “I am the Nubian and I have descended from heaven.” (Nubia was what is now southern Egypt and northern Sudan. Nubian pharaohs ruled Egypt as its 25th Dynasty.) Another text, from the Ptolemaic temple of Hathor at Denderah, says that Isis was born a “black and ruddy woman, endowed with life, sweet of love”.

"Black Isis" by Zingaia. You can find her on Deviant Art.

Modern artists are increasingly depicting Isis as a black woman and I’m very happy to see their beautiful work showing up online more frequently.

But blackness wasn’t just about ethnic heritage to the Egyptians. It was also symbolic. Black was the color of fertility, the color of the rich, black silt that the Nile deposited on Egyptian fields during the Inundation. Black was the color of the healing statues that were carved with magical formulae and over which sufferers poured water, then drank the magically infused water as a medicine. Black is the color of the heavens at night, from which the Goddess descends to us as a Nubian. Black is the color of the dead, as the resins used in mummification turned dark over time.

When the worship of Isis passed into Hellenistic lands, the Greek symbolism of the color black came into play in Isiac iconography as well. In Greek-influenced lands, black was associated with death and the underworld, thus it was the Greek color of mourning. As Isis is a mourning Goddess, She was often depicted wearing robes of black and Melanophoros, “Wearer of the Black,” became one of Her epithets.

Green Isis on a sarcophagus; I know, it looks like a tattoo, but it's a cartonnage sarcophagus.

In Egyptian symbolism, the colors black and green were interchangeable. Everything we associate with the color green—life, freshness, renewal—the Egyptians also associated with green and with black. In scenes of the Otherworld, we often see both Isis and Osiris painted with green skin. Just as the rich black silt from the Nile brings forth bright green plants; the rich darkness of the Otherworld is overseen by the bright Goddess and God of Renewal, Isis and Osiris.

In the same way that green and black were associated, green and blue were also related concepts. Blue was specifically used to indicate the waters and the heavens, and of course, both were essential for the greening of the land of Egypt. Since all these concepts were connected, the throne symbol on Isis’ head was frequently painted in black, green, or blue. Her skin might be blue, too, as in the example above. And, like other Deities, Isis was described as having blue lapis lazuli hair.

Golden Isis

But the ancient Egyptians didn’t stop with black, green, and blue. Since skin color was symbolic, it was very flexible. Isis is also shown with the yellow skin that Egyptian artists sometimes used for Egyptian women or the golden skin of Goddesses and Gods. Indeed, Egyptian tradition held that all the Deities had golden skin. This was literally true when it came to the many statues or reliefs of the Deities that were covered in gold. And it was symbolically true as a way to express the purity and incorruptibility of the Divine Ones for gold is the one metal that never corrodes.

Roman Isis, from the Farnese Collection in Naples. Image copyright Forrest 2009.

When Isis made Her entrance into the Greek and Roman world, just as the Egyptians had, those worshippers, too, portrayed their Goddess as more perfect reflections of themselves. There are a number of striking Roman statues of Isis in which the flesh of the Goddess is carved from white marble while Her robes are carved from black. (I honestly don’t know whether these statues were originally painted as we are discovering many ancient Greek statues were. Yet the fact that the artist used two different colors of marble seems to indicate that the marble itself was intended to be seen. And even if they were painted, the Goddess’ skin would have been pale, as She was portrayed in polychromatic Roman paintings.)

The Isis image on my own altar is black in both color and features. But I also have a green Isis, several golden Isises, a terracotta Isis, a turquoise Isis, and the lovely Farnese Isis on the left is one of my all-time favorite images of Her.

Yet all these images are simply ways human beings have portrayed Her so that we can more easily relate to Her. Isis is a Goddess, not a woman. She is not exclusively Egyptian or Roman or American or Japanese. She will always reflect back to us our own faces. She is of no color—and of every color. She is a Black Goddess, a Green Goddess, a White Goddess, a Red Goddess, a Purple Goddess. She is my Goddess. She is your Goddess. She belongs to us all. But more importantly for those who love Her, we all belong to Her.

Well, it turns out that the statue is called Isis, but it appears to be an Ibis, rather than an anthropomorphic image of the Goddess. Guess they should have called it, “Thoth.” Ah, well.

On the other hand, I learned two pretty cool things about this statue.

This is the "Isis" unveiled in Hyde Park, London.

First, it’s part of a fundraising effort to build an environmental education center in Hyde Park. Pretty sure Isis likes that.

And second, not long after unveiling the statue, it turns out that the chair of the Royal Parks Foundation (in charge of projects like the eco center) and his wife are excitedly expecting a third child. To quote the article, “Clearly, the goddess has worked her magic.”

Indeed.

"Star of Wonder" is a holiday play set in Victorian times and features a mysterious stage magician named Isis.

But did you know that there’s another story about Isis and a wayward would-be magician? This one is told by the second-century CE Greek writer Lucian.

Lucian tells the tale of a man named Eucrates who traveled to Egypt to study there with the priests and scribes of the temples. During his travels by boat, he met one of the learned magicians of Memphis. The mage told Eucrates that he had spent 23 years in the underground sanctuaries of Memphis and that Isis Herself had taught him his magic. During the trip, the magician-priest had occasion to display some of his prodigious powers—riding crocodiles and commanding the river with ease. Eucrates was fascinated and wanted to know more, so when the trip ended in Memphis and the magician invited Eucrates to stay with him, Eucrates accepted happily.

The magician told Eucrates to dismiss the servants he had with him since they would not be needed at the magician’s home. And this was quite true, for any time a chore needed doing, the magician would clothe a pole or broom, speak a word of power over it, and it would come to life and perform the work.

Eucrates wanted to learn this marvelous word so that he too could create servants so easily. He spied on the magician, overheard the three-syllable word, and tried the magic. Clothing a pole, he spoke the word. Instantly, the pole sprang to life and Eucrates told it to fetch water. This it did—and continued to do so until every container in the house was overflowing—for Eucrates had neglected to learn the word to halt the magical servant. In desperation, Eucrates tried to stop the pole by breaking it in two, but then both halves simply got up and continued bringing water. When at last Eucrates felt all was lost, the magician returned home, angrily spoke the appropriate words, and restored order.

You guessed it…this is the origin of the story of “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” told with so much glee in Walt Disney’s Fantasia.

I, too, have been the Sorceress’ apprentice for lo these many years. And Her lessons have been much more interesting, and valuable, than creating magical water fetchers. How about you?