Maybe you recently celebrated Easter – either in a religious way by going to church or in a fun way by having an Easter egg hunt.  Did you ever wonder where the tradition of the Easter bunny bringing eggs came from?  So often our celebrations are a mix of the religious and the traditional. We may not stop to wonder where the elements of our celebration came from. I’ve heard Christians say they resent that pagans are always trying to steal their holidays – not knowing that Christian holidays are often adaptations of much more ancient rituals.

In the case of Easter, parts of the holiday are built on older traditions and stories.  We believe that the word Easter comes from the Germanic goddess of spring Eostre.  In her book Goddesses for Everyday, Julie Loar tells us that this holiday is “the only feast day in the Christian calendar that is still tied to the moon.”  Easter is celebrated on the first Sunday after the first full moon – after the spring equinox.

As the goddess of renewal and new beginnings, Eostre brings the spring each year.  Julie recounts the story that led to the Easter Bunny tradition in this way:

One year the goddess was late, and a little girl found a bird near death from the cold.  The child turned to Eostre for help. In response a rainbow bridge appeared and Eostre came, clothed in her red robe of vibrant sunlight, melting the snows. Because the creature as wounded beyond repair, Easter changed it into a snow hare, who then brought gifts of rainbow eggs.

Many ancient world religions and some current ones have celebrations near the spring equinox dedicated to fertility and renewal of life.  What does your spring ritual look like?  For me, it feels like awakening after a long sleep to see life with new clarity and new joy.

After an amazing two weeks, I am back from Egypt.  I went looking for the divine feminine and I found it – along with a beautiful country and friendly people – excited about the recent revolution and happy to see Americans beginning to return as tourists.

Egypt has more than 5,000 years of recorded history and the people there have a long term perspective that most of us can’t begin to imagine.  At the crossroads of the eastern and western worlds, Egypt has been powerful and has also been conquered many times.  The revolution of February 2011 is seen in the context of the long history of the people.

We began our visit by staying at the Mena House – at the foot of the pyramids, but we didn’t actually visit the Great Pyramid and the Spinx until the end of our trip.  In between, we saw earlier pyramids and temples – some in ruins, some almost as if they had been in use recently. In everything we saw, I was struck by the balance between masculine and feminine – gods and goddesses; kings and queens.  The kind of balance of energy that is so sorely missing in our world today.

I had the privilege of traveling with Julie Loar – tour leader and author of Goddesses for Everyday – this was her 11th trip to Egypt http://www.julieloar.com/ .  Our group was small – just four of us – we called ourselves the four queens. Guardian Travel of Egypt http://www.guardiantravel.com/ was our host and I can’t say enough about our experience with Guardian.  Our Cairo host Abdullah met us at the airport – helped us with our bags and with getting checked in at the hotel. Later in the trip, he shared some of his insights into modern Egyptian life. Our tour guide was Sabray – he had such a deep knowledge of Egyptian history and a great sense of humor.  Sabray made the ancient temples come alive for us. Ratiba Elgabry is the owner of Guardian Travel and she invited us to her home for dinner and always made us feel welcome. Our drivers kept us safe under some of the wildest driving situations I have ever seen. In Egypt, everything is regarding as a guideline – rather than a rule.  Drivers don’t feel confined by lane line markings on the road and the cars often travel five abreast, in a street with only three painted lanes.

During the trip, I had the chance to learn about girls and women in Egypt.  I saw many groups of girls wearing brightly colored clothes – usually including head scarves and also some women totally covered from head to foot in black – including head pieces that covered their eyes.  Egypt is a Muslim country and there are no easy conclusions about the status of women there.  We saw only a few women driving – although it is allowed.

In the coming weeks, I will be writing about the journey – modern day and ancient Egypt and also my own inner spiritual pilgrimage. Stay tuned!

Salaam (Peace)

Cindy

It’s been quite an adventure in Egypt so far, and some of the most empowering information about Egypt is related to the ancient Goddesses that used to be widely worshiped throughout ancient times. Sailing the Nile River, the longest river in the world for three days this past week has been very informative. The Nile valley is a canyon running about 660 miles long and the delta of it spans about 8,500 square miles! For this reason, it became a major source of livelihood for the people of ancient Egypt. The Nile it itself, is said to essentially represent the people of Egypt throughout much of its existence. The river is a magnificent piece of the world’s history and has likewise, been referenced with personifying the floods of the Nile with fertility.

These connections lead to strong beliefs in female goddesses during that time period. The Nile’s flow is also connected to the ancient Egyptian calendar, which was very similar to the calendar much of the world follows today. It included twelve months of 30 days each. The months were divided into seasons based upon the cycles of the Nile. Sound familiar? While cruising the Nile, you can stop off to see several temples of ancient Goddesses among other popular sites. Three of the Goddesses we learned about that seem to stick out the most are the Goddess Isis, more commonly known throughout popular culture, the Goddess Hathor and the Goddess Ma’at.

The Goddess Isis is one of the most famous Goddesses of ancient Egypt. The temple of Isis is located in the Island of Philae, an island that houses many of the temples of Gods and Goddesses of ancient Egypt. It was a major center of worship through the ancient world. Likewise, many of the ancient female deities of Egypt such as Mut, Neith, Nekhbet and Sekmet were also honored in Philae along with Isis. Her popularity resonates with what was believed to be her many powers. She was known as the Goddess of Magic, fertility, and childbirth. Each of the roles of the other Gods and Goddesses in ancient Egypt to some degree served and connected to Isis in some way. Under ancient beliefs, other gods and goddesses merge into one under Isis. She was rated a supreme deity for a large period of time and the belief in Isis spanned well into ancient Roman times as well as early Christian times where it was last traced. Clearly, the influence of Isis was a crucial part of Egypt’s ancient history. Pictures and carvings of Isis often depicted her as a woman with a throne on the top of her headdress. She is also often shown as wearing birds wings. She was often worshiped highly by pharaohs and members of all classes in ancient Egyptian society.

The Goddess Hathor is the Goddess of love, pleasure and beauty. She is also known as goddess of the sky and often depicted wearing cow horns or as a cow. She was considered the protector of pregnant women and midwives. She was the patron of all women, no matter their station in life. Her appearance is usually that of a cow bearing the sun disk between her horns, or a woman wearing a sun disk and horns on her head. In later periods, both images seemed to be combined as one as a woman with a cow’s head. Her temple is located in Upper Egypt, in Dendera on the west bank of the Nile River.

The Goddess Ma’at is not as well known to the modern world, which is ironic since the concepts in which she represented certainly left a mark. Ma’at is known as the Goddess of cosmic order, truth and justice. She represents right relationship to all things. She is often seen in ancient paintings wearing one Ostrich feather on her head to represent truth.  Her name literally meant truth in Egyptian. Order and rational was a highly practiced concept in ancient Egyptian history, which may explain the early successes of the country in the ancient world. The “laws” of Ma’at as a result, were heavily honored and respected as a form of   “taboo.” Egypt was said “to be nothing without Ma’at,” at the time.  The goddess was also known as the wife of Thoth, the moon god and the god of Wisdom.  A small temple of Ma’at exists inside the Karnak Temple Complex. It is likely that a “Priest of Ma’at” in ancient times were often involved within Egypt’s justice system. In later times, the ancient Roman Goddess of Lady Justice also represented similar concepts to Ma’at and is often displayed as a symbol of justice within the American justice system. It appears that Isis, Ma’at and Lady Justice are all linked.

Isn’t it also interesting that all of these Goddesses are depicted as females? Now that’s a nice thought to swagger with don’t you think?  If women prayed and believed in these goddesses nowadays, do you think we would have great swagger? To find out more about the goddesses mentioned in this blog, you can click on the Wikipedia link here. We’ll be back soon with more information and pics about the trip to Egypt. For now, connections are limited so please bare with us. Until then, insha’allah!

At The Girl’s Guide to Swagger, I and guest columnists have given our advice through Swagger Up advice columns.  Now I need your advice!

I have a chance to go on a trip of a life time to Egypt.  Julie Loar, author of Goddesses for Everyday, is guiding this trip in March 2012. Julie’s website is www.QueenOfCups.com.  The 12 day trip will begin in Cairo and include visits to the Pyramids, Spinx, the Egyptian Museum, as well as a cruise on the Nile.  The trip will be focused on sacred history and the divine feminine.

I recently finished reading the wonderful new biography of Cleopatra by Stacy Schiff; book review at http://www.girlsguidetoswagger.com/?p=1316 .  Cleopatra is a woman of swagger and there are so many legendary goddess stories that originated in Egypt.  In her book Goddesses for Everyday, Julie describes Isis as “the great Egyptian goddess of magic .”I have always been fascinated by the archeology and the mystic nature of the country and it has long been on the top of my list of places to visit.

So what is the issue? Of course I should go!  I think so, but the trip is not inexpensive andwhile there has been much positive change in Egypt in the last year – that change has come with civil unrest and some violence.

So – please give me your advice – should I go? How should I decide? Thank you!  Cindy

From Julie -

Though I cannot remember my birth, and shall forget my death, I live in the midst of wonder.

Egyptian Book of the Dead

There are many who feel that we stand on the verge of massive global change and that women will be at the forefront of that change. Leaders are emerging in many disciplines, including the arts. Painter Kimberly Webber feels compelled by a burning desire to create as much art as she can that depicts the divine feminine. Her inspiration comes from “the voice of the earth herself,” and the hope is that the work personifies mother earth and empowers the viewer. Images and ideas appear to her in dreams or through nature where the feminine archetypes bubble up from the chthonic into consciousness. “They are asking to be heard now,” Kimberly says.

Kimberly started painting as a 3 year old and went on to train formally as a painter including studies in Florence, Italy of traditional Renaissance Masters. After leaving the university, she spent six weeks hiking in Northern California and Southern Oregon on the Pacific Crest trail, which runs from Canada to Mexico.  The redwood forests and ocean in California beckoned her to a different kind of learning.  “I wanted to unravel all of my formal academic training and programming,” she says.

Entering a time of earth-based training; she studied with a female shaman and lived deep in the redwoods.  Feeling gently supported and nourished by the forest, Kimberly hiked regularly in the dark, without a flashlight, exploring the night.  Moving out of her head and into her heart, she says it was a time of quantum growth for her and propelled her to a more sensitive, subtle level of painting.

After a year in the redwoods, a quiet but insistent call led Kimberly to Taos, New Mexico. She packed up her tipi in a pickup truck and moved, without ever having been to Taos.  Within 24 hours, she had a work-trade arrangement at the New Buffalo Bed and Breakfast – in exchange for studio space.  Living in her tipi, she bartered for most of her needs and continued journeying deeper into the heart and rhythms of nature.

Kimberly began painting goddesses – a bird goddess on a pile of skulls, a series of figures submerged in their backgrounds. Her paintings reflect sacred geometry and other underlying natural orders. She uses lapis, mica and gemstones to add an inner luminosity to her work. Her current work in progress features the Crete snake goddess manifested in huge eight feet tall images. Read more…

Did you know that many ancient civilizations worshipped the Goddess as the giver of life and wisdom? The cycles of the seasons and of life were understood as the context for life and people lived in balance with the earth.  Male energy and female energy both were honored.

Myth and reality began to change more than 4,000 years ago, when famines in the northern part of Europe and Russia caused marauding warriors to move south and conquer the Goddess-worshipping, peace loving people of the Mediterranean.  On Crete, there was a civilization that lived peacefully – there is no sign of war for 1,500 years, until the invaders from the north arrived.

Before the invasion, the Goddess was most revered, along with her companion or lover, but soon the lover began to take on characteristics of a god.  The Goddess’ power was distributed among many more minor Goddesses in the mythology of Greece and Rome – becoming Hera, Athena, Aphrodite.  As the Jewish and Christian religions developed, the Goddess or Queen of Heaven and her consort Baal were considered to be evil and their worship was forbidden.  Although outlawed, little carvings of the divine feminine were found throughout the Holy Lands. Symbols of the Goddess such as the snake and the apple were made evil as part of the creation myth of the Garden of Eden.

Our knowledge of the ancient Goddess culture has been in the shadows for a long time. Now, there is a revival of interest in those cultures and in the honoring of the divine feminine.  Goddesses for Every Day: Exploring the Wisdom and Power of the Divine Feminine around the World by Julie Loar is part of that awakening.  Julie has identified 366 goddesses – from civilizations around the world – ancient and contemporary – and presented them in this book, along with a contemplation on what each goddess means in our daily life. Read more…