
With the planet Venus currently in her Morning Star aspect, conjunct Ishtar in the sign of Capricorn, it is a good time to consider our relationship with feminine power and qualities of the feminine that have been repressed over millennia. Today, women do not hold top positions of power and are rejected and punished for behaviours that are deemed permissible for men.
I recently discovered a striking example of this (although it was an event that happened some time ago) when I read about a bomb attack on Rosslyn Chapel in July 1914 that was instigated by the militant branch of the Suffragettes. The Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU) were known for their “Deeds Not Words” slogan; after decades of peaceful campaigning for the vote, they pioneered a more militant approach and bombed places of public interest, the homes of politicians and various infrastructure- Rosslyn Chapel and St Paul’s cathedral were among the targets.
Christabel Pankhurst, co-founder and organising secretary of the WSPU, wrote:
“If men use explosives and bombs for their own purpose they call it war, and the throwing of a bomb that destroys other people is then described as a glorious and heroic deed.”
Although Emmeline Pankhurst gave strict orders that no life was to be harmed, either human or animal, the suffragettes’ actions were considered by many as acts of terrorism. Ironically the attacks came to an end with the outbreak of the WW1.

I am not advocating for violence; my point is to show that beneath the socially acceptable image of women lurks a raw, wild, sexual, protective, and aggressive nature. Society has a difficulty accepting this aspect of the feminine as unfeminine, however in rejecting it we also reject the positive qualities of a powerful feminine too, assigning them instead to the masculine… or Mars.
The goddess is a radical act: She calls us back to the wild untamed places of the natural world and the soul to connect with Her cycles and seasons, Her ebbs and flow of death and rebirth, Her blood, and the primal expressions of unmedicated, unamputated, humanness. Her ways may seem harsh and indiscriminate; She does not pander to individual egos, She is neither coy nor coquettish… She does not need your approval and She does not need you to like Her. She does demand that Her ways are respected and will rage upon violation.
Without the goddess in Her full expression our brave new world is eerily devoid of soul. The anima mundi (world soul) becomes more virtual than natural as we are caught in ‘the net’, imprisoned in a programme, coded, controlled, and commodified. While technology and science valiantly attempt to immunise us against the mess of (our own) humanity, the relentless nature of the solar quest is a rejection of the goddess and the feminine soul.
Forming a relationship with the Goddess is potentially a dangerous act: Freed from thousands of years of projections She is Re-membered and focused into a whole potent image. She is not a meek, gentle, beauty, chaste, wifely, motherly, or subservient. She is not a 2- dimension character but a fierce, raw, primal force ready to defend the sacred.
When Her pre-Raphaelite gown falls away exposing Her scarred and charred body pulsating with life, creative potency, and sacred sexuality we will see Her as She is and recognise Her in ourselves. She holds the mirror.
The goddess is a political act because She leads us in and down as well as up and out. Beyond Plato’s cave -which these days is a projection of electro- magnetic phantoms creating increasing sophisticated and seductive images- lies the freedom of the goddess. In the cooling light of the Moon, we are protected from the burning glare of the Sun. As the Dark Maid Lilith-the one who cannot be tamed- the roots of the goddess coil deep into the Earth and Dark Matter at the centre of the cosmos. She invites us to descend and ascend with Her.
The goddess is dangerous because She lives in our body and unless we give permission for it to be entered or tampered with, the condition and fate of our bodies is forged in her alembic. She is the wisdom that lives in our cells; the erotic pleasure and fire that rises unashamedly; the earthy smells and natural processes that eliminate life threatening toxins. She is dangerous because She does not fear death. She is Death.
In The Biblical Ciphers Unsealed: A Revival of the Hebrew Goddess, author Dale Robertson says,
“The Goddess has always represented the liberal end of the political spectrum that celebrates ideals such as freedom from coercion and the basic unity of all people. The priests tried hard to eradicate and suppress the worship of the Goddess. However, the masses never entirely submitted, reverence of the Goddess was too deeply entrenched and the essential needs of her followers too profound for her veneration to be eliminated.”
(Robertson 2001:20).
Demoting the goddess was not easy. The cult of Inanna/Ishtar continued to flourish until its gradual decline in the wake of Christianity between the first and sixth centuries CE. After that the goddess was diminished and reduced to selective images: Mother Mary, some of the feminine deities that became Christian Saints, Mary Magdalene… but only after She was humiliated and rejected.
Universally accepted by all religions, creeds, and colours, the goddess in her many manifestations is beyond economic status and political power. She lives in folk traditions, menarche, childbirth, madness, chaos, frenzy, joy, grief, and delight. She presides in all epochs of time; She resides in the human heart. She does not vie for supremacy or cause wars (except when She is accused of doing so by those who would reject Her and blame Her for the sins of man). She is the scorned one and the Holy one.
One this new Moon, what are your inner Venus and inner Ishtar discussing in their cosmic rendezvous?
References- Robertson, D N 2001. The Biblical Ciphers Unsealed. A Revival of the Hebrew Goddess. Minnesota: Paragon House.