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I interviewed Bernie Taylor, who is a naturalist, author, and cultural astronomer. He has written two books: Biological Time (2004) and Before Orion: Finding the Face of the Hero (2017). Bernie’s work centers on Paleolithic cave art (back to 40,000 years), which he believes encodes humanity’s earliest astronomy, self-realization, and biological knowledge — material that still shapes religious practice and story today. He gives many talks to academic and private audiences and has appeared on over 200 podcasts.

Like me, Bernie stumbled into the mother goddess material, which he discovered by studying the city of Ephesus, a critically important city in mother goddess traditions. Ephesus is on the Aegean coast of modern-day Turkey and was once a major pilgrimage site as it was home to the grandest temple and one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, the famed temple to Artemis.

Ephesus and this temple are also important in the history of Christianity. The Apostle Paul visited the temple in the Book of Acts and nearly started a riot after insulting their traditions. Later Christians destroyed the temple in 401 AD after paganism was banned in the Roman Empire, and the site was razed to the ground with all the stones hauled off for other building projects.

Yet the goddess traditions in Ephesus did not die off, they were absorbed into Christianity. By tradition, Mary, the mother of Jesus, is said to have lived in Ephesus with the Apostle John after the resurrection. In 431 AD, the Catholic Church sanctified the Virgin Mary, with Ephesus serving as the home of all Marian traditions, which continues today.

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Artemis is a complex character as she syncretized different goddesses from Anatolia and the Greek pantheon. Anatolian Artemis was the supreme matriarchal mother goddess who was never created and had always existed since time immemorial.

The Greek Artemis, on the other hand, was a young goddess and submissive to patriarchy, she was the daughter of Zeus and twin sister of Apollo. In the Hellenistic era after Alexander the Great’s conquest, these two disparate Artemises were combined into one, leading to theological disputes that carried on into the Roman era.

Bernie prepared a presentation that traces the symbolism of Anatolian Artemis back through the most ancient Neolithic sites in Turkey, Çatalhöyük and Göbekli Tepe, demonstrating the continuity of mother goddess traditions from the first settlements at the dawn of agriculture.

We touch on some of the evidence at Göbekli Tepe, including the motif of the seated woman giving birth, flanked by lions. This symbolism has been commonly misinterpreted by scholars who have failed to recognize that these are birth scenes and have instead made ridiculous claims about sex and detached penises.

Bernie also introduced me to some interesting new DNA studies (published January 2026) on Çatalhöyük that provide hard evidence of matrilineal society in the Neolithic. A genetic study of 395 individuals buried under Çatalhöyük homes found maternal lines (mother-to-daughter-to-daughter) determined the burials and that women/females received more grave goods than males.

We also talked about Amazon warriors and various possible interpretations for the breast-like features on the coat of Anatolian Artemis that have long intrigued researchers.

And more! Enjoy the conversation with Bernie Taylor. You can find his work at:

https://beforeorion.com/

You can also see the interview on YouTube:

In this episode of Goddess Bible Study we dig into one of the most turbulent periods in the long fight against the Mother Goddess.

King Hezekiah

King Hezekiah was one of the most important Hebrew kings and one of the great Yahwist reformers who worked to eliminate the goddesses and pagan idols. He was considered a near-messianic figure, remembered for his dedication to Yahweh and his success in holding the Assyrians back from destroying Jerusalem. Hezekiah ruled Judah from 715 to 686 BCE, and he is exceptionally well attested by archaeologists, having left permanent marks on the city of Jerusalem that can still be seen today.

As a young man, Hezekiah witnessed the destruction of Israel at the hands of the Assyrians, and he spent much of his reign contending with that same aggressive empire. Refugees from the fallen northern kingdom streamed into Judah during this period, including followers of the northern prophets.

Hezekiah was preceded by his father, the pagan King Ahaz, who had built an altar to Ashur inside the Hebrew Temple itself. Ahaz was condemned by the prophet Isaiah and by the biblical writers generally as a committed pagan — he worshipped Baal, sacrificed his own children, and made offerings on the high places. His son Hezekiah wanted nothing to do with any of it. He didn’t merely decline to follow in his father’s footsteps; he refused Ahaz even a proper burial.

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Yahwist Reformer

Hezekiah was one of only two biblical kings recorded as being fully committed to Yahweh. He carried out dramatic religious reforms and set out to exterminate pagan religion in Judah entirely, with the prophet Isaiah serving as his mentor and adviser throughout. Hezekiah smashed the sacred stones, cut down the Asherah poles, and destroyed the high places used for community worship.

Hezekiah reopened and repaired the Temple and reinstated the Passover Festival. He closed the public altars, smashed the idols, and cut down the Asherah poles across the kingdom. These reforms went far beyond the symbolic — Hezekiah sought to centralize worship entirely at the Jerusalem Temple, ordering that all offerings be consolidated into the hands of the temple priests.

This centralization of worship was a critical step in the formation of the Judeo-Christian traditions. It marks the first real attempt by temple priests to consolidate all religious worship under their own authority.

Paganism had always been a do-it-yourself religious framework, rooted in family and community, where anyone could build an altar and make an offering. The introduction of religious authorities who mediated all worship — who stripped ordinary people of the independence to create their own sacred spaces — would become a defining feature of the Judeo-Christian and Islamic traditions that followed.

Smashing the Bronze Serpent

Among Hezekiah’s reforms, one act stands out as especially striking: he “broke into pieces the bronze snake Moses had made.” This was the bronze serpent Moses had fashioned in Numbers 21:6–9 to heal the Israelites from a plague of snakes sent by Yahweh. By Hezekiah’s time, the relic had been kept and venerated for roughly 500 years.

In Hebrew, “Nehushtan” means something like “a mere piece of brass” — a derogatory, dismissive label, though English Bibles typically present it as simply the object’s proper name. This is one of the great flashpoints in the long divorce between Yahwism and the older religious world it grew out of, and a clear example of a goddess-adjacent symbol being deliberately purged by monotheistic reformers working to push its worship underground.

It is safe to conjecture that the Garden of Eden story with the serpent as villian was written in the same general time period as part of these reforms.

Israeli archaeologists have found evidence of Hezekiah’s reforms. We have discussed Tel Arad previously, it is the only temple site ever recovered in Judah from the First Temple period. The holy of holies in the Tel Arad temple had been carefully dismantled and buried by hand with sand. The pair of altars and pair standing stones were laid over on their sides and not broken.

These pairs correspond to Yahweh and Asherah, and simultaneously demonstrates Israelite paganism, and also the reforms of Hezekiah. Residue on the incense altars were analyzed in 2020 with the larger altar to Yahweh having frankincense, and the smaller altar to Asherah containing cannabis.

Archaeologists excavated Lachish, which we will discuss more below, and they found something unusual, inside of a shrine, they found a commode alongside smashed altars. This also appears to be evidence of Hezekiah’s reforms, and tracks with the events during King Jehu when they desecrated the temple of Baal and made it into a latrine in 2 Kings 27.

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Hezekiah’s Tunnel

Hezekiah rebelled against Assyria and stopped paying tribute, allying himself with Egypt instead. Knowing full well that Jerusalem would face an Assyrian siege as a result, he undertook major building campaigns to prepare the city, fortifying the Broad Wall of Jerusalem and constructing towers along it.

Hezekiah also commissioned one of the most impressive engineering achievements of the ancient world. Jerusalem’s water supply came from the Gihon Spring, which lay outside the city walls — a serious vulnerability in the event of a siege. To protect the water and deny it to the Assyrians, Hezekiah had a long tunnel cut through solid rock to channel the spring’s water directly into the City of David.

The tunnel runs 583 yards (533 meters) and was excavated by two separate teams working from opposite ends, meeting almost perfectly in the middle — a feat that required remarkably sophisticated engineering and measurement for the era. Modern scholars still haven’t fully determined how the two teams managed to find each other underground.

The tunnel was eventually sealed by an earthquake sometime in the Middle Ages, but archaeologists later rediscovered it, and visitors can walk through it today. An inscription carved into the tunnel wall commemorates the exact moment, over 2,700 years ago, when the two digging teams broke through and met.

It was Hezekiah who blocked the upper outlet of the Spring of Gihon and channeled it down to the west side of the City of David. And Hezekiah prospered in all that he did.

-2 Chronicles 32:30

Attack on Judah

In 701 BCE, Sennacherib, king of Assyria, attacked Judah, laying waste to the countryside and capturing every fortified city in his path. Lachish, a heavily defended fortress roughly 80 miles from Jerusalem and the second most important city in Judah, fell to the Assyrians in a major and decisive victory. Sennacherib was proud enough of the achievement to commission huge stone reliefs celebrating it, which now reside in the British Museum — the same reliefs we discussed in the last episode.

The biblical writers, tellingly, barely mention this catastrophic defeat. What they do record is that after Lachish fell and its people were slaughtered, Hezekiah’s envoys went there to meet the Assyrians and offer tribute. Hezekiah stripped the Temple and the royal treasury of all their gold and silver to pay the Assyrians off and spare Jerusalem a siege.

This meeting between Hezekiah and Sennacherib was independently recorded by the Assyrians themselves. Sennacherib’s own inscriptions describe laying siege to Jerusalem and departing only after extracting heavy tribute, boasting that he left Hezekiah trapped in his own palace like a bird in a cage.

The Assyrian account inflates the silver figure from 300 to 800 talents and adds Hezekiah’s daughters and concubines to the tribute list, but is otherwise strikingly consistent with the biblical record. This account survives on the Taylor Prism, a large six-sided cuneiform inscription detailing Sennacherib’s campaigns, unearthed in the ruins of Nineveh and now held in the British Museum alongside the Lachish reliefs.

Hezekiah’s Despair

The biblical narrative doesn’t end with the tribute payment. According to the text, Sennacherib accepted the payment and departed, only to return and threaten Jerusalem’s destruction a second time. This time, the city was said to be saved through direct divine intervention.

Upon hearing that the Assyrians had returned, Hezekiah despaired. He put on sackcloth and went to the Temple to pray for deliverance, arguing before Yahweh that every other god the Assyrians had destroyed was nothing more than wood and stone — while Yahweh alone was the one true God.

The Miracle

According to the Bible, Yahweh heard Hezekiah and saved Jerusalem.

The Assyrians left no record of any such catastrophe — though it’s fair to say a decimated army isn’t the kind of thing an empire tends to memorialize in its own annals. Interestingly, the Egyptians preserved a strikingly similar legend about the very same campaign: they claimed Sennacherib was repulsed in Egypt when his army was decimated in a single night by a plague of field mice that chewed through their bowstrings and shield-thongs, rendering them defenseless.

Whatever actually happened, the outcome is not in dispute: Jerusalem survived and was never sacked by the Assyrians, even as the rest of Judah was laid waste around it. This deliverance became the foundation for a powerful and lasting belief among the Hebrews — that Yahweh was a truly great God, and that Jerusalem itself was inviolable, protected by divine decree. That confidence held strong for more than a century, until the city was finally burned by the Babylonians.

Sennacherib on the other hand, came to an untimely end. He was murdered in 681 BCE in his palace at Nineveh, killed by his own sons as punishment for his sacrilege — the desecration of Babylon’s sacred temples and the flooding of the ancient city.

Next episode we will continue in the book of Kings with the pagan Manassah, the longest lived and among the most successful kings of Judah, and his grandson, the second great reformer, Josiah, who was not as long-lived and successful.

In this period, the Yahwist prophets confronted the traditional religion of Baal and the mother goddess Asherah, while the kingdoms of Israel and Judah were embroiled in ongoing wars with their neighbors and turbulent royal succession.

This episode focuses on the prophets Elijah and Elisha, whose influence inspired the bloody coup by Jehu that overthrew the House of Omri in Israel. Queen Jezebel — the most vilified woman in the Bible — was famously assassinated, as was her daughter Athaliah, the only woman to ever rule Jerusalem in her own right.

We are joined in the discussion by our resident pagan priestess Lisa, and the apostate orthodox priest Joshua.

In this episode of Goddess Bible Study, we dig into the brutal and theologically fascinating history of the Assyrian Empire, the dominant military force of the early Iron Age. The Assyrians destroyed the nation of Israel in 722 BCE and sent ten of the twelve tribes into exile, never to be heard from again.

The Rise of Assyria

For three centuries, from 912 to 612 BCE, the Neo-Assyrian Empire was the most powerful the world had yet seen, and sophisticated in its own way. The Assyrians exercised a highly political theology where their god Ashur was the greatest power in the cosmos and ordained them to rule as his servants. Brutality was the will of the gods, divine punishment for the failure to submit.

The Assyrians built a model of leadership and bureaucracy that later empires would study and imitate. They were the first to mass-produce iron weapons, superior in every way to the bronze arms of their rivals. Their army was disciplined and professional, their tactics advanced, and their siege engines were the pride of the empire — purpose-built machines engineered to breach even the mightiest walled cities.

The Assyrians earned a reputation for extraordinary cruelty, and it was a deliberate, well-documented policy. The palace reliefs at Nineveh, Nimrud, and Khorsabad depict flaying captives alive, impaling rebels on stakes, and stacking severed heads into pyramids outside conquered cities — carved in intricate detail as boasts, not incidental battle scenes.

Amputating limbs and gouging out eyes, then leaving victims alive to wander as walking warnings, was a calculated strategy to instill fear and ensure submission, not cruelty for its own sake. Assyrian kings framed these campaigns of terror as carrying out the will of Ashur: the king executed divine judgment on rebels who, in Assyrian ideology, had broken their sworn oath to the god.

Assyria’s reach extended across the major trade routes of the ancient world, dominating Babylonia, western Persia, Anatolia, and the Levant, with its territory eventually stretching as far as Egypt. Israel and Judah, sitting astride vital trade corridors, played an outsized role in this imperial story, and the Assyrians appear throughout the biblical record as a result.

This is one of the best-documented periods in the ancient Near East — historians and archaeologists have corroborated the biblical account against the records of Israel’s neighbors, so we can read these conflicts from both sides.

Assyria’s achievements weren’t limited to war and theology. Building on medical foundations laid by Babylon, and absorbing the knowledge and talent of every people it conquered, Assyria made real progress in medical science. Ashurnasirpal II (884–859 BCE), who consolidated Assyrian rule across the Levant and Canaan, went so far as to compile the first systematic lists of plants and animals in the empire, bringing scribes along on his campaigns specifically to record new discoveries.

Assyrian expansion along the Mediterranean coast began in earnest under Shalmaneser III (859–824 BCE), who extracted tribute from the wealthy Phoenician cities of Tyre and Sidon during the years Ahab and Jezebel ruled Israel. Assyrian records confirm that Ahab’s successor, King Jehu, submitted to Shalmaneser III and paid him tribute. We showed the Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser in the last episode.

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Ashur, Supreme God

Assyrian religion offers a striking parallel to the religious transformation underway in Israel and Judah. The Assyrians practiced a form of monolatry that approached, and clearly influenced, later monotheism. They insisted their god Ashur was the supreme power in the universe, but they didn’t ban the worship of other gods outright — they simply recast every foreign deity as another manifestation of Ashur himself. It was shrewd political theology, allowing the empire to maintain religious and political consistency across its territory while avoiding the destructive conflict that comes with forcibly suppressing local temples.

Assyrian military dominance was treated as self-evident proof of Ashur’s supremacy, and the imperial propaganda machine made sure everyone knew it. The Assyrians believed Ashur had chosen them as his people and granted them the divine right to rule over other nations — a belief that directly shaped Assyrian identity, ideology, and military expansion.

Theology and empire grew in lockstep, and the theology was actively rewritten to justify political dominance. The empire wanted Ashur acknowledged as supreme, not other gods erased — monolatry was a political project first. Tellingly, Ashur’s cult disappeared entirely once Assyria collapsed; the god had no independent life apart from the imperial project that created him. His theology was so thoroughly a political instrument that it had no staying power once the political structure it served was gone.

Assyrian religion was part of a broader current running through the ancient world in this era — the Axial Age — which pushed cultures toward higher, more transcendent conceptions of the divine. Hebrew monotheism, Zoroastrianism, Chinese Taoism, Confucianism, and strands of Greek philosophy all emerged from this same current, each rejecting the older, more immanent understanding of the divine found in nature worship and shamanism.

This shift had consequences that fell disproportionately on women. Assyria was a deeply patriarchal culture. Women’s legal and property rights were severely curtailed compared to older Mesopotamian cultures, and their sexuality was tightly controlled by their families.

Tiglath-Pileser III

Assyria had fallen into civil war before Tiglath-Pileser III (745–727 BCE) seized power and revitalized the empire. Many scholars regard his reign as the true beginning of the Neo-Assyrian Empire proper. He reorganized the military into what became the most effective fighting force history had yet produced. In 729 BCE, he marched into Babylonia and captured the king of Babylon himself. Tiglath-Pileser appears directly in the biblical text as the conqueror who brought Israel to heel and demanded heavy tribute from Samaria.

King Ahaz and the Altar of Ashur

In Judah, King Ahaz became a vassal of Tiglath-Pileser, paying tribute and allying himself with Assyria against Israel and Syria. Ahaz was thoroughly pagan in his practice, embracing Assyrian religion wholesale. He even built an altar to Ashur and installed it inside the Temple of Yahweh itself — an act that scandalized the biblical writers. Ahaz went further still, sacrificing his own children, placing him among the most offensive kings in the biblical record, second only to Ahab and Jezebel in the eyes of the Deuteronomistic historians.

Ahaz’s submission to Assyria was total and self-interested. Facing pressure from Aram and Israel, he turned to Tiglath-Pileser directly for rescue, stripping the treasuries of both the Temple and the royal palace to pay for it.

The altar itself has a remarkable origin story. Ahaz traveled to Damascus to meet Tiglath-Pileser in person, and while there, he saw an altar that impressed him enough to send detailed construction plans home ahead of him.

The image is hard to miss: the altar of Yahweh is physically shoved aside to make room for the altar modeled on Assyrian religion, with the king of Judah himself performing the sacrifices.

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The Siege of Israel

Tiglath-Pileser III died in 727 BCE and was succeeded by Shalmaneser V. King Hoshea of Israel, perhaps sensing weakness in the transition, stopped paying tribute and allied himself with Egypt against Assyria in 725 BCE. It was a fatal miscalculation. Shalmaneser responded by invading Israel outright and laying siege to Samaria for three years. Hoshea himself was captured and imprisoned.

The fall of Samaria in 722 BCE brought a permanent end to Israel as an independent kingdom. Its people were deported across the Assyrian Empire, scattering into history as the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel.

The Assyrians were not indiscriminate about resettlement— deportees were allowed to bring their families and possessions and were settled on new land, while people from other conquered territories were moved in to replace them. Once a conquered population submitted to the central authority, the Assyrians treated them as Assyrians. Resettlement served as a form of forced assimilation, and those who complied were treated relatively well, while resistance was met with slaughter.

The biblical writers, naturally, tell a different story about why Israel fell. For them, the cause was not Assyrian military superiority but Israel’s failure to worship Yahweh properly — even as the Assyrians themselves credited their victories to the superior power of Ashur.

Biblical writers performed the ultimate theological judo when they successfully recast the destruction of Israel, and later Judah, by outside powers as Yahweh’s punishment of Israelite polytheism, rather than victories for the Assyrian Ashur or Babylonian Marduk.

The list of offenses reads like a checklist of everything the Yahwist reform movement was working to stamp out: idols, golden calves, an Asherah pole, worship of the starry hosts, worship of Baal, child sacrifice, and divination.

In the aftermath, the king of Assyria repopulated the towns of Samaria with people brought in from Babylon, Kuthah, Avva, Hamath, and Sepharvaim, who took over the towns the Israelites had left behind.

After Samaria: Sargon II to Ashurbanipal

Shalmaneser V died suddenly during the siege of Samaria and was succeeded by Sargon II, under whom the empire reached its greatest political and military heights. Sargon II was followed by Sennacherib (705–681 BCE), who campaigned widely and ruthlessly, devastating Judah and laying siege to Jerusalem during the reign of King Hezekiah.

Sennacherib made the ancient city of Nineveh his capital, building there the famed “Palace Without Rival” along with a vast library. Nineveh was dedicated to the goddess Ishtar, and many scholars now believe that Sennacherib’s grand palace gardens at Nineveh were, in fact, the true “Hanging Gardens of Babylon” — since no trace of that famous Wonder of the Ancient World has ever been found in Babylon itself.

In 701 BCE, Sennacherib sieged the Judean city of Lachish, a critical fortified city. The loss of Lachish was devastating to King Hezekiah, but the Bible gives the event only a brief mention. The victory was important enough to Sennacherib that he commissioned an enormous carved relief detailing the battle in all its bloody glory for his palace in Nineveh.

The relief covers the walls of a large room and measures 39 feet long and 16.7 feet high and currently resides in the British Museum. These contrasting accounts, Biblical vs Assyrian, is one of the clearest examples of how the Book of Kings is total political propaganda. We will explore this event more fully in the next episode on King Hezekiah.

Sennacherib’s ambitions eventually turned toward Babylon, which he invaded, breaking its canals and flooding the city before looting its ancient temples — an act of sacrilege so extreme that even his own people considered it beyond the pale. Sennacherib was ultimately assassinated in his own palace by his sons, who saw his crimes against the old Babylonian gods as unforgivable.

His successor was Esarhaddon, one of those very sons, who secured the throne by killing all his brothers and rivals in a brief civil war. Esarhaddon went on to expand the empire into Egypt and secured vassal treaties across the region.

The last great king of Assyria was Ashurbanipal, who reigned from 669-631 BCE and is remembered above all for the extraordinary library he built at Nineveh, sending envoys to every corner of the empire to acquire texts for preservation in the Royal Library. Ashurbanipal is famed as a scholar king who spoke many languages and was highly literate.

After Ashurbanipal’s death, the empire began to unravel. It had grown too large to govern effectively, and its outlying regions began breaking away one by one. In 612 BCE, a coalition of Babylonians, Persians, Medes, and Scythians sacked and burned Nineveh, massacring its residents. The destruction of Nineveh was complete and systematic - it seems Assyria’s enemies truly hated them. Ashur’s cult center in Assur was plundered, and the temples desecrated. Worship of Ashur disappeared along with the empire he championed.

In Nineveh, the largest city in the world at the time, the brutal combat went house-to-house, and the temples to Ashur were completely razed to the ground. The king was killed, and a new Assyrian king attempted to hold on in exile for a few more years before finally falling at the hands of Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylon at Carchemish in 605 BCE. We will also discuss this event in more detail when we get to King Josiah.

There is a strange grace in how the story closes. The fires that destroyed Nineveh baked its clay tablets hard and buried them beneath the rubble, preserving them for millennia. The catastrophe inadvertently produced one of the greatest archaeological discoveries in history when the ruins were unearthed 2,454 years later, in 1842 CE. The Royal Library of Ashurbanipal yielded a treasure trove, vast quantities of art and some 30,000 cuneiform tablets, including the Epic of Gilgamesh, the Enuma Elish, and also clear evidence of the ritual use of cannabis.

In the next couple of episodes, we will get into the great kings of Judah, the Yahwist reformers Hezekiah and Josiah, and the successful pagan Manasseh. This is a critical period in the development of radical Yahwist theology and the fight with the goddesses.

Goddess Bible Study continues with one of the most colorful and pivotal chapters in the divorce saga of the mother goddess, the marital dispute between the prophet Hosea and his wife, the qedesha Gomer.

The biblical book of Hosea tells the story of the prophet who lived in Israel during the kingdom’s final days. This short book reads on multiple levels, between the prophet and his wife, Yahweh and Israel, God and Goddess. Unfortunately, it is a heated argument that ultimately ends in divorce.

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Hosea is the first of the twelve minor prophets, and his book is considered one of the oldest texts in the Bible, written around 760–720 BCE. Hosea preached doom for the nation of Israel, warning that if the people continued their pagan worship and failed to turn completely to Yahweh, destruction would follow.

At the center of Hosea’s story is his marriage to a woman named Gomer, described in the text as a “woman of adultery.” Gomer was most likely a qedesha, though the text does not say so explicitly — at the very least, she was a matriarchal Canaanite woman. Their marriage was contentious. Gomer bore three children, but only the first was fathered by Hosea.

Gomer is typically regarded as a cheating wife and a sinful woman, an assumption rooted in the idea that her culture shared the same patriarchal norms of marital monogamy that we take for granted today. That assumption deserves to be challenged.

Gomer is better understood as representative of the broader society of her time — a Canaanite everywoman, and most likely a holy woman of the qedesha tradition, who would have had considerably more latitude in matters of sexuality and childbearing than an ordinary married woman. Qedesha were free to marry, but they were known to make difficult wives precisely because of their independence.

In the allegory of the book, Gomer’s “adultery” functions as a metaphor for the spiritual adultery of Israel — a nation that worshipped many gods and goddesses rather than Yahweh alone. The Book of Hosea is a layered poetic allegory that operates on several levels simultaneously: it is a conversation between the prophet and his wife, Yahweh and Israel, and Yahweh and Asherah. At its deepest level, this is the argument that leads to divorce - the final declaration and paperwork come later.

The names of the three children are symbolic and carry the weight of this allegory. The first son is named Jezreel, after the location of Jezebel’s palace — the very place where the military commander Jehu massacred her family during his violent coup. Though Jehu was a Yahwist, his treachery and bloodthirstiness were remembered with shame.

The second and third children, who belonged to Gomer alone and were not fathered by Hosea, are given the names “Not Loved” and “Not My People.” Yahweh applies these names to Israel’s children because they lack the proper father, and the names almost certainly reflect Hosea’s own feelings toward his wife’s children as well.

The extended passage in Hosea 2 is, at its core, a declaration of war against the goddess traditions. “Rebuke your mother!” Yahweh announces that he will put an end to the Mother Goddess’s celebrations, terminate her festivals, and punish her people for burning incense to Baal.

The Yahwists want to shut down the goddess traditions entirely — and with them, put the qedesha out of business. The charge of bearing “illegitimate children” is leveled because the society practiced maternity rather than paternity: lineage ran through the mother, not the father, and the Yahwists found this intolerable.

The story of Hosea and Gomer mirrors this conflict at the domestic level. Hosea seeks to end Gomer’s independence just as Yahweh seeks to end goddess worship and her nature festivals, her carousing, and her sexual rituals. When Hosea plans to shut Gomer in and cut her off from her lovers, it is simultaneously Yahweh declaring that the Goddess will also have no lovers — and that he intends to contain her.

The language Yahweh uses to describe the new order is telling. Ishi means “my husband” and Baali means “my lord” — the latter having been a conventional Canaanite greeting and term of devotion. The Yahwists banned its use entirely, scrubbing even the word from acceptable speech.

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From there, Yahweh moved to absorb the powers of nature and creation that had belonged to the Goddess, claiming them as his own. The word Jezreel means, “God plants” or “God sows,” while also being a town name.

In the third chapter, Hosea approaches Gomer with valuables — barley and silver, since coinage did not yet exist — in an effort to win her back. These verses are often read as Hosea purchasing Gomer from another man, but the text does not explicitly say who received the payment. Given that the qedesha were masters of their own behavior and kept the gifts they received in exchange for their favors, it seems more likely that Hosea gave the gifts directly to Gomer to win back her affection. He then tells her she must be sexually faithful to him, and pledges the same in return.

The book does not record her response - Gomer never speaks at all in the book. For all the reader knows, Gomer may have demanded a divorce and left with the children. She never appears again after chapter 3.

The dispute described in Hosea was not only a cosmic event between Yahweh and the Goddess. It was a rupture within the human community itself — a divorce between men and women, between the Yahwist priests and the priestesses who were their own wives, daughters, and mothers. The sacred traditions these women carried had to be repressed and expelled.

The book goes on without Gomer, and Hosea continues to complain of Israel’s sins.

He pledges to “destroy your mother.”

The hostility toward the feminine divine that runs through Hosea is not unique to him — it is a defining feature of the Biblical prophetic tradition. Other prophets of Yahweh would continue to use stark, often brutal sexual language to condemn Israel and Judah for their matriarchal and pagan ways.

The Yahwists wanted to normalize the patriarchal family structure and eliminate the older tribal customs that preceded it. The general hostility to the feminine divine pervades the Biblical texts, with the notable exception of the works attributed to King Solomon.

The contrast with the Greek world is instructive - both cultures imposed firm patriarchy and mandated marital monogamy for women. The Greeks reordered their Olympian pantheon and demoted the goddesses, subordinating them to Zeus and a male-dominated divine hierarchy. The Yahwists went further: they eliminated the goddesses altogether. The erasure was so complete that the Hebrew language developed no word for “goddess” at all.

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Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel

The prophet Isaiah was a contemporary of Hosea and was active in Judah during the reigns of Kings Ahaz and Hezekiah in the 8th century BCE. Like Hosea, Isaiah predicted doom for the Hebrews if they continued in their idolatrous ways — and his condemnations extend explicitly to women who enjoyed lives of independence and adornment.

Isaiah’s misogyny runs deep, and it is not incidental to his theology; the subordination of women and the suppression of goddess worship are two sides of the same campaign.

We will revisit all three of these prophets at length later on, here is a sample to show the continuity with Hosea.

Jeremiah was a critical reformer who lived late in the first temple period under King Josiah and witnessed its destruction by the Babylonians. Jeremiah issued the divorce papers and had the final argument about the Queen of Heaven as the people were all walking into exile with Jerusalem on fire behind them.

The prophet Ezekiel lived in Judah during the Babylonian conquest of Jerusalem and departed with the first wave of exiles. Like Hosea, Ezekiel makes extensive use of sexual language and imagery — women’s bodies, infidelity, and prostitution serving as his primary metaphors for Israel’s religious unfaithfulness.

Yahweh called Ezekiel to prophesy against the exiled Israelites for their stubborn and obstinate behavior. Ezekiel accused Israel of breaking the covenant and warned that Jerusalem would be attacked again as a consequence.

Among his targets were the women prophets, who can be understood as qedesha — identifiable by the magic charms on their wrists and the veils they wore. Ezekiel’s charges against them are striking: he accuses them of holding the powers of life and death, killing those who should not have died and sparing those who should not have lived, in direct defiance of Yahweh’s judgment. This is not merely a condemnation of folk magic; it is an acknowledgment that these women wielded genuine spiritual authority — authority the Yahwists were determined to extinguish.

Ezekiel’s rebuke of the women is extensive and sexually graphic. This is a small sample.

Next Goddess Bible Study, we will return to the Book of Kings and pick up the story with the destruction of Israel by the Assyrians in 722 BCE, and the Yahwist reformation in Judah under King Hezekiah.

Watch the podcast discussion on YouTube.

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Goddess Bible Study continues in the 9th century BCE with the Book of Kings. In this period, the Yahwist prophets confronted the traditional religion of Baal and the mother goddess Asherah, while the kingdoms of Israel and Judah were embroiled in ongoing wars with their neighbors and turbulent royal succession.

This episode focuses on the prophets Elijah and Elisha, whose influence inspired the bloody coup by Jehu that overthrew the House of Omri in Israel. Queen Jezebel — the most vilified woman in the Bible — was famously assassinated, as was her daughter Athaliah, the only woman to ever rule Jerusalem in her own right.

Israel and Judah maintained an uneasy alliance while fighting wars with Aram, Edom, and Syria. Meanwhile, the shadow of the Assyrian Empire loomed on the horizon. King Ahab was a respected military commander, but was ultimately killed on the battlefield, setting off a succession of short-lived kings.

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The previous episode concluded with the Battle of the Prophets on Mount Carmel. According to the Bible, Elijah’s victory brought the rains back after three years of drought that had caused great suffering across the land. No archaeological record confirms the drought — but we do know that the Yahwists were ascendant in this period.

The story picks up with Elijah fleeing into the wilderness to escape Jezebel’s wrath, after killing the 450 prophets of Baal — while leaving the prophets of Asherah untouched.

Elijah was afraid and ran for his life. He traveled forty days and forty nights until he reached Horeb, the mountain of God. There, Yahweh appeared to Elijah.

The Bible portrays King Ahab as weak, passive, and sulking, while Queen Jezebel is cast as dominant, manipulative, and politically shrewd. The historical record tells a different story — Ahab was a formidable military leader, actively engaged in the wars of his day.

Much of the Book of Kings reads as political propaganda, written to denigrate the enemies of the Yahwist movement regardless of their actual popularity or effectiveness as rulers. The Bible is especially vitriolic toward Ahab and Jezebel — which suggests they were real and serious adversaries.

Jezebel is blamed for introducing idolatry and foreign gods to Israel — but these gods were native, and Jezebel was defending the traditional religion of her people. From her perspective, it was the Yahwists who were the dangerous insurgents, armed with revolutionary new ideas.

In 1 Kings 21, Ahab covets a vineyard beside his palace, but the owner refuses to sell. Jezebel finds her husband sulking and mocks him: “Aren’t you the king? Get up — I will get you the vineyard.” She then conspires to have the owner falsely accused of blasphemy and killed, allowing Ahab to seize the land.

The prophet Elijah confronts them both for the crime:

This pivotal moment seals Jezebel’s fate in the narrative. Not long after, Ahab is killed in battle, and his son proves a short-lived replacement. In Judah, the Yahwist king Jehoshaphat succeeds his father Asa and continues his reforms — Asa being the king who, in the last episode, deposed Queen Mother Maacah for carving an image of Asherah.

Here we get one of the few references to the transgender qadesh being expelled from Judah — and yet again, the qedesha priestesses and the prophets of Asherah are left untouched. This culture war played out over centuries, and the priestesses proved a much harder target than the trans folks.

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Ahab's death is one of the more vivid stories in 1 Kings 22. He disguised himself on the battlefield, but a randomly fired arrow found the gap in his armor. When his chariot was brought back, the dogs licked his blood from the floor — fulfilling Elijah's prophecy exactly.

Young King Ahaziah proved less capable than his father and grandfather. After a serious fall inside his own palace, he sent messengers to consult Baal-zebub of Ekron — but a prophet of Yahweh intercepted them and announced the king’s imminent death.

The name Baal-zebub means “lord of the flies” — almost certainly a mocking distortion coined by the Biblical writers rather than the god’s actual name.

Ahaziah was succeeded by his brother Jehoram. Shortly after, the prophet Elijah died and was taken up to heaven in his final supernatural act, passing his mantle to the prophet Elisha.

Elisha was not nice to children.

Moab’s rebellion — which we covered last week alongside the Mesha Stele — is recorded in 2 Kings 3.

Elisha performs a series of healings and miracles before ultimately setting in motion a bloody palace coup that would claim many lives. Elisha instructed one of the Sons of the Prophets to go to the battlefield, find the Israelite commander Jehu, and anoint him king of Israel.

Jehu is a confirmed historical figure who ruled Israel from 841 to 814 BCE — the earliest king in the Biblical narrative to be verified in the archaeological record. His name is also one of the earliest theophoric names for Yahweh, meaning “Yahweh is he.” The emergence of theophoric names is a key marker scholars use to trace the spread of Yahwism as a cultural force. Jehoshaphat and Joash are two other Yahweh-rooted names from the same 9th-century BCE.

The Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser III (c. 841 BCE) depicts Jehu — or his envoy — prostrating before the Assyrian king, providing extra-biblical confirmation of his reign and its date. The original is held in the British Museum.

Even the Bible cannot fully rehabilitate Jehu. He comes across as treasonous and murderous, and his killing spree is remembered with shame by the later prophet Hosea (Hosea 1:4–5).

Upon his anointing, Jehu assassinated both the king of Israel and the king of Judah, along with Queen Mother Jezebel and their extended families — dozens of people in all. The assassination of Jezebel is particularly symbolic, as we will see.

Jehu was a committed Yahwist. He destroyed the temple of Baal and massacred everyone inside — but paganism did not disappear from Israel. The Biblical writers complain that the Golden Calves at Bethel and Dan remained standing, and the context makes clear that goddess worship continued and the qedesha remained untouched.

It is precisely this period that has yielded the most significant archaeological evidence linking Yahweh and Asherah.

Jezebel faced her death with dignity, taking time to paint her eyes and dress her hair before appearing at the window. She was thrown down by her own palace eunuchs, her blood spattering on the stones below. Her flesh was consumed by dogs — fulfilling Elijah’s grisly prophecy to the letter.

Her defenestration is one of the most loaded images in the Hebrew Bible: a great queen, hurled from her own window, devoured in the street. Over the centuries, Jezebel’s name has become synonymous with female treachery, sexual manipulation, temptation, and wickedness — a shorthand for everything the patriarchal tradition feared in a powerful woman.

She is comparable to the tragic Greek figure Clytemnestra, killed by her son Orestes in revenge for the death of his father Agamemnon, as told in Aeschylus’s Oresteia. Both Jezebel and Clytemnestra were politically powerful queens representing older matriarchal traditions, recast as villains in Iron Age patriarchal narratives that celebrated their gruesome deaths as righteous justice.

Jehu was not finished. Having killed both kings of Israel and Judah in a single campaign, and the Queen Mother of Israel, he systematically hunted down and killed their families — all of them.

His most sacrilegious act came last. He invited every remaining servant of Baal to a great sacrifice at the temple, locked the doors, and slaughtered everyone inside. Then he desecrated the temple itself, turning it into a latrine.

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There is no clear archaeological evidence that this particular temple desecration occurred, but archaeologists did discover a Judean temple at Lachish that was desecrated by the installation of a toilet, confirming it was at least a known practice.

Jehu proved to be a successful king, establishing a dynasty in Israel that lasted four generations. And yet, once again, the Yahwists succeeded against Baal but made no headway against paganism more broadly. The Golden Calves at Bethel and Dan remained standing, Asherah worship goes unconfronted, and Asherah poles are not mentioned. The Divine Council was intact. In the 9th century BCE, Yahweh was still one god among many.

Our third and final Queen Mother in this tragic trilogy is Athaliah — daughter of Jezebel and Ahab, wife of the king of Judah, Queen Mother, and ultimately sole ruler of Jerusalem in her own right.

After Jehu killed her son, King Ahaziah, and decimated her family, Athaliah launched a killing spree of her own, slaughtering the remaining royal heirs to seize the throne. One infant survived, hidden away by a family member in the temple.

Athaliah is the only woman in history to rule from Jerusalem as a sovereign queen. She held the throne for six years, from 841 to 835 BCE — until the Yahwists assassinated her, installed the seven-year-old Joash as king, and tore down the temple of Baal.

Joash reigned in Jerusalem for forty years before being killed in a palace coup. Yahweh, it must be said, was never particularly reliable when it came to protecting his kings.

Next episode, we step away from the kings and into the world of the prophet Hosea and his wife Gomer, who is described as a woman of harlotry. I argue that Gomer is a qedesha — a priestess representing the matriarchal Canaanite tradition — and that the Book of Hosea is a poetic, symbolic confrontation between Yahweh and the goddess that ultimately ends in divorce.

Goddess Bible Study is an exploration of the little-known stories of the goddesses, priestesses, and prophetesses in the Bible. We place the Biblical narrative on the historical timeline, along with the neighboring cultures and the archaeological evidence, to bring forth a fresh perspective on these old stories.

Who knew that God had a wife?

And that the Bible tells the story of the divorce of the Mother Goddess?

I was shocked to find out. No one taught me this stuff in Sunday School.

Contemporary critical scholars do excellent work in archaeology, cataloguing the evidence and providing translations, but they do not engage with the material they study theologically.

What does it mean that God once had a wife?

What happened to her?

Who is the Mother Goddess?

What are her traditions, philosophy, and metaphysics?

What was lost when our ancestors got rid of her? Did she go away?

Why does the Mother Goddess matter today?

These are the themes we explore on Goddess Bible Study.

I want to thank our contributors: pagan priestess Lisa Adams, former Orthodox priest Joshua Vander Plaats, and Gnostic Bishop Nathan Wilson for contributing their time and insights to these fantastic conversations.

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This week on Goddess Bible Study, we are in the 9th century BCE, investigating the three Queen Mothers from Israel and Judah who were deposed in the Book of Kings for their worship of the mother goddess Asherah. This is the first of two parts.

Queen Jezebel is the most famous of the three and the most reviled woman in the Bible. She was assassinated by the followers of Yahweh, as was her daughter Athaliah, the only woman ever to rule in Jerusalem. The first to be thrown out was Queen Maacah, wife of Rehoboam, who was deposed by her own grandson, King Asa.

We will also dive into the famous Battle of the Prophets on Mount Carmel, where I argue that Elijah used stage magic to make his offering erupt in flames and defeat the prophets of Baal and Asherah.

We are now entering territory where scriptural history begins to align with hard archaeological evidence, as literacy emerged in the 9th century BCE with new alphabetic scripts copied from the Phoenicians.

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King Asa and the Deposition of Queen Maacah

King Asa was the grandson of the bad king Rehoboam and ruled Judah from 911 to 870 BCE. He is depicted in scripture as the first of the reformist Yahwist kings to actively suppress the worship of Asherah and other traditional pagan religious practices. There is no specific archaeological evidence of Asa or his reforms — we have only the Biblical narrative to go on — but the Bible makes it clear that these Israelites were polytheists fighting a culture war over the role of the old gods versus the new.

Among Asa’s most striking acts was the deposition of his own grandmother, Queen Mother Maacah, because she had constructed an Asherah pole. He also expelled the male qadesh — transgender priests translated in some Bibles as “temple sodomites” — from the land. Notably, he did not expel the female qedesha, who appear to have been a far more entrenched and difficult opponent for the Yahwist reformers.

Jehoshaphat, son of Asa, continued his father's Yahwist reforms, though paganism remained widespread throughout the land. He was also an ally of the northern kingdom of Israel and rode into battle alongside King Ahab — the very battle in which Ahab was killed. The qadesh were still present during Jehoshaphat's reign and were persecuted again, which suggests that the earlier expulsions had been only partially effective.

The Book of Chronicles tells this story somewhat differently. Written later than the Book of Kings, Chronicles clearly adjusts the narrative to present the Biblical heroes in a more favorable light, removing embarrassing details and amplifying their piety.

9th Century BCE: When the Bible Meets Archaeology

The 9th century BCE marks a turning point in the history of Israel, both politically and in terms of the historical record. This is the period when scriptural history begins to align with archaeological data, largely because writing — in both Hebrew and early Greek — returns at this time. Hebrew inscriptions and coins begin to appear regularly, giving historians solid ground to work with.

Omri became king of Israel in 884 BCE, establishing the new city of Samaria as his capital. His lineage is unknown, but his impact was immediate and lasting. He is one of the oldest Biblical figures whose existence has been confirmed archaeologically, and the royal house he founded became known as the House of Omri, just as Judah’s royal line was called the House of David. After roughly fifty years of civil war, Omri stabilized the political situation in Israel, forming alliances with Judah to the south and the Phoenicians to the north, while resisting the growing pressure of the Neo-Assyrian Empire.

Omri’s son Ahab succeeded him as king of Israel around 873 BCE and reigned until his death in 852 BCE. Ahab was a serious and formidable military commander whose forces were large enough to be mentioned by neighboring kingdoms. The Biblical writers, however, despised both Omri and Ahab for their devotion to traditional religion. Samaria under their rule featured a large Asherah pole and a temple dedicated to Baal.

Ahab Becomes King of Israel

The Battle of Qarqar, 853 BCE — The Kurkh Stele

In 853 BCE, King Ahab led a major military force at the Battle of Qarqar, one of the largest and most significant battles of the ancient Near East. The battle pitted the resurgent Neo-Assyrian Empire, led by Emperor Shalmaneser III, against a coalition of twelve kings fighting in resistance.

According to the Kurkh Stele — an Assyrian victory monument now in the British Museum — King Ahab of Israel sent the largest contingent of chariots among the resistance, though scholars dispute the exact numbers. The Kurkh Stele is one of the earliest extra-Biblical references to an Israelite king. Remarkably, the Bible makes no mention of the Battle of Qarqar at all, a notable omission given how significant the conflict was for the entire region.

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The Battle with Moab, 840 BCE — The Mesha Stele

The Mesha Stele is a victory monument erected by King Mesha of Moab, celebrating his successful war against Israel and Judah and the victory of his god Chemosh over Yahweh. It is the oldest known mention of Yahweh outside the Bible and also references the House of Omri, possibly the House of David, and King Ahab himself. The events described on the stele correspond to the account in 2 Kings 3:1–27.

The Biblical account includes a dramatic and disturbing turning point: when the king of Moab saw that the battle had turned against him, he sacrificed his own firstborn son and heir on the city wall — and the tide suddenly shifted in Moab’s favor. According to the Bible, the human sacrifice of a royal prince appeared to work.

Jezebel, The Phoenician Princess and Queen of Israel

Ahab’s queen was the Phoenician princess Jezebel, who died in 841 BCE and remains the most vilified woman in the entire Bible. She was the daughter of Ithobaal I — also known as Ethbaal — of Tyre and Sidon, who had been a high priest of Astarte before assassinating the previous king and seizing the throne. Ithobaal is an actual historical figure, documented to have lived from approximately 915 to 847 BCE. The royal marriage between Jezebel and Ahab served as the seal on a powerful political alliance between Phoenicia and Israel.

Together, Ahab and Jezebel built a new temple to Baal in Samaria, complete with 450 prophets, and erected a grand Asherah pole in the capital city. In Jezreel, they built both a palace and a temple to the mother goddess Asherah, home to 400 prophets, with Jezebel as their personal patron.

The story is generally told that Jezebel introduced foreign gods into Israel — but this framing is misleading. Baal and Asherah were not foreign gods. They were the incumbent gods, the traditional deities of the land. Yahweh was the new, young god, representing a radical break from established religious tradition. When Jezebel supported Baal and Asherah, she was defending the old ways against dangerous revolutionaries. It was Elijah and the Yahwists who were the insurgents.

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Elijah and the Battle of the Prophets on Mount Carmel

Elijah was a prophet of Yahweh in Israel and the chief opponent of Ahab and Jezebel. The Yahwist prophetic order — called the "Sons of the Prophets" — operated as his movement. Jezebel, for her part, actively persecuted the Yahwists and worked to eliminate them. Elijah confronted Ahab directly, declaring: "I will bring disaster upon you and wipe out your house." He also prophesied Jezebel's gruesome end:

The confrontation reached its peak at the Battle of the Prophets on Mount Carmel, described in 1 Kings 18:22–40. The contest was simple: each side would call upon their god to ignite a sacrificial bull on an altar, without the use of fire.

Elijah won — and in the aftermath, slaughtered all 450 prophets of Baal. The 400 prophets of Asherah, however, were left entirely untouched.

Elijah chose Mount Carmel strategically. There was an old limestone altar to Yahweh there that had been torn down, and limestone that had been burned changes chemically into quicklime (calcium oxide). His preparation was a three-step setup:

1. Rebuilt the altar from the old quicklime limestone

2. Salted the meat and altar with powdered sulfur

3. Drenched everything with what appeared to be water but was actually naphtha — “thick water,” a clear petroleum distillate known in the ancient world, imported from Persia

The combination of naphtha + sulfur + quicklime creates a violent, fiery chemical reaction — essentially the same technology later weaponized as Greek Fire in naval battles. A related recipe appears in 2 Maccabees 1:31–36, where “nephthar” (meaning purification) produces exactly such a fire.

Elijah was very clever — he challenged the prophets of Baal to a contest he knew they would lose because he was utilizing a magician’s trick.

It is notable that all 450 prophets of Baal were killed while the 400 prophets of Asherah were left entirely untouched. In this period, Yahweh was associated with Asherah, and would eventually be associated with Anat as well. This fight was between Baal and Yahweh — the goddesses remained, ready to align themselves with whichever male god came out victorious.

Jezebel’s response was fury. She sent a threatening message to Elijah: “May the gods punish me severely if by this time tomorrow I do not make your life like one of them.” Elijah, afraid for his life, fled into the desert. Jezebel surely prayed to Anat for his slaughter.

Next week, we will continue the story of Jezebel, Athaliah, and their murders at the hands of Jehu the usurper and the followers of Yahweh.

We will discuss this topic on the Goddess Bible Study podcast on YouTube and soon on other platforms as well.

https://www.youtube.com/@goddessbiblestudy

Goddess Bible Study returns this week, and we dive into the histories of pagan Israel and pagan Judah during the First Temple period. For the next few sessions, we will be on the historical era of the First Temple as recorded in the Books of I & II Kings, along with some prophets, including Hosea, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel.

Today, we discuss some good kings and bad kings to kick off the journey.

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931 BCE - The Death of King Solomon

In 931 BCE, King Solomon died after a glorious 40-year reign. He passed fat, rich, and happy in his bed, surrounded by his many wives who loved him dearly. If his goddess worship angered any deities, they did not show it in his lifetime.

If anything, the goddesses wept for the loss of their favorite king.

Jerusalem was the spiritual home of Yahweh, but in the late 10th century BCE, the Israelites were entirely pagan, with a full pantheon of gods. Monotheism was centuries away.

Yahweh was worshiped as part of the Divine Council, alongside the mother goddess Asherah, Astarte (Ashtoreth) and Anat, and qedesha priestesses worked in the temple. The “Yahweh and his Asherah” inscriptions date from this period.

The Biblical writers claim that Yahweh chastised Solomon for his worship of the goddess and threatened to divide the kingdom of Israel. Yet the story itself does not illustrate such a tale, as we will see, the stated reasons for the breakup had nothing to do with religion.

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Solomon’s death and burial were recorded simply:

The Kingdom Splits: Rehoboam and Jeroboam

Solomon was succeeded by his son Rehoboam, a famously bad king who inspired ten of the twelve tribes to revolt and form the northern kingdom of Israel, leaving the smaller state of Judah with Jerusalem as its capital and the temple of Yahweh.

The founding of Israel and Judah remains a mystery to scholars. There is firm evidence that both nations existed as independent countries, a wide variety of coins and royal inscriptions have confirmed this. But there is no firm evidence of a united kingdom that broke apart, or of the kings Rehoboam or Jeroboam.

All the written evidence is from the 9th century forward. King Solomon lived in the 10th century BCE, an illiterate period before the new Hebrew written language was invented. We do know that Jeroboam II was a highly successful king of Israel in the 8th century BCE.

Egypt still recorded hieroglyphics on monuments, but the relevant records are damaged, as we will see below.

Jeroboam was a work supervisor under King Solomon and had objected to the heavy labor demanded of the workers. Solomon forced him into exile. Jeroboam returned when Rehoboam was crowned and attempted to mend fences with the new king.

The breakup of the kingdom was, at its core, a labor dispute, a workers’ revolt against a bad king. Biblical writers blame Solomon's paganism for the split, but the Bible describes a conflict over harsh labor practices.

Golden Calves at Bethel and Dan

The first thing Jeroboam did after breaking away from the temple leadership in Jerusalem was to establish pagan shrines in Israel, particularly erecting Golden Calves in the towns of Bethel and Dan.

Bethel was a rival worship center to Jerusalem’s temple and they did not like each other. Bethel represented the old traditions of El and Baal. It is home to the altar built by Jacob that reads “El Elohe Israel” - El is the god of Israel.

The northern kingdom of Israel was pagan throughout its entire 210-year history. Israel originally worshiped Baal as king of the gods, but the competitive Yahweh cult made inroads, competing for kingship. Israel was always polytheistic.

King Jeroboam built high places, new altars, and instituted new festivals to create political allegiance to his new kingdom, pulling the people away from Jerusalem.

Jeroboam erected Asherah poles across the land and appointed priests from among the common people. This did not please the Biblical writers.

Rehoboam, King of Judah

Meanwhile, the kingdom of Judah under Rehoboam was no more virtuous than Israel under Jeroboam. Judah too maintained its pagan practices - Asherah poles, high places, sacred stones, and even the male qadesh shrine priests all persisted under the House of David.

925 BCE - Pharaoh Shishak attacks Canaan

Pharaoh Shishak (Sheshonq I) is a historical figure. The Bible says Shishak attacked Jerusalem and plundered the wealth from the temple, perhaps conveniently covering for the fact that there never was any such wealth there.

Shishak really did attack Canaan in 925 BCE. His victory stele, recorded on the Bubastite Portal at the temple of Karnak, details his military conquests across Canaan. The portal mentions many towns that were sacked, but does not mention Jerusalem.

Many scholars believe this is evidence that Shishak did not sack Jerusalem because there was nothing of value there. But the stele is fractured, and the location where Jerusalem would appear has been rubbed away. It remains an enigma. If Jerusalem were clearly mentioned, it would help resolve the mystery of Solomon and the united kingdom of Israel.

Egyptian hieroglyphics were rare in this period, used only on royal monuments — not for day-to-day texts and letters. What survives is precious, and what is missing is maddening.

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Next time on Goddess Bible Study, we will continue in the Book of Kings. We will detail the fall of the Three Queen Mothers, Maacah, Jezebel, and her daughter Athalia. Along with the famous Battle of the Prophets on Mt. Carmel, and the palace coup by Jehu, who then committed a series of mass murders and desecrated the temple of Baal. This topic may spread across two sessions.

Queen Jezebel of Israel is the Bible's most famous villain — and its most reviled woman. Her name alone became a byword for wickedness, manipulation, and dangerous sexuality, an image that has endured for three thousand years. But from her perspective, she was behaving honorably and defending her traditions against dangerous revolutionaries.

Let’s learn more about Jezebel!

The podcast discussions are continuing, but will appear in a separate email. We are upgrading the production, details soon.

Contact:

goddessbiblestudy@gmail.com

We have been doing things on the cheap until now, using free software to livestream to YouTube. Going forward, we will start properly editing the programs and sharing them to multiple platforms.

Maybe even do some marketing!

We also want to expand our offerings so we can discuss current events and bring in some more voices into the conversation.

Goddess Bible Study began nearly a year ago on a whim, and now we are having a great conversation where we are diving into robust theological and philosophical topics.

As we move forward on the historical timeline, the stories will be increasingly relevant to the world today and less esoteric ancient history.

I am gratified by the progress we have made, the encouragement I have received, and I am super-excited to elevate the production.

Thank you to everyone who has been reading and listening.

We will be back in June with GBS 2.0!

This week’s Goddess Bible Study focuses on one of the most controversial topics in the Bible, the greatest sin committed by the Israelites and Canaanites (aka Phoenicians), child sacrifice.

The grotesque sin of child sacrifice was documented by Greek and Roman writers, in addition to the Hebrew prophets. These imperial rivals to the Phoenicians were universally disgusted by the practice, and it was a crucial distinction between their cultures.

We see evidence of child sacrifice in the cultures that worshipped Baal, particularly Carthage in North Africa, which was a Phoenician colony. The cult of Yahweh emerged in the Iron Age and challenged the primacy of Baal, the incumbent king of the gods. Child sacrifice was one of the most important issues they fought over.

The Greek story of Agamemnon sacrificing Iphigenia at the beginning of the Trojan War, as well as the Hebrew story of Abraham and Isaac, indicate that these practices were culturally familiar, but they were clearly rejected in the religious reformations of the Iron Age.

The Hebrews and Hellenistic Greeks saw themselves as superior peoples, in part, because they rejected the child sacrifice practices of their ancestors.

Sacrifices were made under different circumstances. There were obligatory sacrifices of firstborns, usually animals but sometimes children. Some infants were killed to honor a request being granted by the gods. In other cases, children, including royal children, could be sacrificed in times of danger and deprivation, such as a siege or famine, in hopes of saving the entire community.

This was an era of high child mortality, parents expected to lose many babies, and this is certainly part of the context for these ritual sacrifices.

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Child Sacrifice in the Bible

An early passage from the Bible indicates that child sacrifice had once been commanded.

One of the most famous stories in the Bible is the near-sacrifice of Isaac by his father Abraham. God (El at this stage of history) ordered Abraham to sacrifice his beloved son, Isaac, and Abraham reluctantly agreed, but upon proving his faith, the demand was rescinded by Yahweh.

It is an interesting detail that the story begins with God demanding the sacrifice, while Yahweh steps in at the end to provide the deliverance. This indicates both the distinction between God (El) and Yahweh, who were two separate gods, and also the opposition to sacrifice by the Yahweh cult.

Many scholars believe the original story featured the death of Isaac and that it was later modified by Yahwists. The sacrifice of Iphigenia is similarly told in contradictory stories; in some cases, the girl dies, and in others she is saved by the goddess Artemis and replaced with a substitute.

Several Biblical kings are recorded to have sacrificed their children.

In one instance, Canaanite child sacrifice apparently worked to defend against an assault by the Israelites. Fortunately, we now understand that these sacrifices were a futile and useless superstition that our ancestors were correct to abandon.

The battle featured in the following verse is a real historical incident. The Moabite victory was commemorated on the Mesha Stele from 840 BC, which happens to be the first appearance of Yahweh in the historical record. Mesha, the king of Moab, in an act of desperation, sacrificed his firstborn son, the crown prince, to appeal to the gods to save the city from imminent defeat and destruction. According to the Bible, the sacrifice worked, and victory was snatched from the jaws of defeat.

According to the Hebrew Bible, several kings, primarily of Judah, engaged in the ritual of child sacrifice. There are suggestions that other kings also permitted or participated in the practice.

Ahaz, King of Judah (c. 735–715 BCE):

Manasseh, King of Judah (c. 687–643 BCE):

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Phoenicians

Despite being a civilized and cosmopolitan people, the Phoenicians were deeply superstitious by Greek and Roman accounts, clinging to talismans and amulets that would help protect them from their malevolent gods.

Archaeology has confirmed that the Baalists did practice human sacrifice. Thousands of infant remains have been unearthed at Carthage in a huge “tophet,” a burial ground for charred human and animal sacrifices.

Smaller tophets were also found at Phoenician sites in Sicily, Sardinia, and Tunisia. Child sacrifice at Carthage took place continuously for over 600 years through good times and bad. No tophets have been found in Israel/Canaan, but they may have once existed.

The tophets contain a mix of animal and child remains carefully placed in urns, indicating that animals were used as well, or as substitutes for children. The fact that the animals and children were all buried together shows that these were not cemeteries, but ritual offerings to the gods.

Human sacrifice in the form of killing war captives and slaves was not unusual in the ancient world. Nor was it unheard of for an entire royal court to practice ritual suicide upon the death of the king or Pharaoh. These and other similar practices, including cannibalism, have been documented in many cultures around the world.

But the Phoenician/Canaanite practice of sacrificing their own children to placate the gods does seem unique in the Iron Age Mediterranean, and does not appear to have been practiced in any of the neighboring cultures like Mesopotamia or Egypt. The Greeks allude to child sacrifice in their mythology as an ancient practice of their uncivilized forebears.

Carthaginian child sacrifices are extremely controversial among academics, some refuse to accept that it was happening. Human sacrifice was part of their culture, and most of the literature describes the sacrifices as the fulfillment of vows and responses to prayers being answered by the gods. Apparently, people would offer a child if the gods delivered their prayer requests.

Dramatic Rituals

The method of sacrifice was dramatic, a bronze statue of a god with arms outstretched was stoked with a hot fire. The babies and animals were placed in the god’s arms and immediately consumed by the flames.

Greek historian Cleitarchus, who wrote a biography of Alexander the Great, also wrote about child sacrifice.

Children could be purchased from the poor for sacrificial purposes. It was a requirement that the parents of the sacrificed child do not shed any tears, or else the sacrifice was invalidated, the money lost, and the child would still be dead.

Greek historian Plutarch wrote:

Greek writers wrote for Greek audiences, and they routinely used the familiar names of Greek gods when describing foreign gods, which leads to some confusion among later scholars, who must take care to recognize which gods are being described. In the context of human sacrifice, the Greeks consistently describe them as sacrifices to Cronos, the cruel king of the Titans, the older generation of gods who ate his own children and was displaced by his son, Zeus. The Greeks clearly associate Cronos with El, the god of Israel.

El’s Sacrifice of His Son Ieoud

Very little Phoenician writing or mythology has survived, but bits from the legendary writer Sanchuniathon were preserved by Philo of Byblos and recorded later by the Christian Bishop Eusebius in his polemics against the hated pagans.

One Phoenician myth features El sacrificing his infant son Ieoud in a story reminiscent of Abraham and Isaac.

This story again demonstrates that the Greeks correlated El with Cronos.

Child sacrifices were made by the wealthy and elite, including the royalty. The practice fell into disrepute and corruption when the rich were allowed to purchase the children of the poor as substitutes for their own children. Carthage came under siege in 308 BCE by the king of Syracuse, leading to a political crisis and mass sacrifices.

Biblical Opposition to Sacrifice

The Yahweh cult began pushing its cultural reforms in the 10th century BCE, and child sacrifice was one of the defining issues. The issue was heated throughout the entire First Temple period. The prophet Jeremiah was particularly exercised about it.

Moloch/Mulk

In the Bible, the practice is usually described as sacrifices to the god Moloch, or as “passing the children through fire.”

It is possible that “Moloch” is actually a mistranslation and does not refer to a god but is simply a name for this particular type of sacrifice. Biblical Hebrew is written with no vowels, leading to many possible translations of the same words.

One reason is that there is no evidence in the archaeological record of a god named Moloch anywhere, he only appears in the Bible.

The Hebrew word used is “mlk” traditionally seen as the deity Moloch, but scholars now believe the word is “mulk,” the name used for the sacrifice in Carthage. If the sacrifices were not made to Moloch, that also strengthens the argument that the sacrifices were made to El.

Passing Thru Fire

12th-century Jewish philosopher Maimonides described a pagan custom of passing infants through fire, or a candle, that did not involve sacrifice, but was reminiscent of the Mystery religions, and the various myths where the goddesses Isis and Demeter put an infant in a fire to grant them immortality.

I believe all of us today can be thankful that child sacrifice was long ago abandoned.

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Livestream Tuesday May 5, 2026 at 7 pm EST.

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Next episode of Goddess Bible Study, we will return to the Book of Kings and the reforms against child sacrifice, and the goddesses.

In this week’s Goddess Bible Study, we focus on a special topic: trans folks. This is a hot-button political topic these days, with a lot of sensitivity around language choices. Some people may object to my language choices here, but I am going to stick to the most accurate language I know, and you can’t please everybody.

Transgender people have existed throughout history and across cultures, and they were highly celebrated in goddess traditions of the ancient world, often serving as shamans and high priests. They appear in both the Old and New Testaments, as well as in neighboring cultures.

Many of the great goddesses, such as Ishtar and Cybele, were themselves transgender. Gender bending represents the unification of paradoxes and the wholeness of creation.

Trans people had great names in the ancient world, a few examples include:

• The god Hermaphroditus from Greece

• Qadesh (Holy Ones) in the Bible

• The Galli priests of the great Roman mother goddess Cybele

• The Megabyzi at the Temple of Artemis in Ephesus

• Gala priests in Sumer

• Enaree shamans with the Scythians, as mentioned by Herodotus

• Hijra in India and Kathoey in Thailand, who are still around today

• Ardhanarishvara is a Hindu god, a composite, androgynous form of Shiva and his consort Parvati (Shakti)

Merging male and female symbolizes the synthesis of masculine and feminine energies and the inseparable nature of consciousness and matter. It signifies that the union of opposites creates the rhythm of life, maintaining balance, unity, and harmony in the universe.

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Jesus Christ (New Testament)

Jesus Christ described the condition of male→female transitioners perfectly in the Gospel of Matthew when he said:

A eunuch is a castrated man, and was the common term in the ancient world that would describe today’s transexuals. Jesus describes three types: those who were born that way (biologically intersex, or hermaphrodites), those who were made by others (castrated without consent, generally to work in the palace), and those who choose it for spiritual purposes (voluntary transexuals and priests). There are also cross-dressers who maintain their sexual functions and serve in goddess traditions.

“Those who can accept this should accept it,” says Jesus.

Hebrew Bible (Old Testament)

In the Old Testament (Hebrew Bible), the male transgender priests are called the qadesh, the “holy ones”, and they were the counterparts to the female qedesha priestesses. They were prominent in the earlier pagan Israelite traditions, and they were pushed out, along with the goddesses, in the monotheistic reforms.

The qadesh are only mentioned when they are being chased away and insulted. Their names are translated in a derogatory manner. In English texts, the qadesh are called “temple sodomites” and “dogs,” just as the female qedesha are called “temple prostitutes,” and “harlots” rather than “holy ones.”

The qadesh priests are uniformly condemned by the Biblical writers as a sign of sexual degeneracy by bad pagan kings. Their removal under the reformer kings of Yahweh is celebrated. Ultimately, laws were crafted by the Israelites that forbade the practice in sacred settings.

The qadesh appear in the Biblical narrative during the periods of religious reform, when the Yahweh-alone movement attacked and attempted to destroy the old pagan Israelite traditions. We will be digging into these stories in upcoming episodes of Goddess Bible Study.

Scholars generally associate the male qadesh as being the equivalent of the Roman Galli priests, who are well documented.

Scholars debate the historical usage of the terms eunuch, qadesh, and sodomite, and admittedly, these can be slippery. We can see in the contemporary debate on these topics how fluid gender identity and sexual practices can be, and it was every bit as fluid in ancient times as well.

We only have limited information to draw conclusions from, but we do know with certainty that gender-bending is an ancient practice and was highly celebrated in many societies. We also know with certainty that the patriarchal, monotheistic faiths that restricted the nature-based practices of the goddesses were hostile to anything that made men effeminate.

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Inanna/Ishtar/Astarte

Ishtar, the Babylonian goddess of love and war (Astarte in the Bible), was herself transgender and was one of the most popular deities in the Ancient Near East. Ishtar could produce a beard and present as a man when she went into battle. In one lamentation, Ishtar says,

One of Inanna/Ishtar’s most famous stories is her Descent to the Underworld, where she attempted to visit without permission and was struck dead. The goddess was rescued by sexless eunuchs and brought back to life. These characters were represented in the temples by the kurgarrū and assinnu, servants of Ishtar who dressed in female clothing and performed dances in Ishtar’s temples. Several Akkadian proverbs seem to suggest that they may have also had homosexual proclivities, and some were eunuchs.

During earlier Sumerian times, Inanna was served by priests known as Gala, who performed elegies and lamentations. Men who became gala sometimes adopted female names, and their songs were composed in the Sumerian emesal dialect, which, in literary texts, is normally reserved for the speech of female characters. Some Sumerian proverbs seem to suggest that gala had a reputation for engaging in anal sex with men.

Hermaphroditus

The Greeks and Romans recognized the intersex god Hermaphroditus, the child of Hermes and Aphrodite. He was a remarkably beautiful boy who was merged with a nymph who had fallen in love with him. Hermaphroditus was the god of androgyny and effeminacy and was portrayed as a woman with male genitals.

There are many examples of marble statues of Hermaphroditus from the Greek and Roman eras. Here is one example, displayed in the Louvre Musuem in Paris.

Galli Priests of Cybele

The best documented of the priestly eunuchs were the Galli priests of Rome who served Cybele, the mother of the Gods. The Galli were famous and controversial in the Roman Empire, they had long flowing hair, perfume, and bright, colorful clothes. They engaged in ecstatic rituals filled with song and dance, plant drugs, ritual sex, self-flagellation, and the blood of animal sacrifices. And in a dramatic moment of wild abandon, initiates castrated themselves with a sharp flint knife in service of the great goddess.

These traditions were incredibly ancient, they were formally imported into the Roman Empire from Anatolia (Turkey) in dramatic ceremonies at the height of the Punic Wars. Cybele was credited with helping the Romans defeat Carthage and become the mighty empire. Many temples were built in Rome to the Mater Dei, the Mother of the Gods.

Cybele’s mythology was steeped in stories of castrations and gender-bending. In a famous poem, the Roman poet Catullus detailed the shocking moment when a new initiate, lost in the frenzy of the wild, intoxicated celebrations, cut himself and bled on the forest floor, and turned from he into she.

Cybele’s Galli priests were both honored and marginalized. At this late stage of Roman paganism, hard patriarchy and machismo dominated the culture. The effeminate Galli contradicted all notions of Roman masculinity, and they were confined to their temple most of the year.

Megabyzi of Artemis at Ephesus

The biggest and most famous pagan temple in Jesus’s day was the Grand Temple to Artemis at Ephesus. It was one of the seven wonders of the ancient world and was a major pilgrimage spot for centuries.

The Megabyzi were transgendered eunuch priests who served Artemis at the Grand Temple.

The temple of Artemis makes a cameo appearance in the New Testament when the Apostle Paul visited and nearly caused a riot. (Acts 19:24-31).

Scythian Enaree

The Enaree roamed with the nomadic horse-riding Scythians and their Amazon warrior women. Herodotus wrote that they were hermaphrodite shamans blessed by Aphrodite Urania, the Queen of Heaven, whom the Scythians called Artimpasa.

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Ardhanarishvara

Hijra of India - Kathoey of Thailand

Transgender traditions never disappeared; they lived on around the world and continue today. Some examples include the Hijra of India, and Kathoey (ladyboys) of Thailand, Cambodia, and Laos.

Hinduism recognizes Hijras as a third gender category in law and culture. Trans people have been part of South Asian society forever, but Christian missionaries and the European colonialists viewed them as depraved and worked for centuries to have them criminalized and eradicated.

Christian colonialists and missionaries introduced new sexual mores to the Indian subcontinent that rejected and criminalized homosexuality and outward expressions of gender-bending. Today, the Hijras and Kathoey continue to survive, albeit living on the fringes of society and forced into begging and prostitution to earn money.

Trans people have been around forever, they have unique identities and proud histories. Sometimes venerated and sometimes persecuted, trans people have always been visible and held distinct roles in society. Whether as musicians, sex workers, shamans, or priests, trans people tap into possibilities that most people cannot access and should be given their space to flourish.

Next episode, we will continue with our third contained subject, child sacrifice, before returning to the Bible narrative. Ritual child sacrifice was a common practice in some cultures, including the Canaanites and pagan Israelites. Eliminating child sacrifice was one of the primary reforms the Hebrew prophets of the First Temple period were attempting to achieve.

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Live discussion Tuesday, April 28 at 7 pm EST.

Cannabis in the Bible

This is the topic that started it all for me. In 2018, I began researching cannabis in the Bible with the plan of writing a book.

I was aware that cannabis is mentioned by name in five verses of the Old Testament in the original Hebrew, but was mistranslated as a different plant, so we don’t see it in modern Bibles. This mistranslation occurred in the Septuagint, the first Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible around 300 BC, so the meaning of the word has long been lost and only recently rediscovered.

We now know that cannabis was once sacred to the Hebrews. It is an ingredient in Moses’ Holy Anointing Oil, a recipe that comes directly from the mouth of God, so it must have been important, but cannabis is clearly not sacred in modern Jewish and Christian traditions today. They must have gotten rid of the plant at some point in history. My plan for the book was to figure out when and why it happened.

I opened a Bible for the first time since High School, and began digging into the modern academic scholarship to try and make sense of the story. It was here that I first discovered Asherah, the one-time wife of God.

God had a Wife?

I thought this was the most outrageous thing I had ever heard, and it made no sense, and now we have Goddess Bible Study, but that is another story.

I quickly came to the hypothesis that cannabis and the goddess must have been thrown out together, and that is exactly what happened. Cannabis was deeply sacred in the goddess traditions of the original pagan Israelites when they still had a mother goddess. But they divorced her when they transitioned from pagans into monotheists, and all her nature-based traditions and sacred plants were deemed profane.

My book was originally titled “Cannabis and the Goddess” before a last-minute change at publication time to “A History of the Goddess: from the Ice Age to the Bible,” which I think is much better.

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Anyway, let’s get into the evidence and the stories.

Five Verses

Five verses in the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) use the Hebrew word kaneh, or kaneh bosm, which is the name of cannabis, but it is mistranslated as either calamus or aromatic cane. In all five instances, cannabis fits the context while calamus and aromatic cane does not. Aromatic cane is rather meaningless.

Exodus 30:23; Song of Solomon 4:14; Isaiah 43:24; Jeremiah 6:20; Ezekiel 27:17

Kaneh is described as a sacred ingredient in Moses’ holy anointing oil, a valued aromatic herb, a burnt offering in the temple (twice), and as an object of trade from Lebanon.

All of these references are during the First Temple period (or earlier). Cannabis was eventually thrown out in the reformations of the Yahweh-alone movement, and it does not appear again in the Second Temple.

Biblical commentary has long noticed that the spice mentioned in these five verses (kaneh, kaneh bosm) is vague and ambiguous, and there is no historical consensus among Jewish and Christian scholars on the proper translation. Bosm means sweet, or pungent; often in the context of aromatics applied to the body.

Among various candidates suggested for kaneh (bosm) include calamus, sweet cane, ginger grass, camel grass, lemon grass, sugar cane, balm oil, fennel, and other plants as well.

Aromatic cane is actually a good description of cannabis, which grows 10 feet tall and is pungent.

This is an important scholarly question, it is not just trivia for potheads. If it can be proven that kaneh is cannabis and was burned in the first Hebrew Temple, then there are profound theological, historical, cultural, and legal implications that reverberate in today’s society, beginning with the entire concept of marijuana prohibition.

Why Not Calamus?

Calamus, Acorus calamus L.- Sweet flag, is an herbaceous perennial, a common marsh plant. The flowers are sweetly fragrant and psychoactive. It is a well-known plant used in Indian traditional medicine for centuries. Its aroma makes calamus an essential oil valued in the perfume industry and used as a flavor for foods, alcoholic beverages, and bitters.

So far, so good for calamus, the problem is that calamus is extremely toxic in high doses, as required in the Holy Anointing Oil, nor is it typically a burnt offering.

Calamus was even banned for use as human food or as a food additive in 1968 by the United States Food and Drug Administration because it contains more than 75% asarone. Asarone is a poison that has been shown to cause cancer, and has ill effects on heart, liver, and kidney functions. This toxin in calamus is used for pest control.

Sula Benet - the Scholar

The etymology of kaneh bosm as cannabis was first identified by Polish scholar Sula Benet (aka Sara Benetowa) in her 1936 PhD thesis from Columbia University, and again in a 1975 paper. Her work has been confirmed by modern scholars, though her conclusions are controversial in conservative circles.

Modern cannabis scholar Chris Bennet discovered Sula Benet’s work in the 1990s and popularized the finding with today’s audiences.

Kaneh bosm has clear similarities to other ancient names for cannabis, such as the Assyrian kunubu. Kunubu is listed as an ingredient in the sacred rites in a letter by the mother of Assyrian King Esarhaddon, 680 BCE, which is contemporary to the First Temple.

Cannabis was widely used for both fibers and drugs across Bronze Age Anatolia, Canaan, Egypt, Mesopotamia, and Persia, and is thoroughly documented as deeply sacred in India since prehistoric times.

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Here are the five verses:

Moses’ Holy Anointing Oil

The Holy Anointing Oil is the most important reference since it highlights the sacred value of the plant. This recipe was given directly by God to Moses, and it was used to anoint all the sacred objects in the temple, as well as to anoint high priests and kings.

Producing this recipe with calamus would likely make you sick, but with cannabis, it is highly psychoactive.

The recipe for the holy anointing oil is potent. 250 shekels of cannabis equals 6.28 pounds of flowering cannabis tops infused into roughly 1.5 gallons of olive oil (around 6 liters, hin is not a precise measure), plus myrrh, cinnamon, and cassia. This recipe was boiled and distilled so that all the spices were infused into the oil.

See more here:

Song of Songs

Frankincense, myrrh, and cannabis were routinely blended to make intoxicating incense in the ancient world. Here they are listed among aromatic herbs in the romantic Song of Songs.

Isaiah - Burnt Offering to Yahweh

Cannabis was burned in the First Temple, commanded by Yahweh.

Ezekiel - Trade Goods from Tyre

Cannabis fiber and drug products were widely traded in the ancient world. Here, the prophet Ezekiel listed cannabis among trade goods from the Phoenician (Lebanese) city of Tyre. The Bekaa Valley in Lebanon has been famous for growing cannabis since ancient times.

Jeremiah - Burnt Offering Rejected

Jeremiah was a leading prophet of Yahweh during Josiah’s reign. He witnessed the destruction of Jerusalem and went into exile in Egypt. Yahweh is angry about something here and not satisfied with the offerings being made. Perhaps this is part of the reforms, Jeremiah was one of the reformer prophets.

Evidence of Cannabis at Tel Arad Temple

The scholarly argument for cannabis in the Bible had been based on etymology and conjecture until a recent archeological study brought full confirmation. Tel Arad is an extremely important site in Israel, as it contains the only example of a temple outside Jerusalem during the period when the First Temple stood.

The site is controversial because the temple is pagan and clearly contains a pair of standing stones for Yahweh and Asherah in the Holy of Holies. There are also a pair of incense altars accompanying the standing stones.

The altars contain residues of plant material. This residue had been observed for decades, but it was only in 2020 that the samples were finally analyzed and the findings published in a peer-reviewed journal.

The pair of incense altars were found to have residues of frankincense and cannabis, and provides firm scientific evidence confirming the etymological argument for cannabis in the Bible.

The smaller altar had cannabis and was paired with the standing stone for Asherah, while the larger frankincense altar went with Yahweh.

Evidence of Reforms at Tel Arad

The Tel Arad temple site had been carefully buried in the 8th century BCE, allowing its full preservation. The twin standing stones and incense altars for Yahweh and Asherah that stood in the Holy of Holies were laid down and buried by hand.

The question is, why was the temple site buried?

The site was either buried because of the monotheistic reforms of King Hezekiah as described in the Bible, or because of the Assyrian invasion in that period that saw Israel destroyed and Jerusalem attacked (but barely surviving). Scholars argue both sides.

The Bible tells us about the reformer kings Hezekiah and Josiah in the 8th and 7th centuries BCE. These kings championed the Yahweh-alone movement and worked to centralize worship in the Jerusalem temple. The reforms centered on shutting down the popular pagan goddess traditions that were not subject to their authority,

Hezekiah was King of Judah from 715-686 BCE. He is a historical figure thoroughly attested by archaeologists. The religious reforms were early in his reign.

King Josiah’s Reforms

King Josiah was Hezekiah’s grandson and ruled Judah from 640-609 BCE, with the reforms around 630 BCE.

Women Defend the Queen of Heaven

Not long after, in 586 BCE, Jerusalem was sacked and the First Temple destroyed by the invading Babylonians. The Israelites were sent into exile.

As the exiles were leaving their home, with Jerusalem in flames behind them, the prophet Jeremiah attempted to castigate the women for their ongoing goddess worship and scapegoat them for the tragic turn of events.

The women weren’t having it.

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Divorce of the Sacred Marriage

The Garden of Eden story is a mythological condemnation of the traditional goddess religion of Asherah, Astarte, and Anat. The Garden of Eden story was likely written during the reforms of kings Hezekiah and Josiah, when the Yahwists worked hard to centralize control in the Jerusalem temple and shut down the popular goddess traditions.

Like Hesiod’s Pandora (a contemporary story), the first woman, Eve, was cast as the source of all of men’s troubles, and she must be restrained.

Many celebrated symbols and images of the goddesses, such as the serpent, gardens, sacred plants, and childbirth, were inverted and profaned in the Garden of Eden story in an effort to subvert Eve and all women to patriarchal authority. Cannabis makes an important appearance in my interpretation and is also condemned.

The great goddess traditions were matriarchal women’s religions, and the patriarchal Yahwists shut them down so that the Heavenly Father could rule alone with no wife or competition.

Garden of Eden

The Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil

Could the forbidden fruit be cannabis? It matches the description.

• The fruit of the tree was good for food; cannabis seeds are among the most nutritious seeds found anywhere in nature, valued by humans, animals, and birds.

• The woman saw that the plant was pleasing to the eye; cannabis is widely regarded as a beautiful, attractive plant.

• The plant is desirable for gaining wisdom; cannabis has long been used in religion and ritual, valued for its capacity to promote shamanistic insight and meditative reflection.

• Adam and Eve ate the fruit and their eyes were opened, they realized they were naked; they ate the cannabis, got high, and had ideas; a classic entheogenic experience.

• They sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves; they used the hemp fibers to sew clothes.

Revelation - The Tree of Life

Could cannabis be the Tree of Life, yielding its twelve crops of fruit every month?

We will do a dedicated topic on the Book of Revelation when the time comes.

Next episode of GBS, we will dive into the long, cross-cultural traditions of transgender people.

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Live discussion on cannabis, Tuesday, April 14, 2026 at 7pm EST.

This week on Goddess Bible Study, we conclude our deep dive into King Solomon, the father of the wisdom traditions, with some of his legends outside the Bible.

Our favorite goddess worshipper is arguably the most celebrated biblical figure over the centuries, across many cultures. King Solomon looms large in the religious traditions of Ethiopia, the spiritual legends of the Islamic world, and the magical traditions of Renaissance Europe.

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Queen of Sheba

We will start with one short passage from the Bible, the famous story of the Queen of Sheba, which inspired profound traditions in Ethiopia that live on to this day.

The Queen of Sheba visited King Solomon. The beautiful Queen had heard of Solomon’s great wisdom and wealth and wanted to see for herself. She came bearing fabulous gifts and departed with many of her own.

In Ethiopian legend, the King and Queen had a child of noble birth and historic importance. By tradition, the Queen is believed to have come from Ethiopia, though many scholars say the location was more likely Yemen (especially Yemeni scholars).

Kebra Nagast
In Ethiopian tradition, the Queen of Sheba is named Makeda. She had a child with King Solomon named Menelik, who became king and patriarch of the Solomonic dynasty of Ethiopia. The Kebra Nagast, the “Glory of Kings,” is an Ethiopian sacred text written 1314-1322, but whose origins were centuries earlier. It expounds on many Biblical tales and presents the history of the Solomonic dynasty.

The Kebra Nagast tells the full story of the Queen of Sheba and King Solomon. It also tells how their son Menelik took the Ark of the Covenant with him back to Ethiopia, where it still resides today.

By tradition, the Ark of the Covenant is said to reside in a small chapel in the Ethiopian town of Axum under the careful watch of a single priest who will remain on duty until he dies. Tourists can visit the chapel, but no one is allowed in.

Menelik
The Kebra Nagast tells the story of how Menelik traveled from Ethiopia to Jerusalem to meet his father for the first time when he was 22 years old. As Menelik approached Jerusalem, the people who saw him were amazed at his resemblance to King Solomon. The people became excited, and Solomon soon learned of the regal visitor making his way to the palace.

When the king first saw Menelik, he knew immediately that the visitor was his son and embraced him warmly. No proof was required as their features and manner were so similar. Menelik displayed great bearing and wisdom even as a young man.

King Solomon brought Menelik into his chambers and arrayed him in gorgeous apparel, including a belt of gold and a crown. Solomon presented Menelik to all the nobles, who accepted him and gave him presents.

Solomon wanted Menelik to remain in Jerusalem and succeed him as king, but Menelik was anxious to return to Ethiopia and be king there.

Menelik knew that his half-brother Rehoboam had a claim to the throne in Jerusalem and would be a rival. Rehoboam was six years older and born to Solomon’s wife, while Makeda and Solomon were never married.

King Solomon was aware that Rehoboam lacked wisdom and would be a poor king. Solomon begged Menelik to stay, he offered him the kingdom and many wives and concubines, but Menelik would not be swayed.

Menelik had sworn on his mother’s breast that he would return home soon and not marry a woman in Israel. To swear by a woman’s breast was a serious matter.

Solomonic Dynasty
Solomon saw that it was impossible to keep Menelik in Jerusalem. So the king declared his intention to send the eldest sons of the nobles to Ethiopia, to found a new colony of Hebrews. Zadok the priest anointed Menelik King of Ethiopia inside the Holy of Holies, drenching him with the sacred cannabis oil. Menelik took the Hebrew name, David II, after his grandfather.

Not everyone was happy to leave Jerusalem, for the Ark of the Covenant contained the laws of God and brought good fortune to Israel. Some of Menelik’s men suggested that they secretly take the Ark with them. Some versions of the story say that Menelik knew of the plan, others say he did not.

Menelik’s men fashioned a wooden box that was a replica of the Ark, which was always kept covered under a sacred cloth. The men were not being completely selfish, for they knew that the Kingdom was not stable. Solomon was getting old, and many enemies were rising against him.

Ark of the Covenant
Menelik’s men were able to sneak the Ark of the Covenant out of the Temple because Yahweh wanted the Ark moved. The Ark was loaded onto a wagon and covered with baggage. Menelik received Solomon’s blessings and said farewell. As the caravan left Jerusalem, the men and women wailed, and the animals howled. King Solomon and his people knew instinctively that the glory of Israel had departed with the caravan.

As Menelik traveled, the caravan was led by the Archangel Michael, who cut a path and sheltered them from the heat. Neither man nor beast touched the ground with their feet, they were carried aloft with the speed of an eagle. The caravan traveled in one day a distance that normally took thirteen.

It was revealed to the entire company that they were in possession of the Ark of the Covenant. They all let out a great cheer, and Menelik vowed to establish the second Kingdom of God in Ethiopia.

King Menelik ruled honorably and fathered the Solomonic dynasty. The Ark of the Covenant has remained in Ethiopia until this day, 3000 years later.

When Zadok the priest discovered the Ark missing, he fainted on the spot. Solomon led his men in pursuit of the caravan, but it was too late. The king returned to Jerusalem and wept bitterly. King Solomon knew that the Ark of the Covenant could not have been carried off without Yahweh’s support, for the Ark is powerful and able to take care of itself. Previous usurpers had all been destroyed.

Satisfied that the will of God is irresistible, Solomon and the priests vowed to keep the disappearance of the Ark a secret. They allowed the duplicate box to remain in place, covered with cloth, lest enemies take advantage of their misfortune.

After King Solomon died, he was followed by his cruel and unwise son, Rehoboam. The ten northern tribes rebelled against the young king and formed the northern kingdom of Israel. The nation was split in two, never to be rejoined until modern times.

Pharaoh Shishak’s Invasion

In Rehoboam’s fifth year, 925 BCE, Pharaoh Shishak of Egypt led a military campaign across Canaan. He attacked Judah and plundered the temple, taking away everything, so it was good that the Ark of the Covenant had already been moved to Africa. It is never mentioned again in the Biblical text.

Pharaoh Shishak’s invasion of Canaan was a real historical event recorded in both Egyptian records and the Bible, with the dates from both sources aligning perfectly.

Shishak recorded his campaign on the Bubasite Stele in Karnak, but unfortunately for us, the stele is heavily damaged. The sections about Jerusalem and Judah are not legible, and therefore, we don’t know what was taken from the Jerusalem temple, if anything. The Bible says that all the gold in the temple was taken by Shishak, but the proof text is lost to us.

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Ethiopia
Ethiopia is the birthplace of humanity, the oldest human skeletons were found there, and it is where the migrations out of Africa originated. There are many important spiritual traditions in Ethiopia. To this day, Ethiopia has maintained the oldest continuous traditions of Judaism and Christianity. The country played an important role in the foundation of Islam, and was an inspiration to modern Rastafarians.

Beta Israel is an ancient tribe of Black Jews who live in Ethiopia and neighboring Eritrea. Beta Israel traces their heritage directly back to King Menelik and are pre-Rabbinic. They have unique traditions, and no one is sure of their most ancient origins, except that they migrated down the Nile River over time. The Black Jews are the keepers of the Ark of the Covenant, and the Kebra Nagast is one of their sacred texts.

The Ark of the Covenant is kept in a small chapel in the town of Axum (Aksum) where only a single priest, appointed for life, is allowed to see it. Apparently, Indiana Jones and the rest of the Protestants have not been well-informed, because they seem to think the Ark has been lost all this time.

Ethiopian Coptic Christians trace their roots back to the first century CE and the evangelizing of the Apostle Matthew, who was one of the original 12 disciples of Jesus. Coptic traditions are as old as the Catholic Church, and they traditionally depict Jesus as black.

The Prophet Mohammed also visited Ethiopia in the early days of Islam to escape persecution and was given sanctuary. In thankfulness and respect for his hosts, Mohammed dictated in the Koran that jihad, holy war, should never be conducted in Ethiopia. When all the neighboring African countries became thoroughly Islamic, Ethiopia was spared. The native Ethiopian Jewish and Christian traditions were permitted to co-exist alongside Islam, an arrangement that has persisted to this day.

Emperor Haile Selassie
Modern Ethiopians trace their royal lineage back 3000 years, to King Solomon, Makeda, and Menelik. In practice, their royal line began in the 1200’s and continued unbroken to their last emperor in the 20th century, Haile Selassie.

Emperor Haile Selassie had a long career and was a major figure in international politics. Selassie successfully resisted European colonialism and fought an important war against fascist Italy in the 1930s. Ethiopia is the only African country not colonized by either Europeans or Islamists.

Haile Selassie was the last, and only true African royalty of the 20th century, during an era of rising African Black pride and independence. Haile Selassie was given equivalent honors to all the royalty in Europe and was hailed by Africans the world over, who were struggling to reclaim their identity after centuries of slavery and oppression. The Emperor helped to found the League of Nations and the United Nations, where he represented the voices of the colonized Africans.

Sadly, Haile Selassie was deposed and murdered by Marxist insurgents in 1975 under circumstances that remain disputed.

Haile Selassie was seen by some people to be a messiah, and he inspired a new religion in the 1930’s called Rastafari, though Selassie himself never claimed divine powers of any kind. This new religion was founded in Jamaica and empowered many pan-African liberationists, such as Marcus Garvey, who sought to overthrow the European colonial powers dominating Africa. The most famous Rastafarian is the late Reggae musician Bob Marley, and the religion continues to have a strong community to this day.

King Solomon in Islam

King Solomon (Sulayman in Arabic) is a towering figure in Islamic culture. He appears in the Koran and is widely celebrated in Arab folklore, literature, and occult traditions, often depicted as the ultimate master of the supernatural. The Koran portrays him as a prophet-king, while broader Arab culture expanded his persona into a legendary mage and a central character in epic storytelling.

In popular Arab legends, Solomon’s power is physically tied to the Seal of Solomon (Khatam Sulayman), a miraculous signet ring that contains his seal of intertwined triangles and precious stones. The ring gives Solomon power over jinn, animals, and the elements, and was his protective amulet.

Solomon appears frequently in the Arabian Nights (Alf Layla wa-Layla) as the “Lord of the Age” who imprisons disobedient Jinn.

In stories like “The Fisherman and the Jinni,” Solomon is the one who sealed rebellious spirits in copper carafes with leaden seals, throwing them into the sea to remain until found by unsuspecting humans centuries later. He is often associated with the construction of legendary, unreachable cities made of metal or glass, where his magical legacies are guarded by mechanical automata or trapped spirits.

Occult and Esoteric Traditions

Solomon is a foundational figure in Arabic grimoires and “books of wonders.” He is viewed as the “Grandmaster” of all secret knowledge, including alchemy and the summoning of spirits. Works like those of Ahmed al-Buni (a famous 13th-century occultist) attribute complex magical squares and talismans to Solomon’s wisdom.

Arab folklore attributes the construction of various ancient megalithic sites—such as Palmyra (Tadmur) in Syria and Persepolis in Iran—to Solomon’s Jinn, claiming only supernatural labor could move such massive stones.

Solomon’s wisdom is so ingrained that he is a frequent subject in Arabic poetry and idioms. To say someone has “the wisdom of Solomon” or to reference his ability to “hear the whisper of the ant” is a common way to denote extreme perception or justice in Arabic literary culture.

The Hoopoe, or Messenger Bird, Solomon’s scout, remains a symbol of loyalty and the “bearer of news” in traditional Arab imagery.

Solomonic Magic

King Solomon continued to inspire people’s imaginations for thousands of years. Solomonic magic is a system of European ceremonial magic rooted in Medieval and Renaissance grimoires attributed to the Biblical King Solomon. A grimoire is a book of spells and incantations.

The three great European grimoires are the Key of Solomon and the Lesser Key of Solomon, which focus on rituals and preparations of the magicians, and also the Testament of Solomon, which is written in the first person and describes how Solomon created the magical ring of Andaleeb and used it to control demons and build the First Temple in Jerusalem. The Key and Lesser Key of Solomon are likely medieval texts, while the Testament of Solomon may be much older, going back to the 1st century AD. Scholars have no consensus on when the texts were written.

Aleister Crowley and co-writers translated all three texts from the original Greek language into English and compiled them into a single book, “The Three Magical Books of Solomon.”

Another famous grimoire is the Hygromanteia, the Magical Treatise of Solomon. This is a 16th-century Byzantine work that serves as a bridge between late antique Greek magic and later European traditions. The book was written in medieval Greek and contains various magical techniques and tools, as well as guides for how to summon and control spirits and demons.

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King Solomon’s wisdom, wealth, magic, poetry, and sensuality are all gifts of the divine Mother. These attributes are all seen in the traditions of Isis and the Hindu goddesses, and that is a lesson we can take with us.

I don’t think it is an accident that the goddess-worshipping King Solomon is the most popular and enduring Bible character outside the Bible, with more stories and traditions than anyone else. He is the one character that people seem to feel free to write new stories about, outside the sacred scriptures, without being accused of blasphemy and heresy.

I think it is because the goddess brings undeniable authority of her own.

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In the next few weeks, we will focus on some specific topics before jumping back into Bible history in the book of Kings.

First, a topic near and dear to my heart. We will do a complete breakdown on the evidence of cannabis in the Bible, the subject that got me started on the path of the goddess.

Second, another timely political topic, transgenders! Most people don’t know that there are transexual eunuchs in the Bible called the holy ones. They are the male counterparts of the qedesha priestesses. The male qadesh are only mentioned when they are being chased away, but they are mentioned.

Trans folks were high priests of the goddesses across many pagan cultures, and there is a rich set of traditions for them in the ancient world.

Third, we will dig into the evidence for child sacrifice rituals among the Canaanites, which I believe was real. Eliminating child sacrifice was one of the central reforms the Hebrew prophets were trying to achieve, and I think most modern folks can thank them for their efforts.

Reach out:

goddessbiblestudy@gmail.com

Live discussion Tuesday, April 7 at 7 pm EST.

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This week on Goddess Bible Study, we continue with King Solomon, our favorite Biblical goddess worshipper.

In this episode, we focus on the Song of Songs, also called the Song of Solomon, or the Canticles. It is the most confounding book in the Bible, possibly the most popular, and arguably the most holy. It is also the most goddess-infused.

Song of Songs is the only openly romantic and erotic book in the Bible, and it gives more voice to a woman than any other. It makes no mention of God or anything particularly spiritual, yet rabbis treat it as very holy. It is traditionally read in synagogues on the Shabbat of Passover, and also at weddings.

Song of Songs is a collection of steamy, sultry love poetry, completely lacking in religious content, full of detailed descriptions of the lovers’ relations and naked bodies. There is no mention of God, piety, moral instruction, deliberations over justice, or the fate of humankind. It never mentions Israel, its history, or its covenant.

It is a love song of passion and devotion between the groom and his beautiful new bride. It is among the most difficult books to interpret in the Bible and provides some of the greatest hermeneutical challenges. How is a sexy love poem revealed by God Almighty?

This question was hotly disputed when the final canon of the Hebrew Bible was determined at the Council of Jamnia in 90 AD. Jamnia was the main spiritual center in Israel after Jerusalem, and the 2nd temple were destroyed. The Song of Solomon and Ecclesiastes, another late text also attributed to Solomon, were the last selected for canonization, after a fierce debate.

The highly respected Rabbi Aqiva carried the day with his famous declaration:

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The song is credited to King Solomon, who lived in the 10th century BC, but no one believes he actually wrote it. By tradition, King Solomon was known for his wisdom, poetry, and his love of learning. He also had 700 wives and 300 concubines.

Most scholars believe Song of Songs is a late text, written in the Hellenistic era, perhaps the 3rd century BC, but there is no consensus on who wrote it, when, or who the characters are.

The song clearly comes from the tradition of Babylonian hieros gamos love poetry that goes back to Bronze Age sacred marriage rituals, joining the king with the great goddess. King Solomon worshipped the love goddess Astarte and may have taken part in the rituals personally. The old goddess-worshiping traditions had an entire genre of sacred love poetry that was read aloud during hieros gamos celebrations.

The Bride is unnamed, and the groom’s identity is ambiguous, he may or may not be Solomon. By tradition, she is thought to be the Pharaoh’s daughter, but of course, Solomon had many wives. In the verses, she is said to be from Lebanon. The bride is dark-skinned, and Solomon has black hair.

There is heavy garden imagery throughout. Songs 4:14 mentions cannabis (qaneh) in a list of aromatic and psychoactive herbs, but it is usually translated as calamus, so readers miss the cannabis reference.

Theologians generally view the Song of Songs as an allegory of God’s love for Israel if one is Jewish, or Christ’s love for the church for Christians, and of the redemptive history of Israel.

One may see the Song of Songs as God’s love for the Goddess, his bride, Mother Nature, and all of creation.

Muslims believe the Song is about the Prophet Muhammad. They believe the word “altogether lovely” (mhmdym) in the following verse translates as the name of Muhammad because it sounds similar.

Here, the legendary Billy Graham gives his take. The Song of Songs is God’s love affair with humanity.

The Song advances through a few sections, first the bride and groom describe their love for one another, and she lists his virtues to her friends, perhaps the bridesmaids. Then there is the wedding day and celebration, as well as absence, longing, and searching for one another. The song is circuitous and meandering, and one can see why it is tricky to understand.

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Here is the entire Song of Songs from the NIV, New International Version.

Next week is possibly our last devoted to King Solomon, if we can get through all the remaining material. We will dive into the extra-biblical legends of King Solomon, particularly the Ethiopian traditions of the Kebra Nagast, featuring the Queen of Sheba, Menelik, and the Ark of the Covenant. As well as Islamic traditions, and Solomonic magic from medieval Europe.

We will discuss on the podcast, livestreaming on Tuesday, March 24, at 7 pm EST.

goddessbiblestudy@gmail.com

We continue with King Solomon on Goddess Bible Study, our favorite goddess-worshipping wiseman. I must confess that this post is a bit of a cheat, I am repeating the Biblical material about King Solomon’s temple that we did not get to last week.

We spent the entire previous podcast discussing the potential for a Third Temple in today’s Israel and the implications for WW3. I am personally quite pessimistic and alarmist about current events, but no need to get into that now.

This week, we continue with our regularly scheduled programming and dive into the most glorious temple in the ancient world, according to the Bible.

The image above from ChatGPT is not perfect, here is a more accurate infographic of the temple. Courtesy of the Armstrong Institute of Biblical Archaeology.

King Solomon’s Temple

King Solomon’s Temple was the first Hebrew temple in Jerusalem. It was built around 957 BCE on top of Mount Moriah, where a sacred stone is said to be the location where Abraham attempted to sacrifice his son, Isaac.

Extensive retaining walls and a platform were built on the steep hillsides to provide a location for the temple, which is known as the Temple Mount. The Holy of Holies at the heart of the temple is over the sacred foundation stone.

King Solomon was a pagan goddess worshipper, and an Asherah pole representing the mother goddess stood beside the altar to Yahweh in the temple for two-thirds of its history, roughly 240 out of 360 years, according to the eminent Jewish historian Raphael Patai, author of “The Hebrew Goddess.”

King Solomon’s temple was destroyed by the Babylonians in 586 BCE, sending the Israelites into exile. The Israelites were allowed to return after 70 years when the Persian King Cyrus defeated the Babylonians. It is more than a bit ironic (or moronic) that the contemporary Israelis now find themselves at war to the death with the Persians.

A modest second temple was restored immediately, but it was dramatically rebuilt under King Herod around 18 BCE during Roman rule. The expanded Temple Mount was the largest religious building in the Roman Empire and among the most grand. Jesus visited this temple in the Gospels, and he was crucified nearby. The Second Temple was destroyed by the Romans in the year 70 CE after the Jews revolted.

Jerusalem was burned down by the Romans, but was rebuilt by Emperor Hadrian and renamed Aelia Capitolina in 130 CE after yet another Jewish revolt. A temple to Jupiter was built on the Temple Mount, and Jews were banned from the city.

In the 4th century, Emperor Constantine converted to Christianity and made it the Imperial religion. Jerusalem was consecrated as a holy Christian city. The temple to the goddess Venus near the Temple Mount was sanctified as the church of the Holy Sepulcher, the burial place of Jesus Christ.

The Roman city later fell into decline, and it was taken by the Muslims in 638 without a fight.

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Wealth

The original United Kingdom of Israel reached its greatest territorial expanse under King Solomon in the 10th century BCE. He dominated the local tribes to the east, the Ammonites, Moabites, and Edomites, and sent his armies into Syria as well. He exacted tribute and forced the tribes to labor on his building projects. Palestine lies along important trade routes linking Africa to Asia and Europe.

Solomon had close and profitable relations with King Hiram of Tyre and the Phoenicians. With control of Edom, Israel had ports on both the Mediterranean and the Gulf of Aqaba on the Red Sea, enabling lucrative trade from the Atlantic Ocean to the Indian Ocean.

Solomon raised the kingdom to the heights of its commercial potential. He became fabulously wealthy, and the people were very happy. With trade came peace, and King Solomon ruled over a prosperous kingdom. At least, that is the story.

King Hiram of Tyre

King Solomon’s alliance with the Phoenician King Hiram of Tyre had previously been established by King David. The Tyrians were among the world’s great sailors, traders, and craftsmen, and they possessed the valuable cedar forests of Lebanon. King Hiram provided Solomon with all the cedar and juniper timber he wanted, and Solomon paid him in wheat and olive oil. Together, they engaged in wide-ranging and profitable trade.

Gold from Ophir

King Solomon is reported to have been the richest king ever, his gold from Ophir is legendary. For centuries, people have searched for Solomon’s famous gold mines, but nothing definitive has been found.

King Solomon was said to be so wealthy that he used gold plates, goblets, and utensils, and that the people of Israel did not even bother using silver because it was as common as stones. Solomon amassed massive stores of gold, thousands of horses, cavalry, men, and chariots. We can assume the elaborate claims of wealth to be literary embellishments.

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Building Projects

Solomon went on an extensive building campaign throughout the country. According to the Bible, he built garrison towns for his cavalry, and the fortified cities of Hazor, Megiddo, and Gezer, along with impressive water conduits that allowed cities to withstand sieges.

Solomon was especially lavish with his capital, Jerusalem; he built a great wall and terraces to support buildings and paid particular attention to the new temple and royal palace. Solomon also built temples and tolerated the worship of foreign gods by travelers and visitors on trade missions. Solomon put thousands of men into forced labor to build his palace, temple, and other civil works.

In time, Solomon’s ill-treatment of his slaves and laborers led to the revolt that split the kingdom of Israel. Although the Yahwist prophets and Biblical writers would scapegoat his goddess worship instead.

Hiram Abiff

Modern Freemason mythology centers on King Solomon’s architect and his tragic murder.

King Hiram sent architects and skilled craftsmen to help King Solomon build his temples and other projects. Chief among them was Hiram Abiff, the widow’s son from Tyre. Hiram Abiff was skilled in every kind of bronze work, and Solomon appointed him to be chief architect and Master of Works.

Hiram Abiff constructed Solomon’s grand throne made of ivory and overlaid with gold, with six steps, two lions stood beside the armrests, and twelve more lions stood beside the six steps. A throne of lions fit for a king, or for a goddess.

The lion throne is another clear indication of Solomon’s goddess worship. This tradition goes back to Catal Huyuk, but the Biblical writers seem to think it was unique. The goddess Cybele sat in a similar lion throne a thousand years later in Rome.

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Solomon’s Temple

King Solomon constructed the legendary first Hebrew Temple in Jerusalem. It took seven years to build. The Temple’s magnificence is detailed in the Bible and has long been extolled in legend. King Hiram of Tyre provided the materials and skilled workmen, and the Temple was built in the style of pagan temples of the era.

The Biblical description of Solomon’s Temple suggests that the inside ceiling was 60 cubits long (90 feet), 20 cubits wide (30 feet), and 30 cubits high (45 feet). Solomon’s Temple had a three-room plan with an inner sanctum at the rear. The temple was built from stone and cedar, and the construction consisted of finely hewn masonry combined with carved wooden cherubs and bronze basins. The inner walls were overlaid with carved cedar and completely gilded with gold.

The temple was decorated in a Garden of Eden motif of cherubs and verdant vegetation; palm trees, open flowers, pomegranates, gourds, lions, and oxen. The cherubim appear like angels with wings. There was a pair of large cherubim statues that guarded the Ark of the Covenant in the Holy of Holies, an interior room no one was allowed into except the high priest.

The plans of the building were Phoenician in origin, and the materials, skilled workmen, and architects were delivered by King Hiram of Tyre. Archaeologists have uncovered pagan temples virtually identical to Solomon’s from the same era. The Ain Dara temple to Astarte in Syria has the same layout and was operating from 1300 BCE to 740 BCE, the same period as Solomon’s.

Holy Smoke

When the priests dedicated the temple and brought the Ark of the Covenant into the Holy of Holies, a thick cloud of smoke, the Shekinah, filled the temple and prevented the completion of the rituals.

The Shekinah, the presence of God, manifests as a cloud of smoke that filled the Temple.

Phoenician Megalithic Stones

Final bonus, deep inside one of the retaining walls on the western side of the Temple Mount, where the Jews have been allowed to excavate, they discovered one of the largest megalithic stones ever used anywhere in the world.

This stone is estimated to weigh 570 tons and is similar in style to the stones used in Baalbek, Lebanon. Even though this wall is said to be Herodian, the Romans never worked stones so large. This stonework is thought to be the work of the Phoenicians, if not some earlier culture. King Hiram of Tyre was a Phoenician, so that would track with the Biblical text.

Live discussion on Tuesday, March 17 at 7pm EST.

Reach out at:

goddessbiblestudy@gmail.com

This is a special episode of Goddess Bible Study because this week, we connect with current events, and these events are unsettling to say the least.

We were already scheduled to discuss King Solomon’s temple as part of our extended discussion of the father of wisdom. But all of a sudden, the Temple Mount in Jerusalem has become the center of world affairs, as a terrifying war with Biblical themes and nuclear weapons threatens the entire Middle East, the global economy, and perhaps worse.

The Temple Mount was once home to the First and Second Hebrew Temples, and is currently home to the Dome of the Rock and the al Aqsa Mosque, the third-holiest site in Islam. Many Christian and Jewish prophecies predict a restored Third Jewish Temple as a critical sign of armageddon, the Jewish messiah, the second coming of Jesus Christ, and many other end-times beliefs.

Today, the current nation of Israel, along with the United States, is in a violent war with Iran. Volleys of missiles and drones are flying across the sky and crashing into sensitive targets across every Persian Gulf nation. The entire Middle East is on fire, and there is no end in sight.

In the context of this war, messianic Zionists and Christians have concluded that the end times are here, and it is now time to construct a Third Temple, today. The problem is that the Dome of the Rock is in their way, and to remove it would ignite religious war between Muslims, Jews, and Christians around the world.

It is entirely possible, if not likely, that the Dome of the Rock will be destroyed during the current round of fighting. More than one Israeli commentator has stated that the ongoing missile barrages are the perfect cover to blow up the shrine and blame it on the Iranians, hopefully (for them) sparking conflict between Sunni and Shia Muslims.

It is difficult to overstate the religious and geopolitical significance of the Temple Mount and the response to any possible damage to sacred Islamic sites.

The Temple Mount is already the most contested piece of real estate on planet Earth, and has been at the heart of the conflict between the Israelis and Palestinians since Israel was founded in 1948. It has been the site of many riots and is closely policed under extremely tense arrangements between Islamic and Jewish authorities.

It has long been the dream of certain messianic Jews and Christians to restore the temple, and they have been operating in the open for many years. The Temple Institute is a public-facing organization that has been fundraising and gathering together all of the sacred items to sanctify a new temple, including sacred garments for the priests, a large menorah, and even a new Ark of the Covenant, among other items.

Temple Institute

Their vision to restore the temple has support from the highest echelons of the Israeli government, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The vast majority of the American public is secular and has no idea of a prophetic Third Temple, or of the catasprophic geopolitical risk this religious movement represents.

If the Third Temple movement is successful, it will enrage Muslims around the world with consequences that are impossible to predict. Acts of Jihadi terrorism would be justified for decades to come, which also means that false-flag terrorist attacks are likely to happen. There is always someone, of any political persuasion, looking to profit from bloodshed and chaos.

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Here is some Israeli and Palestinian discussion of the Third Temple movement.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/what-do-the-third-temple-movement-and-noahide-laws-have-in-common-a-far-right-vision/

https://imeu.org/resources/important-events/explainer-the-temple-mount-movement/115

This high-quality documentary video by Third Temple Christians lays out all the details of the preparations and end-times fantasies, with glee and great expectations.

Perhaps the strangest and most controversial item gathered for the Third Temple is a perfect red heifer (a red cow), which must be ritually sacrificed for temple purposes. Apparently, an unblemished, perfectly red cow is hard to find, and none had been identified for 2000 years until an evangelical rancher in Texas found five of them in his herd. Now the Temple movement has its red heifers, which is a sign from the heavens to move forward with their plans.

This is no joke, and the details are even weirder. See the video below.

Goddess, please save us all from these messianic lunatics armed with nuclear weapons.

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Back to our normal programming…

King Solomon’s Temple

King Solomon’s Temple was the first Hebrew temple. It was built on top of Mount Moriah, where a sacred stone is said to be the location where Abraham attempted to sacrifice his son, Isaac.

Extensive retaining walls and a platform were built on the steep hillsides to provide a location for the temple, which is known as the Temple Mount. The Holy of Holies at the heart of the temple is over the sacred foundation stone.

King Solomon was a pagan goddess worshipper, and an Asherah pole representing the mother goddess stood beside the altar to Yahweh in the temple for two-thirds of its history.

King Solomon’s temple was destroyed by the Babylonians in 586 BCE, sending the Israelites into exile. The Israelites were allowed to return after 70 years when the Persian King Cyrus defeated the Babylonians. It is more than a bit ironic (or moronic) that the contemporary Israelis now find themselves at war to the death with the Persians.

A modest second temple was restored immediately, but it was dramatically rebuilt under King Herod around 18 BCE during the Roman Empire. The expanded Temple Mount was the largest religious building in the Roman Empire and among the most grand. Jesus visited this temple in the Gospels, and he was crucified nearby. The Second Temple was destroyed by the Romans in the year 70 CE after the Jews revolted.

Jerusalem was burned down by the Romans, but was rebuilt by Emperor Hadrian and renamed Aelia Capitolina in 130 CE. A temple to Jupiter was built on the Temple Mount, and Jews were banned from the city.

In the 4th century, Emperor Constantine converted to Christianity and made it the Imperial religion. Jerusalem was consecrated as a holy Christian city. The temple to the goddess Venus near the Temple Mount was sanctified as the church of the Holy Sepulcher, the burial place of Jesus Christ.

The Roman city later fell into decline, and it was taken by the Muslims in 638 without a fight.

Subscribe now

Wealth

The original United Kingdom of Israel reached its greatest territorial expanse under King Solomon in the 10th century BCE. He dominated the local tribes to the east, the Ammonites, Moabites, and Edomites, and sent his armies into Syria as well. He exacted tribute and forced the tribes to labor on his building projects. Palestine lies along important trade routes linking Africa to Asia and Europe.

Solomon had close and profitable relations with King Hiram of Tyre and the Phoenicians. With control of Edom, Israel had ports on both the Mediterranean and the Gulf of Aqaba on the Red Sea, enabling lucrative trade from the Atlantic Ocean to the Indian Ocean.

Solomon raised the kingdom to the heights of its commercial potential. He became fabulously wealthy, and the people were very happy. With trade came peace, and King Solomon ruled over a prosperous kingdom. At least, that is the story.

King Hiram of Tyre

King Solomon’s alliance with the Phoenician King Hiram of Tyre had previously been established by King David. The Tyrians were among the world’s great sailors, traders, and craftsmen, and they possessed the valuable cedar forests of Lebanon. King Hiram provided Solomon with all the cedar and juniper timber he wanted, and Solomon paid him in wheat and olive oil. Together, they engaged in wide-ranging and profitable trade.

Gold from Ophir

King Solomon is reported to have been the richest king ever, his gold from Ophir is legendary. For centuries, people have searched for Solomon’s famous gold mines, but nothing definitive has been found.

King Solomon was said to be so wealthy that he used gold plates, goblets, and utensils, and that the people of Israel did not even bother using silver because it was as common as stones. Solomon amassed massive stores of gold, thousands of horses, cavalry, men, and chariots. We can assume the elaborate claims of wealth to be literary embellishments.

Building Projects

Solomon went on an extensive building campaign throughout the country. He built garrison towns for his cavalry, and the fortified cities of Hazor, Megiddo, and Gezer, along with impressive water conduits that allowed cities to withstand sieges.

Solomon was especially lavish with his capital, Jerusalem; he built a great wall and terraces to support buildings and paid particular attention to the new temple and royal palace. Solomon also built temples and tolerated the worship of foreign gods by travelers and visitors on trade missions. Solomon put thousands of men into forced labor to build his palace, temple, and other civil works.

In time, Solomon’s ill-treatment of his slaves and laborers led to the revolt that split the kingdom of Israel. Although the Yahwist prophets and Biblical writers would scapegoat his goddess worship instead.

Hiram Abiff

Modern Freemason mythology centers on King Solomon’s architect and his tragic murder.

King Hiram sent architects and skilled craftsmen to help King Solomon build his temples and other projects. Chief among them was Hiram Abiff, the widow’s son from Tyre. Hiram Abiff was skilled in every kind of bronze work, and Solomon appointed him to be chief architect and Master of Works.

Hiram Abiff constructed Solomon’s grand throne made of ivory and overlaid with gold, with six steps, two lions stood beside the armrests, and twelve more lions stood beside the six steps. A throne of lions fit for a king, or for a goddess.

The lion throne is another clear indication of Solomon’s goddess worship. This tradition goes back to Catal Huyuk, but the Biblical writers seem to think it was unique. The goddess Cybele sat in a similar lion throne a thousand years later in Rome.

Solomon’s Temple

King Solomon constructed the legendary first Hebrew Temple in Jerusalem. It took seven years to build. The Temple’s magnificence is detailed in the Bible and has long been extolled in legend. King Hiram of Tyre provided the materials and skilled workmen, and the Temple was built in the style of pagan temples of the era.

The Biblical description of Solomon’s Temple suggests that the inside ceiling was 60 cubits long (90 feet), 20 cubits wide (30 feet), and 30 cubits high (45 feet). Solomon’s Temple had a three-room plan with an inner sanctum at the rear. The temple was built from stone and cedar, and the construction consisted of finely hewn masonry combined with carved wooden cherubs and bronze basins. The inner walls were overlaid with carved cedar and completely gilded with gold.

The temple was decorated in a Garden of Eden motif of cherubs and verdant vegetation; palm trees, open flowers, pomegranates, gourds, lions, and oxen. The cherubim appear like angels with wings. There was a pair of large cherubim statues that guarded the Ark of the Covenant in the Holy of Holies, an interior room no one was allowed into except the high priest.

The plans of the building were Phoenician in origin, and the materials, skilled workmen, and architects were delivered by King Hiram of Tyre. Archaeologists have uncovered pagan temples virtually identical to Solomon’s from the same era. The Ain Dara temple to Astarte in Syria has the same layout and was operating from 1300 BCE to 740 BCE, the same period as Solomon’s.

Holy Smoke

When the priests dedicated the temple and brought the Ark of the Covenant into the Holy of Holies, a thick cloud of smoke, the Shekinah, filled the temple and prevented the completion of the rituals.

The Shekinah, the presence of God, manifests as a cloud of smoke that filled the Temple.

Phoenician Megalithic Stones

Final bonus, deep inside one of the retaining walls on the western side of the Temple Mount, where the Jews have been allowed to excavate, they discovered one of the largest megalithic stones ever used anywhere in the world.

This stone is estimated to weigh 570 tons and is similar in style to the stones used in Baalbek, Lebanon. Even though this wall is said to be Herodian, the Romans never worked stones so large. This stonework is thought to be the work of the Phoenicians, if not some earlier culture. King Hiram of Tyre was a Phoenician, so that would track with the Biblical text.

Live discussion on Tuesday, March 10 at 7pm EST.

Reach out at:

goddessbiblestudy@gmail.com

Next week’s Goddess Bible Study, we will dive into the Song of Songs, the Canticles, the only romantic and sexual text in the Bible, and for many faithful, the most divinely inspired text of them all.

This week on Goddess Bible Study, we will keep it pretty simple with part II of King Solomon and dive into some of his wisdom texts. He is famous for writing the Biblical books of Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Songs, as well as the Apocryphal book, Wisdom of Solomon, and some psalms.

King Solomon inspired poets, philosophers, theologians, and magicians for centuries. Some of the most profound literature in the Biblical tradition is attributed to him.

King Solomon was a goddess worshiper, the Bible tells us. He is the conduit through which the visceral pagan goddess traditions were transmuted into the ephemeral wisdom traditions of Sophia.

Sophia is the one aspect of the feminine divine that is acceptable in the Abrahamic faiths, and she lies at the heart of every Western esoteric tradition, from the Gnostics and Kabalah to the Freemasons.

Most of these texts were written long after King Solomon’s time, in the post-exilic and Hellenistic periods, though some of the earliest Proverbs and psalms may have come from the First Temple. Magical texts about Solomon continued to be written for another thousand years in the Islamic world and Medieval Europe.

There is no evidence that King Solomon personally wrote anything, since there is no evidence of literacy in the time period he was alive (10th century BCE). The court of a historical King Solomon, if he even existed, was likely operating in the oral tradition.

Written Hebrew was a new language in the Iron Age, and first appears in the historical record a century after Solomon. Perhaps his court had some role in early Hebrew writing, which was copied from the Phoenicians, who were friends of Solomon, but the Bible itself does not say so.

The Bible makes no mention of Solomon writing anything at all, and if he helped invent a new form of writing, they probably would have given him credit.

I am content to believe that there was a historical King Solomon and a First Temple in Jerusalem in the 10th century BCE, but I do not believe most of the legends about him are historical. His wealth, his wives, and his wisdom serve a variety of symbolic and theological purposes in the Bible.

King Solomon is a literary figure who represents the Yahwists’ greatest mythological and propagandistic glory, a united kingdom overflowing with wealth and great achievements that likely never existed in real life.

Yet King Solomon has inspired some of the deepest philosophy for thousands of years. We will let these samples speak for themselves.

These are rare passages from the Bible in which the Goddess speaks, even if she is somewhat veiled.

Wisdom is Sophia, and Shakti, the Divine Mother.

Proverbs

BLESSED IS HE WHO FINDS WISDOM:
Blessed are those who find wisdom, those who gain understanding, for she is more profitable than silver and yields better returns than gold. She is more precious than rubies; nothing you desire can compare with her. Long life is in her right hand; in her left hand are riches and honor. Her ways are pleasant ways, and all her paths are peace. She is a tree of life to those who take hold of her; those who hold her fast will be blessed.

– Proverbs 3:13-18

By wisdom Yahweh laid the earth’s foundations, by understanding he set the heavens in place; by his knowledge the watery depths were divided, and the clouds let drop the dew. My son, do not let wisdom and understanding out of your sight, preserve sound judgment and discretion; they will be life for you, an ornament to grace your neck.

– Proverbs 3:19-21

EXCELLENCE OF WISDOM:
Does not wisdom call out? Does not understanding raise her voice? At the highest point along the way, where the paths meet, she takes her stand; beside the gate leading into the city, at the entrance, she cries aloud:

“To you, O people, I call out; I raise my voice to all mankind. You who are simple, gain prudence; you who are foolish, set your hearts on it. Listen, for I have trustworthy things to say; I open my lips to speak what is right. My mouth speaks what is true, for my lips detest wickedness.

All the words of my mouth are just; none of them is crooked or perverse. To the discerning all of them are right; they are upright to those who have found knowledge. Choose my instruction instead of silver, knowledge rather than choice gold, for wisdom is more precious than rubies, and nothing you desire can compare with her.

“I, wisdom, dwell together with prudence; I possess knowledge and discretion. To fear Yahweh is to hate evil; I hate pride and arrogance, evil behavior and perverse speech. Counsel and sound judgment are mine; I have insight, I have power. By me kings reign and rulers issue decrees that are just; by me princes govern, and nobles – all who rule on earth.

I love those who love me, and those who seek me find me. With me are riches and honor, enduring wealth and prosperity. My fruit is better than fine gold; what I yield surpasses choice silver. I walk in the way of righteousness, along the paths of justice, bestowing a rich inheritance on those who love me and making their treasuries full.

“Yahweh brought me forth as the first of his works, before his deeds of old; I was formed long ages ago, at the very beginning, when the world came to be.

When there were no watery depths, I was given birth, when there were no springs overflowing with water; before the mountains were settled in place, before the hills, I was given birth before he made the world or its fields or any of the dust of the earth.

I was there when he set the heavens in place, when he marked out the horizon on the face of the deep, when he established the clouds above and fixed securely the fountains of the deep, when he gave the sea its boundary so the waters would not overstep his command, and when he marked out the foundations of the earth.

Then I was constantly at his side. I was filled with delight day after day, rejoicing always in his presence, rejoicing in his whole world and delighting in mankind.

“Now then, my children, listen to me; blessed are those who keep my ways. Listen to my instruction and be wise; do not disregard it.

Blessed are those who listen to me, watching daily at my doors, waiting at my doorway. For those who find me find life and receive favor from Yahweh. But those who fail to find me harm themselves; all who hate me love death.”

– Proverbs 8:1-36

Wisdom reposes in the heart of the discerning and even among fools she lets herself be known.

– Proverbs 14:33

The heart of the discerning acquires knowledge, for the ears of the wise seek it out.

– Proverbs 18:15

The one who gets wisdom loves life; the one who cherishes understanding will soon prosper.

– Proverbs 19:8

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Ecclesiastes

Contemporary Biblical scholars believe the book of Ecclesiastes was written in the Hellenistic period around 250 BCE and reflects Hellenistic philosophy, though some may be from the earlier Persian period.

From much wisdom comes much sorrow; the more knowledge, the more grief.

– Ecclesiastes 1:18

Whoever loves money never has enough; whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with their income.

– Ecclesiastes 5:10

Do not say, “Why were the old days better than these?” For it is not wise to ask such questions. Wisdom, like an inheritance, is a good thing and benefits those who see the sun. Wisdom is a shelter as money is a shelter, but the advantage of knowledge is this: Wisdom preserves those who have it.

– Ecclesiastes 7:10-12

There is something else meaningless that occurs on earth: the righteous who get what the wicked deserve, and the wicked who get what the righteous deserve. This too, I say, is meaningless.
So I commend the enjoyment of life because there is nothing better for a person under the sun than to eat and drink and be glad. Then joy will accompany them in their toil all the days of the life God has given them under the sun.

– Ecclesiastes 8:14-15

No one can comprehend what goes on under the sun. Despite all their efforts to search it out, no one can discover its meaning. Even if the wise claim they know, they cannot really comprehend it.

– Ecclesiastes 8:17

I have seen something else under the sun: The race is not to the swift or the battle to the strong, nor does food come to the wise or wealth to the brilliant or favor to the learned; but time and chance happen to them all.

Moreover, no one knows when their hour will come: As fish are caught in a cruel net, or birds are taken in a snare, so people are trapped by evil times that fall unexpectedly upon them.

– Ecclesiastes 9:11-12

Generations come and generations go, but the earth remains forever.

– Ecclesiastes 1:4

All streams flow into the sea, yet the sea is never full. To the place the streams come from, there they return again.

– Ecclesiastes 1:7

What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.

– Ecclesiastes 1:9

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Wisdom of Solomon

The Wisdom of Solomon is a Jewish work believed to have been written in the first century BCE in Alexandria, Egypt. It is one of the Apocryphal books of the Bible and would have been embraced in the Gnostic traditions.

The Wisdom of Solomon reflects core beliefs of Hellenistic philosophy at the time when Sophia, wisdom, was elevated as the feminine aspect of God’s glory and the bride of God.

The text is in Greek, so it was certainly not written by King Solomon personally, it is a synthesis of Greek and Jewish philosophical thought and dedicated to the father of the wisdom traditions.

This sample is a short passage from a much longer book.

I learned both what is secret and what is manifest,
for wisdom, the fashioner of all things, taught me.

There is in her a spirit that is intelligent,
holy, unique, manifold,
subtle, mobile, clear,
unpolluted, distinct, invulnerable,
loving the good, keen, irresistible,
beneficent, humane, steadfast, sure,
free from anxiety, all-powerful, overseeing all,
and penetrating through all spirits
that are intelligent and pure and most subtle.

For wisdom is more mobile than any motion;
because of her pureness she pervades and penetrates all things.

For she is a breath of the power of God,

and a pure emanation of the glory of the Almighty;

therefore nothing defiled gains entrance into her.

For she is a reflection of eternal light,
a spotless mirror of the working of God,
and an image of his goodness.

Although she is but one, she can do all things,
and while remaining in herself, she renews all things;
in every generation she passes into holy souls
and makes them friends of God, and prophets;
for God loves nothing so much as the man who lives with wisdom.

She is more beautiful than the sun, and excels every constellation of the stars.
Compared with the light she is found to be superior,
for it is succeeded by the night, but against wisdom evil does not prevail.

–Wisdom of Solomon, 7:21-30 (RSV, Apocrypha)

We will continue with King Solomon for a few more weeks. Next, we have his great wealth and building projects, especially the First Temple, and also the Song of Songs. Then we will conclude the discussion of King Solomon with some extra-Biblical material, including the Ethiopian legends of the Queen of Sheba, the Kebra Negast, and the Ark of the Covenant, the Freemasons, as well as Arab legends such as the Ring of Andaleeb, and other magical texts.

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Goddess Bible Study this week begins a deep dive into King Solomon, the wisest, wealthiest, and most celebrated of all the Biblical kings. We will spend a few weeks on King Solomon as he is one of the pivotal figures in the Goddess Bible Study narrative.

King Solomon is a paradox, the Biblical writers dress him up as the wisest king ever, and he is known as the father of the esoteric wisdom traditions. Yet the Biblical writers are also harshly critical of Solomon for worshipping goddesses, which they blame on his many wives.

King Solomon followed Yahweh, but he did not follow Yahweh alone.

King Solomon is the transitional figure who transmuted Israelite paganism into Biblical monotheism. Through Solomon, theologians pass through the acceptable aspects of the feminine divine while rejecting others. Theologians accept transcendent “wisdom”, which they describe as “she,” while they reject all the visceral nature-based traditions rooted in matriarchy, sexuality, plant medicine, and ecstasy.

The ephemeral feminine divine wisdom is seen in all Western esoteric traditions, including Kabbalah, the Rosicrucians, Hermetics, Gnostics, and modern Freemasons. The Greeks gave wisdom the name Sophia, and commonly presented her as a goddess, a tradition that continues today.

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As King David’s health failed at the end of his long rule, various princes asserted their claims for the throne. David’s wife Bathsheba, with whom he had had a scandalous adulterous affair when they first met, maneuvered her youngest son to be chosen by David as his successor.

It is worth noting the role played by Solomon’s mother in placing Solomon on the throne ahead of his many rivals.

David and Bathsheba’s 15-year-old son was named Jedidiah, “the friend of God.” After being anointed king beside the Gihon Spring, drenched in the holy cannabis oil, he would be known by a name of legendary renown.

King Solomon ruled in Jerusalem for 40 years from 970-931 BCE and is revered by Jews, Christians, Muslims, and Rastafarians as the wisest and wealthiest of all the world’s ancient kings. King Solomon is perhaps the most celebrated of all Old Testament characters (alongside Moses), and countless stories exist about him outside the Bible.

Known as the “King of Peace,” Solomon ruled the united kingdom of Israel at its legendary height, brought trade and prosperity, and built the first Hebrew Temple in Jerusalem. The Father of Wisdom is credited with authoring the biblical books of Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, the Song of Solomon, and some Psalms.

Solomon’s exploits and wealth are clearly exaggerated, and scholars debate the very existence of King Solomon and King David, since no archaeological evidence confirming them has been found.

It is accepted that the Israelites were in Jerusalem during this period, but scholars do not believe that Jerusalem was wealthy. There was no grand palace or other large construction projects as described in the Bible.

There are megalithic stones tourists can see in the Temple Mount, similar to those found in Baalbek, Lebanon, indicating a Phoenician-style temple, but we don’t know what it looked like, and it’s doubtful that it was layered in gold.

The Temple Mount in Jerusalem is currently the home of the Islamic Dome of the Rock and the Al-Aqsa Mosque, and has not been archaeologically studied outside the Jewish sections. It is the single most contentious location on all of planet Earth, fought over by Jews, Muslims, and Christians alike.

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Solomon’s Pagan Worship

Young King Solomon had to work to consolidate his power and fend off rivals. Meanwhile, the people continued to worship in the old pagan ways, offering sacrifices and burning incense at the high places. High places were hilltop altars, stone platforms, and sacred groves where the people made offerings to the various gods and goddesses.

There was no authority or centralized worship in pagan folk traditions, just community altars that people built themselves. The big cities had state religions and large temples, but in the countryside, religion was a community and family affair. There was no doctrine, dogma, or overarching authority on spiritual matters. Paganism was a do-it-yourself religious framework, and the Yahweh-alone reforms would come later.

Wise King Solomon followed the people and also burned incense and made offerings on the high places. The following passage about young Solomon is crucial. “The king went to Gibeon to offer sacrifices, for that was the most important high place.”

King Solomon made a thousand burnt offerings at Gibeon, the most important pagan shrine. Rather than being angry, Yahweh rewarded Solomon by granting him wisdom. Solomon took that blessing and became the philosophical bridge between the pagan and monotheistic traditions.

The Book of Chronicles was written later, and it tells the same story slightly differently. The writer of Chronicles altered the detail that Gibeon was “the most important high place” and changed it to be the location for Moses’s tent of meeting instead.

This is a clear example of revisionist history, as the Bible went through generations of writers over many centuries.

Goddess Worshipper

For all of King Solomon’s great attributes, he is harshly criticized in the Bible for his goddess worship and devotion to his wives. King Solomon built a temple (or high place) to Astarte in Jerusalem. The writers blame Solomon, in part, for the later breakup of the united kingdom of Israel into Israel and Judah.

Solomon is said to have had 700 wives and 300 concubines. He loved women, and the women loved him. The king was a sensuous man who appreciated the finer things in life: luxury, poetry, wisdom, and love.

King Solomon likely took part in the hieros gamos (sacred marriage) rituals. The Song of Solomon comes from a genre of sacred love poetry used in these traditions. The king had close relations with the goddess-worshipping Phoenicians, who helped him build the Jerusalem temple and with whom he engaged in wide-ranging trade.

Two Women and a Baby

Solomon demonstrated his wisdom when he judged a famous dispute in the Bible. Two women came to him, both claiming to be the mother of the same baby, while the other’s baby was dead. The king said, “Bring me a sword, cut the child in half, and give one half to each mother.”

The woman whose child was alive was deeply moved out of love for her son and said, “Do not kill the living baby!” But the woman whose child was dead said, “Neither of us can have him!”

Then the king made his ruling, “Give the baby to the first woman, she is the mother of the living child.” When all Israel heard the verdict, they were awed by Solomon’s wisdom.

In the book of Proverbs, Solomon describes how wisdom was at God’s side as he laid the foundations of creation, guided by her hand.

King Solomon would eventually die in his bed, fat, rich, and happy, surrounded by his family and the women who loved him. If God was unhappy with King Solomon, he did not show it in Solomon’s lifetime, or perhaps the Goddess just loved him more.

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Next week, we will dive into some of the wisdom texts in Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Wisdom of Solomon. Following that, we have his great wealth and building projects, especially the First Temple, and also the Song of Songs. Then we will conclude the discussion of King Solomon with some extra-Biblical material, including the Ethiopian legends of the Queen of Sheba, the Kebra Negast, and the Ark of the Covenant, as well as Arab legends such as the Ring of Andaleeb.

Reach out to:

goddessbiblestudy@gmail.com

Live discussion Tues, Feb. 24, at 7:00 pm EST