WHEN GOD WAS A WOMAN* ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ — Center for Women, the Earth, the Divine

The Human Search for the Divine

It is safe to say that humans have always been aware of something powerful beyond themselves.

In his book The Idea of the Holy, Rudolph Otto (1869-1937) named the human experience of the holy as the mysterium tremendum, the numinous.

Otto developed the concept of the numinous to describe the non-rational, overwhelming, and inherently mysterious aspect of the holy that underlies all religious experience.

The phrase, mysterium tremendum, can be translated as “an awe-inspiring mystery.”

—Brittanica

There is no denying it! There really was a time when the Divine was understood as feminine.

Relatively new archeological discoveries in areas around what is now modern Turkey have given us a different perspective on the plethora of uncovered figurines and other artifacts of the prehistoric periods.

Riane Eisler (1937- ) is an Austrian-born social systems scientist, futurist, cultural historian, attorney, consultant, and speaker. Dr. Eisler’s extensive research published in her books has inspired scholars and social activists. Her research has had an effect in many fields, including history, literature, philosophy, art, economics, psychology, sociology, education, human rights, organizational development, political science, and healthcare.

In her 1987 (updated in1995) book The Chalice and the Blade, Riane Eisler writes that:

It was not until after World War II that some of the most important new evidence was unearthed of the religious tradition extending over thousands of years into the…period that follows the Paleolithic, [which was the Neolithic period, the final stage in the three-part Stone Age].

Our knowledge of prehistory was advanced by the…discovery and excavation of two new Neolithic sites: the towns of Catalhöyük and Hacilar…in what used to be called the plains of Anatolia (now modern Turkey).

The knowledge unearthed at these two sites showed a stability and continuity of growth over many thousands of year for progressively more advanced Goddess-worshipping cultures.

Eisler further states that:

the vagina-shaped cowrie shells [and] the red ocher found in burials, the so-called Venus figurines, and the hybrid woman-animal figurines early writers dismissed as ‘monstrosities’ all relate to an early form of worship in which the life-giving powers of woman played a major part.

Cowrie Shells

They were all expressions of our forebears’ attempts to understand their world…along with the first awareness of self in relation to other humans, animals, and the rest of nature…and some awareness of the awesome mystery…of the fact that life emerges from the body of woman.

The Paleolithic remains appear to be early manifestations of what was later to develop into a complex religion centering on the worship of a Mother Goddess as the source and regeneratrix of all forms of life.

Carol Patrice Christ (1945-2021) was a feminist historian, thealogian, author, and foremother of the Goddess movement. She obtained her PhD from Yale University and served as a professor at universities such as Columbia University and Harvard Divinity School.

“In Old Europe and Ancient Crete, women were respected for their roles in the discovery of agriculture and for inventing the arts of weaving and pottery making.”

From our previous C:WED post on Marija Gimbutas’ work:

The term Old Europe is applied to a pre-Indo-European culture of Europe, a culture matrifocal and probably matrilinear, agricultural and sedentary, egalitarian and peaceful. (7000-3500 BCE)

Old Europe: the area of autochthonous European civilization, c. 7000-3500 BCE in relation to the rest of Europe

It contrasted sharply with the ensuing proto-Indo-European culture which was patriarchal, stratified, pastoral, mobile, and war-oriented, superimposed on all of Europe, except the southern and western fringes, in three waves of infiltration from the Russian steppe, between 4500-and 2500 BC.

During and after this period the female deities, or more accurately, the Goddess Creatrix in her many aspects, were largely replaced by the predominantly male divinities of the Indo-European.

—from Marija Gimbutas, The Goddesses and Gods of Old Europe 6500-3500 BC: Myths and Cult Images, University of California Press,1982.

The 1991 book, shown below, is another tome from Gimbutas on the world of Old Europe, HarperCollins Publishers.

Marija Gimbutas (1921-1994)

Marija Gimbutas was a Lithuanian archaeologist and anthropologist known for her research into the Neolithic and Bronze Age cultures of "Old Europe" and for her Kurgan hypothesis, which located the Proto-Indo-European homeland in the Pontic Steppe.

—Wikipedia

**Core signs of the Old European script, 5300-4300 BCE**

The pre-Indo-European culture of Europe was not necessarily matriarchal, but was, as stated above, matrilineal and matrifocal in its arrangement.

Matrilineal refers to the genealogical and inheritance lines passed and traced through the mother and her family, not the father’s as it would be in a patrilineal culture.

Matrifocal refers to a sociological group, as a household, tribe, etc., having a female as its leader.

*Merlin Stone provides some excellent insight into those ancient times. The title of her 1976 book, WHEN GOD WAS A WOMAN, is the source of the title of our present C:WED post.

Merlin Stone was born in Flatbush, Brooklyn, NY. She taught at Buffalo State College as an assistant professor of art and at what is now the State University of New York Buffalo as an assistant professor of sculpture. She spent a decade on research before writing the book published in the UK as The Paradise Papers and then in the U.S. as When God Was a Woman (1976).

—Wikipedia

I will allow Merlin Stone to speak for herself from her book:

In prehistoric and early historic periods of human development, religions existed in which people revered the supreme creator as female.

At the very dawn of religion, God was a woman.

In nearly all areas of the world, female deities were extolled as healers, dispensers of curative herbs, roots, plants and other medicinal aids, casting the priestesses who attended the shrines into the role of physicians of those who worshipped there.

…[I]t has been archeologically confirmed that the earliest law, government, medicine, agriculture, architecture, metallurgy, wheeled vehicles, ceramics, textiles, and written language were initially developed in societies who, for thousands of years, worshiped the ancient Creatrix of the Universe.

…[T]he pieces of this jigsaw puzzle—more that an inscription of an ancient prayer, an art relic, or parts of broken columns on a grassy field—revealed the overall structure of a geographically vast and major religion, one that had affected the lives of multitudes of people over thousands of years.

[BUT THEN]

The Goddess culture was systematically destroyed by the patriarchal religions.

Why and when the more northern tribes came to choose a male deity is a moot question. In their earliest development they left neither tablets nor temples.

It is only upon their arrival in the Goddess-worshiping communities of the Near and Middle East, which by that time had developed into thriving urban centers, that they come to our attention.

What is most significant is that in historic times the northern invaders viewed themselves as a superior people. This attitude seems to have been based primarily upon their ability to conquer the more culturally developed earlier settlers, the people of the Goddess.

...[H]istorical mythological and archaeological evidence suggests that it was these northern people who brought with them the concepts of light as good and dark as evil (very possibly the symbolism of their racial attitude towards the darker people of the southern areas) and of a supreme male deity.

Sheila Collins writes, ‘Theology is ultimately political. The way human communities deify the transcendent and determine the categories of good and evil have more to do with the power dynamics of the social systems which create the theologies than with…spontaneous revelation….’

It is the advocates of the later male deities, imposed upon that ancient worship with the intention of destroying it and its customs, that are still, through their subsequent absorption into education, law, literature, economics, philosophy, psychology, media, and general social attitudes, imposed upon even the most non-religious people of today.

[This] is an invitation to all women: to join in the search to find out who we really are, by beginning to know our own past heritage as more than a broken and buried fragment of a male culture. [Emphasis mine]

It is only as many of the tenets of the Judeo-Christian theologians are seen in the light of their political origins, and the subsequent absorption of those tenets into secular life [are] understood, that as women we will be able to view ourselves as mature, self-determining human beings.

With this understanding we may be able to regard ourselves not as permanent helpers but as doers, not as decorative and convenient assistants to men but as responsible and competent individuals in our own right.

It is also an invitation to men—those who have previously questioned the reasons for the roles and images of females and males in contemporary society and those who had never considered the subject before. [Emphasis mine]

It is an invitation extended in the hope that becoming aware of the historical political origins of the Bible, and the role played over the centuries by the Judeo-Christian theologies in formulating the attitudes toward women and men today, may lead to a greater understanding, cooperation and mutual respect between women and men than has heretofore been possible.

For men interested in achieving this goal, exploring the past offers a deeper and more realistic understanding of today’s sexual stereotypes by placing them in the perspective of their historical evolution.

I am not suggesting a return or revival of the ancient female religion.

As Sheila Collins writes, ‘As women our hope for fulfillment lies in the present and future and not in some mythical golden past…’

I [Merlin Stone] do hold hope, however, that a contemporary consciousness of the once-widespread veneration of the female deity as the wise Creatrix of the Universe and all life and civilization may be used to cut through the many oppressive and falsely founded patriarchal images, stereotypes, customs, and laws that were developed as direct reactions to Goddess worship by the leaders of the later male-worshiping religions.

For your enjoyment and intrigue, following are images taken from the archeological findings and writings of Marija Gimbutas, as displayed in another one of her wonderful books: The Language of the Goddess, 1989, HarperCollins Publishers, First HarperCollins Paperback Edition, 1991.

**Chevron and V as Bird Goddess Symbols**

From Carol P. Christ:

Theologians frequently assert that God has no body, no gender, no race and no age.

If we do not mean that God is male when we use masculine pronouns and imagery, then why should there be any objections to using female imagery and pronouns as well?

Most people state that God is neither male nor female. Yet most people become flustered, upset or even angry when it is suggested that the God they know as Lord and Father might also be God the Mother, or Goddess.

Of Interest!

I saved the clipping below because it was so intriguing and because Paestum is near Positano, Italy where my paternal grandparents were born and baptized before coming to New York City with their parents—my grandmother at age two and my grandfather at age seven.

My husband Bruno and I, along with our sons, had been to Positano and were hoping for another trip that would include a stop in Paestum.

New York Times April 30, 1985

“Women’s Cults of Antiquity: The Veil Rises”

Site: City of Paestum in southern Italy

Apologies for the cutoff of the last words of the article.

During WW II the allies landed a large force from the Gulf of Salerno on the beaches of the Sele River in spite of the resistance offered by the German troops who occupied this region. It took eight days to displace them from the floodplain and then the allies pushed them progressively farther and farther north, up the "boot" of Italy. The allies established field hospital stations during the invasion at the Paestum temples because both sides in the conflict agreed to avoid harming these impressive and irreplaceable structures. Thus, 2,500 years of human history didn't disappear during one anomalous 8-day period in recent human history.

And then, there is this:

Eleanor discovered this sculpture on a trip to Amsterdam, NY last weekend (September 2025). The piece is overlooking the Mohawk River, a part of the Erie Canal.

The woman is surrounded by a child holding a lamb. Around the woman are also fish, birds (a cardinal, a humming bird, a crane), and flowers—representatives of the natural world.

OFFICIAL DESCRIPTION by the PUBLIC ART ARCHIVE:

Title: Mother and Child at the Mohawk River (slideshow)

Artist: Dimitar Lukanov

The artist calls his work a celebration of life! He demonstrates the process of creating the sculpture in a video that is within the slideshow.

Location: Mohawk Valley Gateway Overlook

City: Amsterdam, NY, USA

Date: 2018

Cast in bronze, the sculpture stands at 11ft (3.50m). A veritable symphony of life, the composition is directed by the Mother, as in a miraculous orchestra of flora and fauna, all lead by the inviting, uplifting gesture of a woman - the Mother with whom the world begins. [Emphasis mine]

IN YOUR OWN WORDS:

Previous Post: Quotes that Teach Us About the Image of the Divine, Written by Anne Andersson on September 12, 2025

—Wow - really powerful newsletter this day. THANKS Anne and Eleanor.—KD

—The “Our Father”: This information about an earlier goddess worship that existed in Europe before the arrival of the Indo-European culture is really fascinating. Much of it I didn’t know.

Here’s my question, that perhaps could be the subject of a future column- In so many ways, the “Our Father” is a prayer of great spiritual value. Yet by reciting the words which frame God in a Patriarchal world view, are we doing more harm than good? Peace. —JP

Preview of Current Post: When God Was a Women, Written by Anne Andersson on September 17, 2025

—I like it! 😊 —MA

—Great post! And nice that you added a little inclusive language quotes at the end. And I forgot Paestum had the “all-women cult” aspect! —CA

—Looks good. —DA

—Great work. In Amsterdam NY at the Erie Canal park there is a statue of a woman holding a child with several animals in attendance who is identified as creatrix--very beautiful and powerful.

C:WED’s new section:

WOMEN SPEAK OUT.

BELIEVE THE WOMEN.

Listen! Hear! Believe!

Backstory:

“Missing from governmental discussions of the Epstein/Maxwell pedophile and trafficking of girls and women story have been the voices of the survivors.

TODAY’S FEATURED WOMAN IS: SARAH RANSOME

NPR's Rachel Martin talks to Sarah Ransome about her experiences with Ghislaine Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein — accused of sexually exploiting minors.

7-minute NPR video + transcipt

https://www.npr.org/2021/12/17/1065083182/sarah-ransome-writes-about-jeffrey-epstein-abuse-allegations-in-silenced-no-more

Sarah says she was one of those young women who was abused by Epstein - 22 years old at the time. In 2018, she settled a lawsuit with Epstein and Maxwell. Sarah says early childhood trauma made her especially vulnerable to Epstein's abuse.

Sarah writes about the Jeffrey Epstein abuse allegations in her book Silenced No More.

If you wish to know more about this subject:

The 2020 Netflix original, four-part docuseries, Jeffrey Epstein: Filthy Rich, presents a detailed account of Epstein’s abuse and those who enabled him. Survivors also share their own stories.

https://www.netflix.com/title/80224905

DO YOU WISH TO BE PROACTIVE?

CONTACT YOUR CONGRESSIONAL REPRESENTATIVES:

—Urge your House members and Senators to vote for:

H.R.4405—Epstein Files Transparency Act

119TH CONGRESS

A BILL

To direct the Attorney General to make publicly available documents related to Jeffrey Epstein, and for other purposes.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Epstein Files Transparency Act.

—Ask your House members and Senators to stand with the survivors who are seeking an investigation and full release of unredacted Epstein files.

—Thank members who stand with the survivors!

HERE’S HOW:

FIND YOUR REPRESENTATIVE:

https://www.house.gov

https://www.house.gov/representatives/find-your-representative

CONTACTING U.S. SENATORS:

https://www.senate.gov

https://www.senate.gov/senators/senators-contact.htm

PAPER STILL WORKS:

Handwritten or typed letters mailed in the U.S. Post Office are still considered an effective way to communicate with your representatives, according to the U.S. Capitol - Visitor Center.

https://www.visitthecapitol.gov/sites/default/files/2023-05/CVC_CraftVideo_FollowAlong_Letters.pdf

The link above offers a guideline on how to format and compose a letter to your member of Congress.

C:WED WISH LIST:

—Please consider this:

When we have completed our study of Ecofeminism with our examination of the Image of God (in just a few more posts), we will revert to a more leisurely posting time frame

We will also cover more general topics of choice, while remaining within our framework of Women, the Earth, and the Divine.

—Perhaps you might suggest a topic for the C:WED blog.

Thanks to member of our C:WED family, Louise Connors, who has suggested this topic: What might we learn from the few animal and insect species that are led by females, for example, the lion and the bumble bee?

Thanks also to another member of our C:WED family, Jim Philipps, who suggested this question as a possible post:

In so many ways, the “Our Father” is a prayer of great spiritual value. Yet by reciting the words which frame God in a Patriarchal world view, are we doing more harm than good?

We would love to hear from you!

—Please do send suggestions to: info@cwed.org

—PLEASE keep reading our posts!

—PLEASE spread the word about us!

Share our website with your friends, relatives, and colleagues: www.cwed.org

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