The Myth of the Goddess
Evolution of an Image
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- $21.99
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- $21.99
Publisher Description
A comprehensive, scholarly accessible study, in which the authors draw upon poetry and mythology, art and literature, archaeology and psychology to show how the myth of the goddess has been lost from our formal Judeo-Christian images of the divine. They explain what happened to the goddess, when, and how she was excluded from western culture, and the implications of this loss.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The authors of this ground-breaking, rich, ambitious work attempt to trace the evolution of consciousness by following humanity's changing attitudes toward female deities, from the Paleolithic mother goddess enshrined in figurines to Inanna of Sumer, Isis of Egypt, Aphrodite of Greece, and beyond. Baring, a London-based Jungian analyst, and Cashford, who writes on mythology, regard the formal disappearance of goddess myths as a pivotal event signaling the devaluation of the feminine and the opposition of feeling to thinking. They interpret the Virgin Mary as the unrecognized mother goddess of Christianity, identify hidden images of the goddess in the Old Testament and demonstrate that a Hebrew goddess existed in various forms such as the Shekhinah, founder of the world in Kabbalism. A wonderfully readable synthesis, this monumental study is packed wth scores of riveting illustrations. It will serve as a sourcebook for students of myth, feminists and those seeking to balance and integrate masculine and feminine components of their psyche.
