The Ogdoad: Eight Primordial Deities of Chaos in Egyptian Mythology

In Egyptian mythology, the Ogdoad were eight primordial deities. They were also called the Hehu or Infinites, the celestial rulers of a cosmic age. 

They were believed to be the origin of all myths and legends.

The Ogdoad predate the Egyptian religious system currently recognized and more commonly known Egyptian gods, such as Osiris, his sister/wife Isis, and the emissary of the underworld, Anubis.

References to the Ogdoad date to the Old Kingdom of Egypt, and even at the time of composition of the Pyramid Texts towards the end of the Old Kingdom, they appear to have been antiquated and mostly forgotten by everyone except religious experts. They are frequently mentioned in the Coffin Texts of the Middle Kingdom. 

The Ogdoad were concerned with the preservation and flourishing of the celestial world, and later—as well as indirectly—the formation of the human race. 

According to ancient Egyptian myths, before the world was formed, there was a watery mass of dark, directionless chaos. In this chaos lived the Ogdoad. The Ogdoad was a system of eight deities, four gods and their female aspect (the number four was considered to represent completeness). 

Texts of the Late Period describe them as having the heads of frogs (male) and serpents (female), and they are often depicted in this way in reliefs of the Ptolemaic Kingdom.

The eight deities were arranged in four male-female pairs (the female names being merely derivative female forms of the male names). 

These deities were Nun and Naunet represented the primeval waters; Heh and Hauhet represented eternity; Kek and Kuaket represented darkness; and Amun and Amunet represented air (or that which is hidden). However, the gods difffer from one source to another. 

E. A. Wallis Budge (1904) compares the concept to a group of four pairs of primeval gods mentioned in the Babylonian Enûma Eliš, viz. Abzu and Tiamat, Lahmu and Lahamu, Anshar and Kishar, Anu and Nudimmud.

Primeaval darkness was sometimes represented by Gereh and Gerehet and Heh and Hehet are sometimes included as forces of chaos, possibly representing the currents of the primeaval waters. When Amun rose in prominence as a creator god in his own right, he and Amunet were replaced by Nia and Niat, gods of the void.

Nun and Nunet 

Nun (Nu) is referred in Egyptian mythology as the “father of the god”. The name Nun means “primeval waters”. Nunet (or Naunet) is the female aspect of Nun. She is depicted as “the Mother of all Mothers”. 

The name Nun means “waters”. They represented chaos and the primeval waters to which everything have sprouted from nothingness. 

Nun appearance portrayed as a bearded man or a frog headed man with blue green skin which represents water and wearing the palm frond that symbolized long life, one on his head, and another on his hand.  Sometimes, Nun also depicted as man carrying a solar bark on his upraised arms. On the boat standing is by eight deities.

Nunet, like her three sisters Kauket, Amaunet and Hauhet, was represented as a woman with the head of a snake, mostly that of a cobra, or as a snake itself. 

Nunet is believed to be the goddess of the primordial abyss to the underworld. She guards the twelve veils of negation believed to be the flaws of the original creation. Access to these cracks would lead to the void that was Nun. She embodies the primal womb – where cycles of life, death and rebirth continues for all creatures and beings. She is also believed to be the mother of the sun god together with the composite deity known as Nun-Ptah.

In Khumunu, she is believed to be the goddess who supported the mountains that helped support the sky where the sun god was born from the watery abyss.

She is rarely mentioned as an individual deity outside her connection with Nun. Together they do not have a specific cult center yet they represented sacred lakes and underground streams that are known to be found in the country.

Huh and Hauhet

Huh is the male aspect and Hauhet also known as Heh or Hehet is the female aspect. 

The name Huh also spelled as Heh, Hah, Hauh, Huah, or Hahuh literally means “endlessness.” They represented space, eternity and infinity. They also symbolizes limitless, long life, intelligence and a perceptive mind. 

Huh is sometimes depicted as a crouching man holding a palm stem in each hand with shen ring at the base of each palm stem, the Egyptian sign of long life. The shen ring symbolized infinity. The image of Heh with his arms raised was the hieroglyph for the number one million, which was essentially considered equivalent to infinity in Egyptian mathematics. So, he was also given the title as “the god of millions of years”.

Hauhet represented fire and had the head of a cat in some myths. Most often, she is just thought of as a representation of her husband Huh and not a separate goddess. She exists, as scholars would say, because of the duality of the nature of the Ogdoad deities. However, legend has it, that the cosmic egg (the first act of creation) was believed to have arisen from the hands of Hauhet and Huh out of the proto matter. Out of the egg, Ra, the sun and light god, arises thus the creation of life in the world. Because of this, together with Huh, they represented the 12th hour of the night welcoming the rebirth of the sun.

Kek and Kauket

Kek (Kuk, Keku, or Pepe.. lol, j/k) is the deification of the primordial concept of darkness. The name Kek means darkness, the god of the darkness of chaos before the creation was began. 

Kek's female counterpart was Kauket also known as Keket.

Kek and Kauket represented darkness, obscurity and night. In some aspects they also represent night and day, and were called "raiser up of the light" and the "raiser up of the night", respectively.

Like her Ogdoad brothers and sisters, Kek was represented as a frog-headed man, and the female form as a serpent-headed woman.

Amun and Amaunet

Her name, jmnt, is a feminine noun that means "The Hidden One". She is a member of the Ogdoad of Hermopolis, who represented aspects of the primeval existence before the creation: Amunet was paired with Amun — whose name means "The Hidden One" too, with a masculine ending (jmn) — within this divine group, from the earliest known documentation. Such pairing of deities is characteristic of the religious concepts of the ancient Egyptians, being the Ogdoad itself composed by four balanced couples of deities or deified primeval concepts.

It seems likely that Amunet may have been artificially conceived by theologians as a complement to Amun, rather than being an originally independent deity. The Pyramid Texts mention the beneficent shadow of Amun and Amunet:

O Amun and Amunet! You pair of the gods, who joined the gods with their shadow.

— PT 446c

The fourth pair appears with varying names; sometimes the name Amun is replaced by Ni, Nenu, Nu, or Qerḥ, and the name Amunet Qerḥet by Ennit, Nenuit, Nunu, Nit, or Qerḥet. 

Amun and Amaunet were deities having several different characteristics during the long history of the pantheon of Ancient Egypt. 

But initially, they were the two aspects of the primordial concept of air and invisibility in the Ogdoad cosmogony. Amun's name translates into the “Hidden One” suggestive of his role as the invisible god of the wind and air. Their powers are also connected to the words silence, stillness, mystery and obscurity.

As with all goddesses in the Ogdoad, Amunet was depicted either as an Egyptian cobra snake, or as a snake-headed woman. The male deities in the Ogdoad generally were depicted with the head of a frog. 

Amun is believed to be a self-created god. Amaunet was said to be the mother who is father, implying that she was a creator who needed no male to procreate.

As the deites became more significant, eventually both aspects of the abstract concept were depicted as independent deities and identified as a pair. 

Amun and Amaunet changed in personification over the duration of the dynasties of Egypt.

Because Amun represented the element of "hiddenness" or "obscurity" while the others represented more clearly defined concepts such as "darkness," "water," and "infinity." Amun as "The Obscure One" left room for people to define him according to their own understanding of what they needed him to be. 

 The Cosmic Egg

There are at minimum three different views from the Egyptians that succeeded the time of the Ogdoad as to how the world as they knew it came into creation.  

The first held that the world was born from a cosmic egg created by the gods of the Ogdoad. It was invisible as the sun had not yet been born. When it cracked, it revealed the “bird of light" (occasionally the egg was said to contain air, associated with Amun and Amaunet). This form of the sun was called Ra, one of the only Egyptian deities to have surpassed the laws of time to be accepted by both the followers of the Ogdoad and the later religion, and thus the world was born.

Alternatively, a second version says that the egg was laid by an ibis, (a bird sacred to Thoth). However, the cult of Thoth developed after the original myth of the Ogdoad, so it is probable that this story was an attempt to incorporate Thoth into the pre-existing Ogdoad (who were sometimes known as “the souls of Thoth” or the “Eastern Souls”, eight baboons who helped the sun to rise every morning).

Another belief is that the universe was created from a lotus flower that "rose from the Sea of the Two Knives". Within the petals was the same sun god as mentioned above, Ra, who then forged the cosmos. 

And finally, another opinion begins in the same way—a lotus flower rising from the sea—however, within the flower was not Ra but one of the sacred scarab beetles representing the sun. This beetle then transformed into a boy whose tears made humanity, and went by the name Nefertum ("young Amun"). 

It is also interesting to note the similarity between the Ogdoad and the description of the creation of the world found in the Pentateuch (the first five books of the Old Testament).

Also read:

• Chaos in Mythology
• The nine parts of the human soul according to ancient Egypt

Foods Have Energy: The Yin and Yang of Food

“Food and medicine are not two different things;

they are the front and back of one body.”

– Masanobu Fukuoka

According to Traditional Chinese Medicine, every food has an energy. Yin food is cool and expanding; Yang food is warm and contracting. It has nothing to do with the temperature at which they are served!

Conventional fields of western nutrition classify food in terms of its chemical composition, including the calories, carbohydrates, proteins, fats, and other nutrients that it contains. Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) focuses on the energy properties of food. 

The concept of yin and yang was introduced in the I Ching. The philosophy states that imbalances in the life force (qi) cause illness and unhappiness. Hence, by adjusting your diet you can regain equilibrium.

Practitioners of TCM believe that qi is the essential life force that flows through all of nature. To achieve harmony of your body, mind, and qi, they emphasize the importance of eating yin-yang balanced foods. Yin and yang are said to be energetic qualities that shape everything in the universe, including your health.

The Chinese symbol for yin is the shaded side of a hill. It signifies femininity, coolness, dampness, and darkness. In contrast, yang is the sunny side of the hill. It signifies masculinity, warmth, dryness, and light. Yin and yang are complementary qualities and essential to each other.

Yin foods are believed to be cool and thought to moisten your body. Yang foods are believed to be warm and drying. The yin or yang characteristics of a certain food have less to do with its actual temperature or moisture level than its purported energy properties and effects on your body. Boiled spinach for example, is cooling and moistening. Tea has a cool energy, it means that when we drink hot tea, it generates cool energy and it is therefore considered a cool beverage. Chilled wine is warming. The effects of such food qualities on health have been observed for thousands of years. 

"Cool" or yin foods are generally low in calories and high in potassium. 

"Hot" or yang foods tend to be higher in calories and sodium.

Yin foods usually grow in the earth and darkness.

Yang foods usually grow in the air and sunshine.

If it is soft, wet and cool, it is more yin.

If it is hard, dry and spicy, it is more yang.

Tropical foods are considered more yin because they have a more expansive and cooling effect on the body.

Yin/cooling energy comes from less motion, while Yang/warming energy comes from more action. For example, a chicken holds more heat than a lamb, and a lamb more heat than a cow. Land animals are mostly warming, from their dry environment, while water animals are mostly cooling. And thus, ducks are considered cooling by some, neutral by others. Even different body parts of the same pig might be considered yin or yang depending on their function and location.

Practitioners of TCM believe that eating too many yin or yang foods will throw off your body’s balance and cause adverse health effects. They link certain disorders to an excess of yin, yang, or both types of foods.

Yin and Yang body balance is also created through our activities (sitting still is Yin, exercise is Yang), and our environments (a cold weather climate and a sleepy country town is more Yin; a hotter climate and busy city is Yang).

Winter is yin, while summer is yang, and night is yin while day is yang. Arthritis made worse by cold weather is a yin condition. A red, inflamed rash brought on by heat is a yang condition. A ruddy-faced, irritable man with high blood pressure is relatively yang. An anemic, melancholy woman is relatively yin.

If you eat predominantly yin foods, your body will be capable of producing more yin energy - darker, slower-moving and colder. In contrast, eating predominantly yang foods will produce more yang energy - faster, hotter and much more energetic. 

Yang Excess/Yin Deficiency

When yin energy is deficient, your body starts to show heat signs. You prefer cold beverages and cool weather. You may even have high blood pressure, red eyes, inflamed tissues, rashes, swellings, or dry skin

Extreme yang force has some emotional and behavioral side effects: chronic aggression, rigidity in thinking and behavior, being controlling and overly competitive, sexual obsession or compulsivity, materialism, inability to relax, self-absorption, lack of sensitivity to one’s inner world, one’s emotions, or other people, the desire to dominate others.

Yin-Building Foods

Alfalfa sprouts, apples, artichokes, asparagus, avocados, bananas, barley, bean sprouts, broccoli, carrots, celery, cilantro, crab, clams, cucumbers, dandelion greens, duck, eggplant, egg whites, fish, grapefruit, grapes, honey, kelp, nettles, papaya, pears, pomegranates, radish, romaine lettuce, seaweed, soybean sprouts, spinach, star fruit, strawberries, tofu, tomatoes, watermelons, zucchinis.

Raw foods are generally cooling. Avoid stimulating foods like caffeine, alcohol, sugar, and pungent spices.

Yin Excess/Yang Deficiency

When yang energy is deficient, the body begins to slow down, showing signs of diminished activity and coldness. You are attracted to warmth, warming food and drink. It is important to build up the yang energy to bring balance back to the body.  Excess of yin in the body causes fatigue, depression, muscle ache, stuffy nose, cough with clear white phlegm, fluid retention, weak/sluggish digestion.

Extreme yin force has some emotional and behavioral side effects: Depression is definitely a Yin state. Yin is cold, dark, slow, black/blue, introverted, and damp. It’s like north side of a hill, which will feel much colder than the south side, which receives the warming and drying rays of the sun. There is a distinct lack of drive, motivation, courage, and mojo in this state. Victim thinking, sadness, guilt and grief.

Yang-Building Foods:

Basil, beef, black beans, pepper, butter, cayenne, chicken liver and fat, chestnuts, chili powder, cinnamon, clove, coffee, egg yolks, garlic, ginger, horseradish, lamb, leeks, lobster, lochi, mussels, mustard greens, nutmeg, oats, onions, parsnips, pork, pumpkin seeds, turkey, quinoa, scallions, shrimp, walnuts.

Avoid cold foods, cold liquids, and too many raw foods.

Also read:

• Jing –Your original life force, and how to nourish it
• The Three Treasures and Sexual Energy Cultivation
• Hatha, the Union of Sun & Moon 

What is bibliomancy?

Bibliomancy is the practice of seeking spiritual insight, or divination, by selecting a random passage from a sacred book.

The book will be opened at a random page and while keeping your eyes closed you will point at a line or passage in the book. 

Bibliomancy compares with rhapsodomancy (from rhapsode "poem, song, ode") "divination by reading a random passage from a poem".

Chartomancy, from the Latin charta, meaning 'paper', it is the art and practice of divination by interpreting the writings in literary or musical works, official papers, letters, manuscripts, documents, and so forth. Chartomancy it is considered to be a form of Bibliomancy.

Stichomancy or Libromancy ("divination from lines") involves selecting a random passage from a random book of any nature.

Bibliomancy and Stichomancy have been popular methods of divination for at least 3000 years, when the I Ching was first used to divine the future.

Homer's Iliad and Odyssey were common choices for the ancient Greeks. Among Christians, the Bible is most commonly used, and in Islamic cultures the Qur'an. During the Middle Ages using texts such as Virgil's Aeneid was common in Europe. In Iran, Bibliomancy using the dīvān of Hafiz is the most popular for this kind of divination, but by no means the only kind. The Masnawī of Rumi may also be used. 

With the increased need for entertainment and education, books became more accessible to both rich and poor in the 1800s in England, and the interest in the supernatural and the occult was also heightening around this time. This sparked a revival for Bibliomancy, so much so that opening a book and randomly selecting a passage became a daily habit just as reading your horoscope is for people nowadays. Just like fortune tellers, psychics and palm readers, there were Bibliomancy practitioners popping up around London.

Method:

• Pick a book you believe to hold truth.
• Balance it on its spine; let it fall open.
• With eyes closed, touch your finger to any random passage.
• View the passage as wisdom to your future.

Because book owners frequently have favorite passages that the books open themselves to, some practitioners use dice or another randomiser to choose the page to be opened. This practice was formalized by the use of coins or yarrow stalks in consulting the I Ching. Tarot can also be considered a form of bibliomancy, with the main difference that the cards (pages) are unbound.

Another variant requires the selection of a random book from a library before selecting the random passage from that book. This also holds if a book has fallen down from a shelf on its own.

Also read: Scrying, The Ancient Art of Revelation

Darkroom retreat, meet your deepest self

I am a forest, and a night of dark trees: but he who is not afraid

of my darkness, will find banks full of roses under my cypresses.

-Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra

Darkroom retreats have been used by a variety of spiritual traditions throughout the centuries as a higher-level practice. The aspirant enters a room specially prepared to admit absolutely no light and spends some time under this sensory deprivation in order to bring about a profound shift of consciousness. The time period dedicated to dark retreat varies from a few hours to decades.

The Tao says: "When you go into the dark and this becomes total, the Darkness soon turns into light."

Master Mantak Chia:

“[Many] spiritual traditions have used darkness techniques in the pursuit of enlightenment. In Europe, the dark room often appeared in underground form as a network of tunnels, in Egypt as the Pyramids, in Rome as the catacombs, and by the Essenes, near the Dead Sea in Israel, as caves. In the Taoist tradition caves have been used throughout the ages for higher level practices. In the Tao, the cave, the Immortal Mountain, the Wu San, represents the Perfect Inner Alchemy Chamber. Meditating and fasting in the cave is the final journey of spiritual work. The caves are the Earth Mother and its energy lines. Like the hollowing bones, caves contain the earliest information of life stored inside the Earth. Caves contain the vital essence of the Earth Power.

In the Darkness, our mind and soul begin to wander freely in the vast realms of psychic and spiritual experience. When you enter this primordial state you are reunited with the true Self and Divinity within. You literally ‘conduct’ the universal energy. You may see into the past and future, understand the true meaning of existence, and begin to understand the order of things. You return to the womb, the cocoon of our material structure and Nature’s original Darkness. Complete darkness profoundly changes the sensory sensibilities of the body/brain. We are deprived of all visual reference. Sounds begin to fall away as we lose contact with the external world and turn the senses inward. The effect of darkness is to shut down major cortical centers in the brain, depressing mental and cognitivefunctions in the higher brain centers. Emotional and feeling statesare enhanced, especially the sense of smell and the finer senses of psychic perception. Dreams become more lucid, and the dream state manifests in our conscious awareness. Eventually, we awaken within ourselves the awareness of the Source, the spirit, the soul. We descend into the void, into the darkness of deep, inner space". 

The Alchemical Perspective:

“The journey into Darkness is not just a first stage, but it is the essence of the spiritual alchemical work, because without it, the individual will remain only at the superficial level of mere rational thinking and social existence, dominated by dogmas. There is an important alchemical adagio: Visita Interiora Terrae Rectificando Occultum Lapidem (“Visit the interior of the earth; rectify what you find there, and you will discover the hidden stone.”) To describe the “descent into Darkness,” summed up in the word “vitriol,” alchemy has preserved some very ancient symbols.

The individual (actually only his/her personality) descending into its original nature will suffer a great loss. He must abandon all his old moral, social and spiritual values. Thus, he will open himself to a different order, more in tune with the Harmony of the Whole. This is what is happening in a Dark Retreat.”

“Remember that by welcoming darkness, you become a womb for light…” -Leela

In India, the retreats in darkness are usually called Kaya Kalpa Retreats. The term kalpa means “ageless” or “immortal” while kaya means “body”. Thus Kaya Kalpa is an ayurvedic treatments for rejuvenating the body calling for seclusion in darkness, meditation, along with the application of various herbal concoctions. It is even seen as a form of Yoga and ayurvedic medicine that was developed in southern India at about the same time Hatha Yoga was born.

Kaya Kalpa has the following main objectives:

• Revealing the Supreme Self / Ultimate Reality
• Slowing down the aging process
• Maintaining excellent physical health and youthful vitality
• Delaying physical death until one achieves jivamukta (spiritual liberation from the effects of karma)

“If you can love darkness, you will become unafraid of death. If you can enter into darkness – and you can enter when there is no fear – you will achieve total relaxation. If you can become one with darkness, you are dissolved, it is a surrender. Now there is no fear, because if you have become one with darkness, you have become one with death. You cannot die now, you have become deathless. Darkness is deathless. Light is born and dies. Darkness simply is. It is deathless.” -Osho

In India and China, as in the book of Genesis, the first work of Creation was the separation of light and darkness which were interfused in the beginning. A “return to the beginning of things” might therefore find expression in the resolution of this duality and the recreation of primordial unity where the rational mind dissolves.

It is an advanced practice in the Dzogchen lineages of the Nyingmapa, Bönpo, and other schools of Tibetan Buddhism which recommended a period of 49 days.

Dark retreat in the Himalayan tradition is a restricted practice only to be engaged by the senior spiritual practitioner under appropriate spiritual guidance. This practice is considered conducive for navigating the bardo at the time of death and for realising the rainbow body. The traditional dark retreat requires stability in the natural state and is only suitable for advanced practitioners.

There are historians who suggest that ancient Egyptians and Mayans practiced a form of the Dark Retreat as well, traditionally lasting ten days.

The Brain Science Behind Dark Room Therapy

Retreating into complete darkness for an extended period of time has a major effect on the brain. Shifts of consciousness can help us see that which is beyond illusion. If we take a look at the chemistry of the brain we can start to make sense of the biochemical process behind dark room techniques and their effects on the brain. 

When one experiences complete darkness the area of the brain stimulated is a gland called the pineal gland. The pineal gland is the gland in the brain associated with our third eye. Spiritual leaders around the world view the "opening of the inner eye" as a time when we can clearly see shifts in our perspective, when we open up to our intuition and our own psychic abilities and when the outer world stays the same but our inner world changes. We know that the pineal gland needs darkness in order to produce and emit melatonin. What happens during extended periods in darkness can be described by participants as a waking consciousness.

Melatonin continues to build up in the brain as you stay in complete darkness. When the melatonin stores build up to about 15-20 mg the brain begins to realize it no longer needs melatonin and begins producing pinolene. Pinolene is said to be released by the pineal gland also and is responsible for what we call "the light show". In complete darkness you may be able to see light patterns forming. These visions are connected to the internal workings of the mind. At this stage there is a letting go of the ego as we lose perception of the physical world. This process often occurs within the first 3 days of darkness.

If we look deeper at the pineal gland and its response to the dark for more extended periods we are introduced to a psychedelic substance called Dimethyltriptamine, or DMT. This substance is naturally occurring within the brain, also produced by the pineal gland, and typically only released at birth and at death. It has been nicknamed "the spirit molecule" because of the states of altered consciousness it provides and how it translates into feelings of universal compassion. This is a state where we can deeply work on healing ourselves from past traumas. 

Researcher on DMT, Terrence McKenna, believed the substance was a portal to another dimension wherein we gain access to the true nature of reality, a vibratory non-material space of loving energy and unlimited potentiality. This theory is not far from what has already been taught in ancient Eastern religions or Shamanic traditions. Extended periods of darkness is a much softer, natural way to experience conscious altering DMT without ingesting anything.

Everything we need to reach these deep conscious states is naturally within us all.

“I wish I could show you,

when you are lonely or in the darkness,

the astonishing light

of your own being”

-Hafiz


Also read:

• What is Gnosis?
• Psychonaut: Sailor of the Mind
• Silence is much more important to our brains than we think
• The Awakening of Consciousness
• Sufi Dancing and Islamic Mysticism
• Staring into someone’s eyes for 10 minutes induces an altered state of consciousness
• Chaos Magick: Unlocking the Power of the Subconscious Mind

Sumerian Goddess Inanna (Ishtar)

"My father gave me the heavens,
 gave me the earth,                  
 I am Inanna!

 Kingship he gave me,
 queenship he gave me,
 waging of battle and attack he gave me,
 the floodstorm he gave me,
 the hurricane he gave me!

 The heavens he set as a crown upon my head,
 the earth he set as sandals on my feet,
 a holy robe he wrapped around my body,
 a holy scepter he placed in my hand.

 The gods are sparrows, I am a falcon."

Inanna is among the most important deities and the most important goddess in the Mesopotamian pantheon. She is primarily known as the goddess of sexual love but is equally prominent as the goddess of warfare. In her celestial aspect, Inanna is the planet Venus, the morning and the evening star.

Ishtar is the East Semitic, Akkadian, Assyrian, and Babylonian goddess of fertility, love, war, and sex. She is the counterpart to the Sumerian Inanna, and is the cognate for the goddess Astarte.

The Ishtar Gate was the eighth gate to the inner city of Babylon. It was constructed in about 575 BC by order of King Nebuchadnezzar. The roof and doors of the gate were of cedar, according to the dedication plaque.

Through the gate ran the Processional Way, which was lined with walls covered in lions (about 120 of them) on blue glazed bricks. She was associated with, and often shown in the company of, a lion.

Inanna figures in various myths and epics, including The Epic of Gilgamesh. She got Enki drunk and tricked him into bestowing many attributes and powers upon her. In the myth The Elevation of Inanna, Enki, An and Enlil all give their powers to Inanna, making her the Queen of the Universe.

Inanna is a femme fatale whose lovers always seem to come to grief. She is impatient, impetuous, and demanding. Gilgamesh risked death when he spurned her advances, comparing her to a back door that would let cold air into the house.

The original Dance of the Seven Veils was Inannaís descent into the Underworld, her sister Ereshkigalís realm, where she was gradually stripped naked as she passed through the seven gates. First went her crown, next earrings, then necklace, breast pins, belt of birthstones, then bracelets and finally her gown.

No acts of procreation took place on earth while Inanna was in the Underworld.

When she discovered that her only way out was in exchange for someone else, she betrayed Damuzi into taking her place. Inanna's time in the Underworld is a myth of the lunar cycle, Damuzi's a myth of the seasons.

Magic in Ancient Mesopotamia

Ancient Mesopotamia was a vast region in Western Asia situated within the Tigris–Euphrates river system which has become known as the ‘cradle of civilization’ due to the huge number of feats the culture achieved. Agriculture, animal herding, and domestication had developed there by 8000 years ago. 

Magick and religion for Ancient Mesopotamians were inseparable parts of the same whole, because both were seen as the link between the physical reality and the subtle spheres of existence.

It can be difficult to grasp Mesopotamian magic as a cultural concept. Steeped in the philosophical traditions of Western dualism, we often view magic in a binary relation to religion, yet no such distinction existed in Mesopotamia. For people living in ancient Iraq and the imperial peripheries in Syria, Anatolia, and Iran during the first millennium B.C., magic was a part of everyday life. Far from being considered irrational, it was the guiding principle by which Mesopotamians understood various natural phenomena and their positive and negative consequences. For example, celestial omens could reveal a king to be in imminent danger, or portend fortuitous circumstances in war. 

Magic could also be used to combat the negative actions of ghosts, demons, and human sorcerers, as well as protect against the curse that resulted from unknowingly committing a sin, and thus losing the favor of one’s personal god or goddess. The responsibilities of a Mesopotamian magician could come under the umbrella of a number of specialties that we might refer to as magical, scientific, medical, literary, and religious.

A deep insight into the Mesopotamian civilization has been gained from the hundreds of thousands of clay tablets inscribed with cuneiform, one of the earliest forms of writing, that they left.

Maqlú, which means ‘burning’, is a work composed around 700 BC spanning nine tablets. 

It details a ceremony which was supposed to thwart and drive away evil magic, protect the intended target from the bad magic, and weaken the person who was responsible for casting the malevolent spell or curse. The first eight tablets feature almost 100 incantations, and the ninth gives directions for the ritual. It is a work intended to aide an exorcist and his patient.

Maqlú, along with several other Mesopotamian texts, paint a picture of a society where magic was practiced both legitimately and openly, and illegitimately and maliciously.

It is implied that evil magic worked as the practitioners tricked the Gods into believing they were assisting a genuine need. The ritual in Maqlú was supposed to work by revealing the deception to the Gods so they would reverse what they had done to help the evil doer. But we can also build up a picture of a society in which ‘good’ magic was an everyday part of life for many people.

Although many people believed in or even practiced rudimentary magic, there were also professional magicians in ancient Mesopotamia. These professional magicians would have been specialists in a particular field of magic. Some would have been specialists in divination, while others would have been professional exorcists. As with some other ancient societies, many of those who worked in a field that was not fully understood were considered to be magicians; so scientists, doctors, and astronomers were placed alongside mystics and exorcists.

It was also possible to specialize within these fields. One set of mystics who specialized in a particular form of divination were the bārû, performed divination by consulting the livers of animals and also by observation of the flight of birds.

The liver was considered the source of the blood and hence the basis of life itself. The liver was divided into sections, with each section representing a particular deity.

(Picture: Divinatory livers, clay models for the training of soothsayers, in the Louvre).

Mesopotamian divination was not just divination, and not limited in development to a type of superstition, but was developed to the extent to which it was in fact a science.

One magical tradition which was quite widespread in Mesopotamia is that of the herbalist. Herbalists had access to long lists of plants which gave the names of plants, how they were to be prepared and what ailments they were to be used for and in what way. 

The herbalists did not only have to know his herbs but also when best to harvest them and had to observe the correct rituals when doing so. Also, there was a correct time when to administer the medicine to the patient. This timing was usually connected to celestial phenomena.

Ritual prescriptions included time and mode of harvesting, for example:

Look for a gourd which grows alone in the plain;

when the sun has gone down,

cover your head with a kerchief,

cover the gourd too,

draw a magic circle with flour around it,

and in the morning, before the sun comes out,

pull it up from its location,

take its root.

Often, the plant or its root may not be exposed to the sun or daylight at any time. The plant may also be addressed in speaking, asking it to give up its life or part of its substance for benign purposes.

Plants were seen to come in two varieties: male and female. This is not connected to any actual sex, but rather refers to potency, with 'male' usually referring to greater potency.

Plants growing in remote places such as on mountains may be seen as more potent than easily collectable plants. In addition, plants on mountains are nearer to the stars and thus more potent.

The role of stones in Babylonian magic is comparable to the role of herbs. Stones can have magical properties which are also collected on long lists.

In the Metropolitan Museum of Art  there is a cuneiform tablet with a list of 303 magical stones dating to mid- to late 1st millennium B.C. (picture left).

This multi-columned tablet contains a list of stones with their magical associations and medical purposes.

Stone, precious or not, could be used for figurines and statues who then had magical properties (e. g. guarding a place). Various metals such as gold and silver were also considered imbued with such properties. More often, however, stones were used for amulets on a piece of string or tendon (which in itself might be part of a charm) or could be tied onto the body with a strip of cloth, usually in the area which was supposed to benefit from the influence of the stone. Thus, a stone supposed to remedy stomach cramps might be worn in a bandage around the hips. Stones could be used as remedies and as prophylactic means.

Magnetite is known as a stone evoking the truth; he who carries it is obliged to speak nothing but the truth. Stones may be male and female just as herbs; this applies especially to the tone of colour, paler colours being female.

The power of the stones is supposed to be derived from the stars. Amulet stones are exposed to starlight over night to be 'charged'.

Two concepts are inseparable from all kinds of magic in Mesopotamian culture: the gods and the stars. All magic is connected to one, the other or both.

Magic rituals were often connected to the invocation of the gods who were likened to star constellations observed in the night sky, the planets, or the sun and moon. 

Anu, Enlil and Ea are represented by the whole sky, having their three regions staked out on the night sky the so-called Paths of Anu, Enlil and Ea respectively; Venus is Inanna / Ishtar in her female aspect as morning star and goddess of love, Mercury is the same god(dess) in her male aspect as evening star and god of war; Mars is the destroyer and god of pestilence Nergal; the Moon is Sin / Nanna, the sun is Shamash, and both are male gods; Marduk was Jupiter. The names for gods and planets can be used interchangeably.

Where Do You Find Your “Waldeinsamkeit”?

I go to nature to be soothed and healed, and to have my senses put in order. ~ John Burroughs

There’s a German word, “waldeinsamkeit ," that roughly translates to “the feeling of being alone in the woods.” 

From Wald (“forest”) +‎ Einsamkeit (“loneliness”).

It’s meant to describe a singular type of loneliness that is at once isolating, peaceful, and reflective.

Waldeinsamkeit is a strange name for a beautiful idea.

The concept of Waldeinsamkeit might seem scary or unsettling (the idea of being alone in the woods), but it is definitely a positive thing; it suggests a calm, contemplative atmosphere amidst a beautiful setting. If you’ve ever taken a solitary stroll through a forest and felt better for it, then you’ll understand. 

Waldeinsamkeit refers to having a connection with nature, and enjoying time alone amongst it. It is no surprise, then, that the Germans have this word, if their forests are anything to go by.

Perhaps the best known German forest is the Schwarzwald (Black Forest) in Baden-Württemberg, which was also the setting for many Brothers Grimm fairy tales. When you think about it, a lot of fairy tales are set in forests – Hansel und Gretel (Hansel and Gretel), Rumpelstilzchen (Rumpelstiltskin), Schneewittchen (Snow White), and Rotkäppchen (Little Red Riding Hood), to name a few! If anyone has experienced Waldeinsamkeit, it’s surely the characters in those fairy tales (at least, before things started to go wrong for them…).

There are even some real-life fairytale castles that exist in the heart of the German forests. The best-known of these is probably King Ludwig II’s Schloss Neuschwanstein, located in Hohenschwangau, Bavaria. This castle is often nicknamed “The fairytale castle”, and for good reason.

Yes, the woods and forests of Germany are certainly magical, mysterious, special places. It is easy to feel alone in them, and to get lost in your own thoughts as you stroll through them. Perhaps that is why the Germans have the word Waldeinsamkeit; they know, more than anyone, what it is to be alone in the woods – and how rejuvenating it can be.

Goethe frequented the Thuringian Forest, taking inspiration from the feeling among the spruce and spas around Ilmenau; Mozart found it in the springs in Carlsbad; successive Kaisers made it part of public health policy, and even Hitler insisted on it to maintain a healthy work-life balance.

And having a spot where you can go and indulge in a little waldeinsamkeit of your own can be a rewarding experience for everyone. 

One study from Japan noticed that hiking alone in forests helps reduce stress by lowering blood pressure and cortisol levels.

Shinrin-yoku is a term that means "taking in the forest atmosphere" or "forest bathing." It was developed in Japan during the 1980s and has become a cornerstone of preventive health care and healing in Japanese medicine. 

While waldeinsamkeit traditionally implies a dense, quiet wood, the emotional experience can happen just about anywhere. Maybe it’s a meaningful hideaway in your city or town that you like to keep all to yourself, or maybe it’s a bustling public square where you allow yourself to be alone in a crowd. 

Tell us about your favorite place to be blissfully alone, and why that place is so perfect for your peaceful solitude, in the comments below.

Also read:

• Shinrin-Yoku: Forest Bathing Therapy
• Silence is much more important to our brains than we think
• Ikigai: Finding your reason for being
• Having access to green places 'helps people live longer'