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Nechey nechey ai Ma Shyama/ Ami je tore shonge jaboe/
Tui khabi Ma panthar muroe/ Ami je tore prasad paboe
Roughly translated, it reads Mother Kali, come dancing on, I will follow you/ you will munch the sacrificed goat's head/ I will have the leftovers.
Not quite an appetizing meal, but the Bengali singing unsteadily on his feet was dripping piety. Probably, it was the country liquor with which he filled up himself, but his devotion and religiousity was unmistakable. In that, at least, he was different from Gunter Grass, who excoriated Ma Kali in his book, Show Me Your Tongue. Ma Kali, anyway, had her turn of excoriating Grass. It became known that Gras had enrolled in the Nazi air force at 16.
Since paleolithic times humankind have been worshipping goddesses, and anthropologists think (without firm evidence) that the first god or the entity for worship conjured up by those of our .distant ancestors was female. This belief is somewhat supported by the ancient myth of creation by self- fertilisation, very common in the vegetable kingdom and in parthenogenetic insects, mollusces and snails. Probably, this had given rise to the belief that the Mother Goddess created not only herself , but also the universe all by herself, alone.
Agricultural religions
And that accounted for the growth of agricultural religions, belief systems narrating that the benevolence, happiness and prosperity the gods shower on us are all due to the Mother Goddess (MG for short). No wonder, that nearly all such early religions, societies and tribes were matriarchal. Be that as it may, there is no evidence that the female members of such societies considered themselves superior to their male constituents. Usually, a balance was achieved by equally honouring the female and male gods. This could be the origin of that charming myth of the marriage between Earth Mother and Sky God in many early cultures and societies. A line from a poem by Mao Ze Dong stating that women hold up the sky reflects that belief.
Images
The first images (excavated) which the Cro-Magnons of the Upper Paleolithic Period had made are all unmistakably female figures going back to as early as 35,000 BCE. Naturally, they are all called Venus, after Botticelli's masterpiece renaissance painting, The Birth of Venus. There is a Venus of Vestonice (Czechoslovakia - circa 35,000 - 25,000 BCE); of Willendorf (Germany - ca 22,000 BCE); and one in Laussel, southern France chiselled out as a bas-relief in a rock shelter, ca 19,000 BCE. There is also the doubtful Venus of Morocco (ca 400,000 BCE) because experts are not sure how it was made - shaped by the actions of rain and wind or by human hands. They are, however, unanimous in their opinion that it was used as a figurine. The Laussale Venus is painted in red, perhaps suggesting blood . This and the detail showing a bison horn held in one hand suuggests that the rock shelter was probably a hunting shrine. There are Cro-Magnon paintings in caves showing women during during child birth. An interesting painting in the Pyrennes depicted a naked woman apparently as a mascot of mammoth hunters , the guardian of wild things and the defender of the cave shelter.
Proto-Neolithic (circa 9,000 - 7,000 BCE); Middle Neolithic (ca 6,000 - 5,000 BCE); and Higher Neolithic (ca 4,500 - 3,500 BCE) Periods also yielded female figurines, some of which were decorated and appeared to have been objects of worship. Isis or the Horned Goddess was depicted in cave paintings (ca 7,000 BCE) in Africa, interestingly as a bisexual woman. MG was called Ta - Urt (Great One) in predynastic Egypt before ca 3100 BCE, and was shown as a pregnant hippopotamus standing on her hind legs. MG figurines associated with cow, sheep, goat, dove, humped ox, snake, pig and double axe were the characteristics of the Halaf culture flourishing in the Tigris basin, ca 5,000 - 4,000 BCE. The Sumerian culture (ca 4,000 BCE) associated princesses and queens of the cities with the MG, while the kings were regarded as gods.
Different roles
In the millennia gone, MG asumed and played many roles -- mother, wife, creator, destroyer, homemaker, huntress, healer, sorcerer...and so on, her roles depending on the state of development of the culture she was a part of. She could be a queen with a royal consort; she could be a mother whose son had died or sacrificed to represent the birth and rebirth of the seasons; she was called by a myriad of names and had many faces, but always unfailingly she represented nature, and was identified with the sun and the moon; with the earth and the sky. Her devotees, whatever they called themselves, were nature worshippers as well. She was the Supreme Being, while the gods were described in anthropomorphic terms.
It is generally believed that the Black Madonna icons were created from the descriptions of ancient goddesses, particularly the Egyptian Goddess Isis holding on her lap her son, Horus. Spirits of the benevolent or malevolent kinds are described in many languages (for example Syriac) in the feminine gender. So it was in early Christianity upto circa 400 CE, after which the practice was discontinued. Even at present, the Latter - day Saints or the Mormons (followers of a tangential Christian doctrine) subtly accept the existence of a Heavenly Mother, but chastise the members who openly declare their adherence to this goddess instead of praying to God the Father. The Mother Goddess was the central figure, the very essence of the craft and practice of Neo - pagan Witchcraft. As the Great Mother, she represented fertility bringing forth all life; as Mother Nature, she embodied the world of the living and the world of the planets. She herself was the elemental force: the creator and the destroyer. She was the Queen of Heaven; and she was the moon. Emotion, intuition, magical powers and psychic faculty were her attributes. A genderles Divine Force was the power behind her, but in the universe it was manifested as male and female principles. Though both the principles were accepted, the Goddess or the female principle was given importance by excluding the Horned God or the male principle. Many aspects, facets and names characterised the Goddess; but in Neo - paganism and Witchcraft, She was worshipped in her three Goddess forms : Virgin, Mother and Crone.
Mother Goddesses elsewhere
In ancient cultures Mother Goddesses were worshipped in different forms with varying names. She was known as Tiamat in Sumerian mythology; Ishtar or Inana and Ninsun were her names in Mesopotamia; Asherah in Canaan; Ashtart in Syria; and Aphrodite in Greece. The Mother Goddess of the Celts or the ancient Irish, Anu or sometimes called Danu lend her name to Irish literature, and Tuatha de Dannan meaning people of Danu came to be known as the last and most favoured generation of gods. The Nordic Bronze Age was the time when probably a Mother Goddess was worshipped by the Germanic tribes as a part of their religious practice, known as the Nerthus of Germanic mythology. She lived on in the Norse mythology as Frevia, and was worshipped by that name. Njord, interestingly, was her male counterpart in Scandinavia, the only male deity in an otherwise female pantheon, which included Yggdrasil or World Ash. It is said that the image of Grendel's mother in the poem Beowulf was based on a Mother Goddess from Norse mythology.
Ancient Near Eastern culture zones surrounding the Aegean Sea worshipped the MG known as Cybele. Her other forms, revered in Rome were known as Magna Mater, Great Mother, Rhea and Gaia. Classical Greece had twelve Olympian Mother Goddesses like Hera, Demeter and so on with many special powers. Potnia Theron, the MG of the Minoans was the Mistress of the Animals besides many other qualities. Apparently, all her powers were later appropriated by Artemis born of Zeus and Leto. Apollo, the very good-looking Greek God was her twin brother. She was beautiful and energetic; wore a short dress leaving her legs bare; and looked young all the tme. She was also the MG of the place known as Ephesus where she wore a peculiar dress representing honeycombs, breasts, fruits and the like. Experts are divided over the purposes of her outfit, but the general opinion is that it represents a lactating woman capable of feeding many babies. A bow is her symbol, her hunting weapon; and she often wears a crescent on her brow. Her strength lies in her ability to defend herself, and naturally she is a defender of women and animals. She provides comfort to women during child birth. She dislikes men, an example of misandry perhaps, and hates marriage for the bondage it imposes on women.
Greek and Roman (Italian) Mother Goddesses
Quite a number of Mother Goddesses are common in Greek and Roman mythologies, among whom perhaps the most revered is Cybele. She is a Near Eastern MG with her domain spreading from Phrygia to Greece, Rome amd other places. The Agora in Athens, a sort of gathering and commercial centre once, has a temple known as Metroon dedicated to her. Sacred prostitution, castration and fertility rites were the forms in which she was paid tributes. Her cult followers raised monuments in her honour from circa 6,000 BCE to the end of the Roman Empire. Recent archaeological finds have established that she was venerated even in Thrace. Rhea is her other name in Greece, and Agdos is what she is called when she takes the form of a rock. In an interesting observation, Ean Begg in his work on Christian Black Virgins speaks of a link Cybele has with the Ka'bah : "Her name is etymologically linked with the words for crypt, cave, head and dome and is distantly related to the Ka'aba, the cube-shaped Holy of Holies in Mecca that contains the feminine black stone venerated by Islam" Begg, p.57. Though famously known as The Great Mother, she was also called Mater Kubile; while her Roman Ceremonial name name was Mater Deum Magna Idaea (Great Idaean Mother of the Gods). She was one of the various nature deities worshipped in Asia Minor, and Phrygia in west - central Turkey was the original place of her cult - followers. The Greeks saw her resmblance to their own MG, Rhea and unhesitatingly combined the two. In 204 BCE, when Hannibal was marching to conquer Rome, there was a prophecy stated to be from her that the enemy would be defeated and expelled if the "Idaean Mother" was brought to Rome, together with her sacred symbol, a small stone reputed to have fallen from the heavens. Though emphasis was placed on her maternal instincts and attributes, her worship was orgiastic in nature. Apparently, only castrated males could become her priests, so as to honour her lover the agricultural god Attis who self - mutilated himself that way and died bleeding under a pine tree.
Aurora or Eos is the Greek Goddess of Dawn, daughter of the Titan, Hyperion; the Sun God, Helios is her brother and the Moon Goddess, Selene is her sister. Homer described her in his works as the Rosy - Fingered one. Her lover is the hunter Orion as also Cephalus, who is the father of her child, Phaethon. Artistically, she is depicted as rising from the sea in a chariot drawn by winged horses, and morning dews falling from the two pitchers held in her hands.
The Furies are so called because they are the Goddesses of anger, jealousy and revenge. The Greeks (probably not to provoke them) called them euphemistically Eumenides (meaning "The Kind Ones), and Romans (not so tactful) addressed them as Furiae. Older than the Olympian Pantheon, this trio or triune were the punishing force of the Mother Goddess disciplining Her law - breakers. It is speculated that they were personification of curses and rose from ghosts or the victims of murder. The Greek poet Hesiod believed them to be the daughters of the Earth Mother, Gaia and to come out of the mutilated body of Her spouse, Uranus. Aeschylus in his plays called them the daughters of Nyx; Sophocles in his works described them as daughters of Darkness and Gaia; and it was Euripides who spoke of them as three in number. Subsequent authors named them Alecto (Unceasing in Anger); Tisiphone (Avenger of Murder); and Megaera (Jealous). They lived in the underworld, due to which they were associated with the fertility of the soil, and came out often to chase and punish the wicked. The Greeks were afraid even to utter their name, Erinyes, and in addition to the appeasing title of "The Kind Ones" called them Semnam Theai meaning The Venerable Goddesses.