© Chet Davis

We are in a time where we are seeing the increased emergence of the interest in the Goddess on the conscious level. There is an embracing of different aspects of the Goddess. Not only an embracing but for many a driving force to explore and know the Goddess in both an intellectual and experiential way. What is unique that is to happen here today in relationship to your relationship, your personal relationship with that of what we call the Goddess. And what is it that I as a teacher perhaps can offer to you that you have not already reached in your understanding? And so as I was considering these questions in the early hours of the morning the word that came back was trust. I said well elaborate please. But isn't that just like the Goddess? Trust.

So perhaps we will begin by talking about by what do we mean when we say Goddess? Because the minute we say Goddess and/or God, we have separation. And yet we do live in a world of polarities. What I would remind you and in loving recognition of the males we have here, is the Goddess is not an exclusive to the polarity of the outer manifestation of the female gender. For we carry the polarities within ourselves and so by the very recognition of that we carry the Goddess and the God within us. And we carry something that I will speak to today of that of what is beyond that of what we call the God and Goddess.

There is much that is available in popular reading and often discussion about the perception of the differences in how men and women think. While there may well be gender differences in the way we perceive our world in our time I would like us to consider for a moment the possible ways of perception of the world a long time ago. A time for many where it is believed that recognition of our interconnection with nature and our relationship with the earth resulted in a whole different way of perception and communications. A time in which deity, was seen both as one and multiple without a sense of conflict. A form of thinking called bicameral. Where there was use of two compartments.

In one compartment the source of the question, thought or need and from the other the response. The response was perceived as coming from deity, deity often included the experience that the tribal chief or the queen/priestess was a part of the expression and voice of deity. It is a way of thinking which is inclusive. And it was very beneficial in that time because we were in a consciousness that you would probably call a tribal consciousness, a group consciousness. So this aspect of thinking in the totality was one in which involved the group mind and also simultaneously access to that which some would call supernatural or extraordinary.

It was said that as we developed a stronger sense of identification with self that this form of thinking was no more. While the stronger sense of identification with the separate self from the group, deity was also seen as outside of self. Perceptions became more self-contained and reasoning in a linear fashion became the norm. This was said to have started occurring between 3000 BC and 1250 BC. In the relatively more recent times (such as during the period of history known as Romanticism in which such composers as Mozart reported accessing and writing whole compositions of music in their heads in a short period of time) another form of thinking began to be noted that seemed more involved than the linear, separated perceptions of the world. One of the ways these thinkers often describe this process of perception is they say they are hovering over a concept and they find themselves being drawn to one particular area or source of information as opposed to what we might call a more of a systematic categorical thinking, a sequential form of thinking. It's a difference between the perceptions of the world as holographic, the totality and perception as separate, linear and sequential.

Now there might be those of us who have a prejudice about that. We may well say I prefer this form of thinking or that form of thinking. What I would encourage you to recognize is that both are very purposeful.

Going back a moment to the earliest form of perceptions we discussed, that of bicameral, as a fellow member of your tribe, I could be over there rounding up a herd of bison to head your way and I could send you the thought, the bison are coming and you and the rest of the tribe would know. And it even went further than that because what we're really talking about here is a very magical, the early beginning recognition of magical thinking. Because not only am I herding the bison, but guess what?

There was a good chance that the night before we all had a party, but a very divinely inspired party and we set up in our group mind the call to the group mind of the bison. And we called them, we sang to them; we invited them to us. And they came. And yes we ate some of them. We ate what we needed and we used every aspect of them. And after we ate them we honored them because we recognized that they gave us life. And when something ate us, which of course happened too, then we celebrated. It was a freeing of one form to another form to another form. And so we are in this group mind. There is one thing about a group mind, it works very well.

Not a whole lot of fire by friction, or to put it another way resistance. But you see because it works very well we could have stayed in that mode for a long, long time. But you see creation demands growth. So, the god forms and the goddesses had their own party and asked what do we need to do? And there was this particularly interesting sort of androgynous figure some call Prometheus. Although many associate him with the male there is also actual mythologies that associate her as a female.

So we have a somewhat androgynous figure who while this debate is going on about what do with this potentially stagnant situation, Prometheus took it upon the Prometheus self to step in as it were and took the fire out of that middle temple where the meeting was going on and slipped it in a reed and brought it down and proceeded to sort of touch all of us humans on the head. And we have, right on cue the spark of mind and so we started thinking of me. We started to separate from the group mind. It's my bison. You kill, I eat. In came linear thinking.

With the identification with self came a different way of perception because we could not be part of the group mind operating as a whole and still have such a strong sense of self. Because a strong sense of self by its very nature said whoa I'm me and you're you. So what does this have to do with Sophia? Who do you think built this all up? Active Intelligence. Sophia.

What is Sophia? I am reticent to call Sophia a Goddess form because by the very implication of that and the way that we linear thinkers do, we want to put it in our box, we want to give it traits, we want to say this is what it is. But we do have to have some way to organize ourselves. So I would say that Sophia is perhaps a composite, a composite that is inclusive of all of the aspects of the Divine Feminine. The Goddess does not stand alone, but stands in balance with God.

Some say that the Goddess reflects to us God. Why do you think we so many times associate the Goddess with the moon? What do we associate with the sun? Often we associate the sun with the God. Yet at one time the sun was considered the mother and moon the father. So probably when we were in that group mind our experience of the relationship with the Goddess and God was different. But right now in general in our day and time, we would normally associate the sun with what we call a masculine aspect and we would associate the moon with a feminine aspect. And so we see many of the Goddess forms from the Egyptian mythology we will see them with the moon as part of their crown. The moon being reflective of the sun. And I want to talk a little bit about that. Because there is a mystery in that. Because there is a holding of an understanding about a receptivity and the relationship to the sacred marriage.

On the Tree of Life we see the manifestation, the divine feminine called at the very beginning, the very earliest whirling, we see Her coming down and backing through the Tree on the pillar of severity. Sophia is recognized in all three aspects of the divine feminine that of what we call the Black Goddess, that of what we call the White Goddess and that of what we call the Red Goddess. These colors are associated with the alchemical process. We see the Black aspect, the nature aspect. The aspect that is associated with form. This aspect, the Black Goddess can be associated with Black Isis.

There are literally hundreds of sites in which black Madonna statues are still venerated. There is also form of the Black Goddess expression in many traditions. In the White Goddess we have such aspects as expressed in the form of Mary, as Demeter, we see the White Goddess as being that of virginal. Virginal, being that one who is initiated into the mysteries. And we have the golden Isis; she is representing the red aspect of Sophia. The red Goddess being that which is associated with completion and the mystical marriage.

The very aspect of creation, which is the embodiment of divine feminine, has multiple implications. Let's talk a little bit about the Black Goddess, what that means. The dark goddess is associated with that of nature, the form world with the understanding that we are a part of the one called nature. The four elements and more. She holds for the potential for understanding of ourselves through that which we hold in the shadow, that which has not yet been brought into the light of self-awareness. She is the great destroyer, for out of destruction comes new creation. Cutting things away because they are no longer needed. And if you're holding on to it, it's going to be painful.

Nephthys is often times associated with the dark aspect of the Goddess. She is the one in the Egyptian pantheon who is depicted with a cup on her head. She takes us into the unconscious mind.

Dark Goddess is often times associated with unconsciousness; it's Persephone in the underworld. Going into the hidden regions of our self. So the dark Goddess is an aspect that still says to us go, go into the regions that are hidden to you or which you have not yet explored. For that which you do not know has power over you. If you don't get your unconscious mind in order, chaos sets in and you can't produce the opening. If you don't go down there you're not ever going to get it in order. And that is one of the gifts of the dark Goddess. She says come with me into the unconsciousness. I will embrace you. However, the dark Goddess also says to us, I love you enough to open new terrain and say go for it.

Artemis, The Goddess of the Hunt is another aspect of the dark goddess and says you don't have to stay home baking that bread and doing that sewing. Unless you want to, for there are other choices available. The Goddess of the hearth is there as well if you choose. But if you want to strip that long skirt off, put on that short skirt and let us play. Let's go into the woods. What do woods mean? What happens when you dream? You go into the woods. Where are you going? The subconscious. And she also says while you are at it go out into the world to places wherever you want to go. Remember that what we do internally we are doing externally as well. And we have Aphrodite who says and while you're at it, I have other things in mind and by gosh enjoy, enjoy.

Venus and Aphrodite have one of those love hate things going on with humanity at this time. I have heard stories about how Venus was covered up because of her sensuality and yet sensuality is part of our nature - even if we do not acknowledge or explore it. The dark Goddess says love your form. Love your form and how you create, whether it is creation through your sexuality, whether it's creation through your word, whether it's creation through your heart, whether it's creation through your hands in the earth, it's all creation, love it all. Fear it not. Again the dark Goddess.

One aspect the dark Goddesses all have in common is they are all associated with the form, with Malkuth, with the earth. And the first step, aspects of the alchemical process are all associated with form. When you think of all these aspects of Sophia they have to do with aspects of form, but they also have to do with being comfortable with form, being into form. It is called the descent into matter.

We are in matter now. For many of us it is a judgment, I want out of here. How many of you have said I would give anything if this was my last lifetime. Guess what you have got a few rounds to go with the dark Goddess. She's not about to let you out of here until you love it. And then she's not going to let you out until you don't love it anymore and you don't hate it. But first and foremost, you must love it, because that's the message of the dark Goddess.

You must accept me to love you enough to bring the destroyer aspect to your life. You must accept me and love me enough that I can take my sword and cut through your crap. In fact, I'll give it to you and let you cut through it yourself. You must love it enough that you lift matter with you, when and if you ever do go on, not to return to this world of form. That is by the way part of our agreement with the dark Goddess.

For you see she is the builder of form and we are form. We talked this over, we said okay you give me the building blocks to create this body and I'll dance with you. When the time comes, when we are complete with our cosmic dance, we all go together. You don't leave this date at the door. The dark Goddess goes with you. She is not left behind.

So in the descent to matter, the dark Goddess is associated with the evolutionary flow. And she in the evolutionary flow is associated with the white Goddess. Now one is not better than the other. In fact, you can't have an ascent without a descent. You have to have the dark Goddess. She is power. She's love. She loves enough to give her body to create you. She loves enough to take her reflective power She stands in your subconscious mind and reflects the sun's light in places the sun cannot go. That is important.

When you embrace the dark Goddess in yourself, she can open the door that will allow the illumination of the sun into this unconscious region. The sun, goes to the dawn and to the noonday, and sets for its time of rest. In the underworld, in your unconscious mind, the Goddess holds the mirror that lets you see from the reflection of the sun. The sun can not go in to the unconscious by itself.

In other words, you can't go into your own unconscious regions without your own acceptance of your own divine feminine nature. That is why in many traditions you would never see a male deity without a female consort. You never saw one without the other until you got into our day and time and now you see it everywhere. It was a recognition of the alchemical aspect. It was a recognition of the balance aspect. The white Goddess in the Christian tradition is Mary, the virginal Goddess.

Now again the stereotypical implication is she has not been touched and she is not tainted. When we talk about the white Goddess we talk about the initiation into the mysteries. It implies a level of mastery. It implies that as you begin the path of the mysteries that you and the black Goddess have danced enough dances that you're not stepping on each other's feet all the time. Still probably some, but it implies that there is a harmony between you and the black Goddess.

In other words there is a harmony between you and you. Because what happens for most of us is that when we begin this path, and remember occult simply means hidden, what happens? All your stuff comes up in your face. It is not being done to you. It is something in you. If you're committed to this you will persevere. So the aspect of the white Goddess is an aspect again in which we begin, it is not that we leave behind the dark Goddess, you have a different relationship with her. You begin to integrate her. With the white aspect of the Goddess is when you are beginning the ascent back. But again you're beginning the ascent back with the dark Goddess.

You're taking her with you and yes there is a transformation that occurs. So the white Goddess is the Goddess that takes us on the path of ascent. We have been in this world of form because the ultimate gift is the gift of experiences. And the black Goddess has enriched our lives with all sorts of experiences. The black Goddess is the part of us that is our emotional nature and our physical nature. So we begin this aspect, this dance with the white Goddess.

Now as we know, the white Goddess that was presented to us in the form of Mary was an aspect that was presented as standing alone. In other words, we have Mary, who portrays the white Goddess but we have her portrayed as never having been a dark Goddess. She couldn't have a body if she wasn't related to the dark Goddess. Mary Magdalene is often seen as a dark Goddess. We see an aspect of the separation of the sexuality from that of the white Goddess, the virginal Goddess.

There was a rite that was celebrated at the summer solstice, the land was considered owned by women. The rite was that the purpose of the male was to fertilize the land so they had a sacred union and it was usually done on a hill, the seven steps leading with the eight being the marriage bed and the High Priestess of the land and the King would come together. This was part of the mysteries. The land was feminine and was considered under the control of women. When things are grown on the land you make money, the cattle are fed and the people are fed. So whoever had the larger land had more power. In time the balance was lost. By that time we were no longer nomadic. We had grown into an agricultural community.

It is a myth the Goddess ruled during the agricultural time. The need to own came out of the agricultural community. People staying in places longer, then ownership became a key issue. The land became a political and economic issue. Now there are many would say this shift was disempowering. But this unfoldment has been very necessary and very appropriate. It is very easy to go to an emotionally loaded place in the end of this Piscean age.

We have to remember we all participated in this. We have to remember that emotion is the fuel for our jet but it is not the jet. If that fuel is not contained and focused and it gets spilled out everywhere and is ignited, guess who gets burned. Part of our charge and those who are walking the path of the mysteries is to be responsible with that of what we hold in these understandings because there can be a lot of judgment that results in anger and rage. In some cases this anger and rage is directed at men, particularly these perceived to be in a position of power. It is misplaced when it is directed there.

Men did not do anything to the Goddess that women did not at one time or another also do. In fact, much is a result of us not leaving from the dark goddesses as women and also as men because she knows power. She knows the truth of power and she too in her perfection is going so she gives us the gift of the recognition. We in a sense had to make a different relationship with ourselves as physical beings.

Perhaps we need to look at this from the standpoint of if we had indeed a Mary in our Christian system that was recognized for who she was and as an initiate, as a woman comfortable in form and formlessness, as one who loved on all levels to the depths of the depths, to the heights of the heights in the way of the truth. Perhaps we would have not learned the lessons of this age that we have needed to learn for we were not as her. We were not as her, for she came and was picked by the Lords of Light.

We on the other hand perhaps needed to have an icon that said, you have to have a different relationship with yourself in form and maybe you do need to distance yourself for a little while in terms of your physical nature and your emotional nature. Maybe you do need to aspire for awhile, a couple of thousand years or so to a place where you develop a different relationship with your sensuality, your sexuality, your emotional self, your physical self.

Perhaps that was another manifestation of Sophia and we in our arrogance think we see and then we judge. Sophia has never left. Another term that is associated with Sophia is the Shekinah. Some say that it was the Shekinah who went before the Ark of the Covenant. And the Shekinah is depicted as the fiery cloud. And the Shekinah struck down anything that got in the way of this ark, Because remember we're talking again of the Wisdom aspect. We're taking about wisdom being that which nurtures and that which destroys.

That which creates and that which has the prerogative to destroy its creation. And yet the Shekinah was also cut out of the space of recognition. There are only a relative few mystical rabbis who will talk of the Shekinah. But in general the belief that came was to discuss the Shekinah, as being equal to God was dangerous. So we have the Shekinah which is another aspect of the White Goddess.

The White Goddess is in her ascent. She is taking all that has been experienced in form, taking the essence of experience and Goddess is leading to a new level of wisdom. And then the next step is that of the Red Goddess. And for those of you, who have ever studied any of the Rosicrucian doctrine when the sacred marriage is discussed, that is the Red Goddess. Because there is one thing consistently present when we talk about the white Goddess. The white Goddess is separated from her consort, the masculine half. The call for the ascent, the return is a result for the longing for wholeness.

I've gone down, I've splintered into thousands of different forms, as the dark goddesses it's wonderful to experience all of these things, to experience love, to experience hate, to experience wealth, to experience poverty, to experience. But I'm gathering all of these experiences now and I've gathered them back into wholeness and I long for wholeness. And that is the experience of the White Goddess, the White Goddess longs for wholeness. And what is mirrored to us is we see Mary without a bridegroom and we see the Shekinah left alone in the desert because she was too hot to handle.

What is interesting is that for those of you, who have ever done any research about the ark is that when the Shekinah was abandoned, the ark was killing anything and everything including the carriers. If indeed we look at the ark as being the implication, that it carries the masculine aspect, if you do not have wisdom and you just have this raw power of whirling, this aspect of creation that is the flowing and you don't have the container.

What happened when we said Jesus cannot be conceived as having a consort? What happened when we said there is God the Father and God the Son, but not God the Mother? The implication was that one polarity can stand alone. The Shekinah is sometimes represented by the dove. There was a relationship between the Shekinah and Jesus. The Shekinah was very much present and part of the initiation process. But in the outer world the message was one can stand alone. One energy can stand alone without the other.

The aspect of the Red Goddess is the joining of the two pillars. She has her consort. It is the sacred marriage that is the Red Goddess. That is not an external, by the way, that is internal. That is when the two become one and something else still. She is depicted as red because she is fire. The Red Goddess is often seen as fire, the inner fire. Remember, I referred to earlier, the fire of friction we needed to get out of the group mind so we could create a little more friction in our lives. The fire of friction, that is one of the aspects of being in the material world.

The gift of the Black Goddess is friction because in friction we grow. The solar fire is the fire of illumination. The solar fire is that of the White Goddess. Then we have the electrical fire. It is the fire of the Red Goddess, for she has joined with her consort and she is one. She is one, that is the Red Goddess. Fire in the morning, stellar fire. Well let's talk a little bit about the fact that we have Lucifer who is called the Light Bearer. We also have the Goddess who has aspects of the Light Bearer. The common thread. Because you see there is one thing that the Goddess and Lucifer have in common. Which is that they came to free humanity. And what this story tells us is that it is through the gift of knowledge, and therefore choice that we grow.

We had to develop a sense of self if we were going to grow. Our destiny is to indeed be the gods and goddesses, to be beyond the gods and goddesses, to be the One. To return to the One. But we can't do that without knowledge, which becomes wisdom and then beyond to illumination. So yes, give me that apple; give me a case of them. She did offer to Adam the gift of knowledge.

The Goddess offers us all the gift of knowledge. Because knowledge opens the door to freedom. We have images of the Goddess that are often also associated with Lucifer, such as the snake, fire, the Seductive Lilith (the women before Eve who turned into a demon because of her rebellious nature) and uncleanness of menstruation blood. And the reason we need to be very comfortable with these images associate with the Goddess and our own relationship with the Goddess stories is because what I am asking you to do is to embrace yourselves as the Goddess as well as God. And you cannot do that if there is a part of you that's saying get that snake tail off me. Love that snake tail.

The Goddess if often depicted with some sort of tail, in a snake form. I would like to talk more about the Red Goddess. What does it mean for the Goddess to join with her consort? Who is the consort? It's because the whole implication is that there is that place where self and no-self merge. That's the mystical marriage. That is when the aspects we call us are transformed into a different level. What is the next step in the relationship of thinking? Why is it a benefit to have a sense of self and simultaneously have a holographic way of perceiving thinking? Because you have a sense of self and operating simultaneously from a sense of group and a sense of essential self at a different level.

So let's talk about this sense of self, this way of thinking that holds a sense of self. Right now for most of us our sense of self is very much associated with a sense of self that identifies with what we look like or what we wear. It is transitory and changes from year to year and lifetime to lifetime. What I'm talking about here is that of Self when you have joined in that place of greater identification and unity with the One.

You have access to the greater picture but what is it you identify within as your sense of self at this time? Is that the bigger picture? How about Spirit? Because what I'm talking about your sense of self as self has to be flexible. People that access the higher realms can go mad. What is the missing component? When we open up to a wider field of energy, however we want to put that, we have to have an anchor.

If your anchor is solidified to me, me, me, you're never going to open. You have flexibility and yet a sense of identification. And the only way that can be is when you identify yourself with Spirit and you have to simultaneously embrace the Dark Goddess because if not, guess what you're going to do? You are not going to stay connected with the form world. You must also know yourself as the white Goddess as you ascend to the unseen world and prepare to be as the red Goddess as move through the alchemical process for the sacred union.