This month’s Goddess is Isis, the Egyptian Goddess of rebirth and femininity. She is a strong symbol of female empowerment; in fact she taught women how to grind corn, weave cloth, spin flax, and even tame men enough to be lived with. She was the first-born daughter of Geb and Nut, the Goddess of the overreaching sky and God of the Earth, respectively. Some myths say that Isis is the daughter of Ra instead. She taught her people how to read and the skill of agriculture. She is also regarded as a Goddess of Medicine and Wisdom.
Isis became the most powerful of all the Egyptian deities, with power even over Ra. Ra was an uncaring deity at this time, and many humans suffered under his rule. Seeing Ra’s lack of caring, Isis mixed a bit of his saliva with mud which created a poisonous snake that soon bit him. This poison caused Ra to suffer greatly, and Isis offered to cure him should he want the cure. Isis explained to him that the only way for the cure to work was for Ra to give her his true, secret name. Ra was taken aback for this would give her ultimate and complete power over him, as well as power over life and death. Caught in a corner, Ra agreed, giving Isis his true name in a whisper, and, with it, he gave her power over life and death itself. Keeping her end of the bargain, she used her magic to heal Ra and gave him relief from his suffering.
Another story of her immense powers has to do with her dead husband Osiris. Shortly after the murder of her husband, Isis set out to give her husband Osiris a proper burial. Her search took her to Phoenicia where she met the queen, Astarte. Not recognizing Isis as a goddess, Astarte hired Isis as a nursemaid to tend to her son, the infant prince. Having become fond of the prince, Isis decided she would make the child a God through magic. The ritual she did included holding the child over a fire which is when Astarte came into the room, breaking the ritual. When Astarte demanded an explanation, Isis showed her true self and explained her quest for Osiris’s body. Astarte realized what Isis was looking for and led her to the beautiful box that Seth had used to entrap and drown Osiris. Hiding the body in the Nile delta, Isis began the trip to Egypt for a proper burial.
Seth, however, found out, and cut the body into pieces, scattering them. He expected crocodiles to eat the pieces so Osiris could not be revived. Isis went out to find the pieces of her fallen husband and used her magic to reform him (save for one piece which she never found). She brought him back to life, and, as they lay there, their son Horus was conceived.
There are many other stories of both Isis and her husband, Osiris. I hope you’ll take a bit of time to research further. Research and knowledge are the hallmark of all Pagans in all their forms so be sure to check them out!
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Featured Goddess: Isis
The Pagan Gamer