INANNA - LADY OF LOVE AND WAR, QUEEN OF HEAVEN AND EARTH, HOLY PRIESTESS OF HEAVEN, THE MORNING AND EVENING STAR
3.3 THE COURTSHIP OF INANNA AND DUMUZI
The third part of the Cycle of Inanna is the Courtship of Inanna and Dumuzi. There, we meet the young goddess as the Lover and Beloved united as one. The Courtship deals with Inanna and Dumuzi as they meet and fall in love with each other to become one of the most passionate and vibrant couples in world myth and religion. Perhaps only Solomon and Sheba in the Song of Songs can approach the Sumerian spontaneity and exuberance of Inanna and Dumuzi, and it is very likely that the Sumerian composition is the inspiration for Solomon´s Song of Songs. There are more than twenty-plus compositions celebrating Inanna and Dumuzi, it preceeds the Song of Songs and The Courtship can be said to be the most beloved and well-known love story of ancient Mesopotamia, therefore known to Jewish sages and poets. Thus, we can assume thus with a degree of certainty that it was the source for Solomon´s love song to Sheba. In what follows, we will review in brief the main stages of the courtship for your delight:
a) Inanna and Utu and the Bridal Sheets - It is in the beginning of Springtime and nature a feast of colors, smells, growth and renewal when Inanna, the young Sumerian goddess of love and war, meets and falls in love with Dumuzi, the mortal shepherd of royal lineage. Utu, the Sun God and Inanna's brother comes to tell her that the land is in full bloom, and that a piece of linen is always needed, so he will bring some flax for her. A delightful dialogue follows, where Inanna, full of curiosity, asks Utu who will ret, spin, dye, weave and bleach the cloth for her sheets. Finally, bursting with eagerness, the young goddess finds courage to ask The Real Question she wanted to know:
"Brother, when you have brought it to me already bleached, who will go to bed with me? Who will go to bed with me?"
Utu replies that she will lie with Dumuzi, the mortal shepherd, of the offspring of a king. Inanna first rejects Dumuzi, argueing that the shepherd´s garments and wool are coarse, and that She will marry the farmer instead, the one who tends to her storehouses and grains. My interpretation is that Inanna, first of all, represents the Sumerian urban elite that comes from a rural background and needs to integrate the herding shepherds in society and nobility. Utu defends the choice of Dumuzi to no avail. Only when Dumuzi himself comes to Inanna and enummerates his qualities in comparison to the farmer, affirming that his lineage is as holy as Inanna's, the young goddess accepts him in full. This passage can be seen as the young goddess´ veiled request to encourage Dumuzi to "prove himself worthy of Her". The message is that there are outer material and inner emotional expectations to be met on both sides by any and every relationship, and the fencing groud of the first encounters may well lead to the 10,000 ways of asking and replying:
" How do I love thee?
Let me count the ways..."
b) Inanna and Ningal - next Inanna runs to Ningal, her mother, for advice on how to proceed towards Dumuzi, how she should get ready for him. We meet therefore Inanna´s mother, who acts as the female initiator of the young goddess in the mysteries of femininity. The choice of words in the poem are bathing, robing herself, dowry, the lapis lazuli necklace and the seal in her hand. Bathing is self-explanatory, but the following actions carry more meaning. Anointing oneself is a sacred act, because oil contains the four elements (Air, Water, Earth and Fire), thus seen as the ritual blessing of the body. Clothes represent the Outer Garment we present to the world, and Inanna chooses wisely the royal robe of a young goddess who knows herself well. The dowry may represent the riches she brings to the outer and inner relationship with the beloved, the lapis beads, which lay exactly on the throat chakra, the power of words to captivate. Finally, Inanna takes the seal in her hand, her authority, inner and outer, to meet her promissed bridegroom. And throughout this time Dumuzi is made to wait for her, and we can guess he is also getting ready to meet the young goddess, but nothing is said about his actions. We know, nevertheless, that Anu, the Skyfather, covered himself with the velvet mantle of the firmament and the stars before he descended to Earth to mate with Ki in another myth.
Again, we have Inanna as a maiden, lovingly initiated by her close family members, as befitted to any girl (and boy) who is loved and well cared for her (his) family.
c) The first encounters - From the moment Inanna and Dumuzi first meet and fall for each other, the lovers enter a world of senses and feelings that explodes in color and emotions around them. What they experience is a world that is vibrant and alive, full of meaning in which they totally engage themselves. This process is described in verses that speak of simple things the lovers do together, like drinking, eating, churning, dancing, singing, tasting, smelling, everyday acts whereby both open up to each other, willing to share everything and everywhere in all worlds they thread upon.
As Inanna and Dumuzi meet and experience their own world in the world, the similarities with Solomon's and Sheba´s Song of Songs become more startling in structure and meaning. This is not surprising: Jewish sages probably found inspiration to write their Song of Songs in the Courtship. Numbers speak for themselves: the Song of Songs is the only romantic-erotic piece in the Old Testament Bible, whereas we have hundreds of clay tablets in cuneiform with songs of divine love preceeding the Song of Songs by a couple of centuries at least.
d) The Consecration of the Sacred King - after the close complicity of the night spent with Dumuzi, Inanna decrees the fate of her chosen consort and priest-king, because because "in all ways" She found him " fit" and "Inanna holds you dear". It must be pointed out that in South Mesopotamia, after kingship descended from the avens to Eridu, it is Inanna and Enlil who descend to Earth to choose and crown the king, as described in the myth of Etana. It is Inanna (or her earthly representative, the High Priestess of Uruk/the land) again in the Courtship that decrees the fate of the king/Dumuzi. This is a very strong evidence that at least the High Priestess was equal in status to the king, once he had to be first accepted by her to rule the land as her consort. The words that consecrate the king spoken by Inanna are the following:
'In battle, I am your leader
In combat, I am your armour-bearer
In the assembly, I am your advocate
n the campaign, I am your inspiration
You, the chosen shepherd of the holy shrine
You, the king, the faithful provider of Uruk,
You, the light of An's great shrine
In all ways you are fit
To hold your head high on the lofty dais
To sit on the lapis lazuli throne
To cover your head with the holy crown
To wear long clothes on your body
To bind yourself with the garment of kingship
To race on the road with the holy sceptre in your hand
And the holy sandals on you feet
You, the sprinter, the chosen shepherd
In all ways I find you fit
May your heart enjoy long days.
That which An determined for you - may it not be altered
That which Enlil has granted - may it not be altered
You are the favourite of Ningal
Inanna holds you dear.'
Then comes Ninshubur, Inanna´s main advisor, who in this context represents the people´s acknowledgement of Dumuzi´s sacred kingship conferred by Inanna. She takes Dumuzi by the hand and together they go to Inanna. Ninshubur says:
In combat, I am your armour-bearer
In the assembly, I am your advocate
n the campaign, I am your inspiration
You, the chosen shepherd of the holy shrine
You, the king, the faithful provider of Uruk,
You, the light of An's great shrine
In all ways you are fit
To hold your head high on the lofty dais
To sit on the lapis lazuli throne
To cover your head with the holy crown
To wear long clothes on your body
To bind yourself with the garment of kingship
To race on the road with the holy sceptre in your hand
And the holy sandals on you feet
You, the sprinter, the chosen shepherd
In all ways I find you fit
May your heart enjoy long days.
That which An determined for you - may it not be altered
That which Enlil has granted - may it not be altered
You are the favourite of Ningal
Inanna holds you dear.'
Then comes Ninshubur, Inanna´s main advisor, who in this context represents the people´s acknowledgement of Dumuzi´s sacred kingship conferred by Inanna. She takes Dumuzi by the hand and together they go to Inanna. Ninshubur says:
'My queen, here is the choice of your heart
The king, your beloved bridegroom
May he spend long days in the sweetness of your holy loins
Give him a favourable and glorious reign!
O my Queen of Heaven and Earth
Queen of all the Universe
May he enjoy long days in the sweetness of your holy loins!
Give him a favorable and glorious reign,
Grant him the king´s throne, firm in its foundations.
Grant him the shepherd´s staff of judgement,
Grant him the enduring crown with the radiant and noble diadem.
From where the sun rises to where the sun sets,
From South to North
From the Upper Sea to the Lower Sea,
From the land of the hulupu tree to the land of the cedar,
Let his shepherd´s staff protect all of Sumer and Akkad..."
e) The final verses of the Courtship tell us of the delight the couple found in each other, and I will leave you with the words of Inanna:
Inanna spoke:
" My beloved, the delight of my eyes, met me.
We rejoiced together.
He took his pleasure of me.
He brought me into his house.
He laid me down on the fragrant honey-bed,
My sweet love, leying by my heart,
Tongue-playing, one by one,
My fair Dumuzi did so fifty times."...
3.3.1 A NOTE ON INANNA AS THE HIERODULE
I have discussed the role of the priestesses of Inanna/Ishtar as the Hierodule or Sacred Prostitute in detail in The Mystery of Sacred Prostitution, Shamhat here in Ladies... and in a myth retelling called The Priestess and Enkidu. Therefore I would kindly ask you to refer to these files. Nevertheless, as much of the bad press targeted to Inanna/Ishtar is based on Her persona as a Love Goddess, it is worth making the following remarks:
a) the language that refers to the sacred service of the body to the divine seen in the worshiper by a priestess of Inanna/Ishtar is in general to say the least depreciative displaying the split between mind-body-spirit that has plagued Western thought for the last 2,000 years;
b) the text that is frequently invoked to justify Inanna´s/Ishtar´s terrifying behavior towards Her ex-lovers is Tablet 6 of the Epic of Gilgamesh, when the king of Uruk rejects to be the goddess´ consort in the Sacred Rite saying that Inanna reserved a fate worse than death to Her former consorts. I have discussed this point elsewhere, but because of its importance I will refer to my interpretation of this passage: i) first of all, Gilgamesh is not an authority himself in matters of the heart or courting ladies. In the first Tablet of the Epic, he is consistently rude and did not treat either young girls or ladies the way befitted to a sacred king, so how could he act as one in Tablet 6? ii) Gilgamesh expresses a purely male-centered point of view towards the Divine Feminine in Inanna/Ishtar, and let me remind you that Love Goddesses cannot be possessed, as all Great Gifts are. Love, like Wisdom or Laughter, cannot be possessed, because they belong to all, and should be seen as Eternal Flow in all worlds and spheres. Inanna did not transform Her former lovers in their beastly selves: they did it to themselves the moment jealously they wanted to possess Love for themselves and not to serve Her as the worshiper.
Thus, Inanna/Ishtar is not truly a man-eater or a disgrace for those who love Her well and keep doing so. It is important to remark that according to Mary Wakeman ( In: Ancient Sumer and the Women's Movement: The Process of Reaching Behind, Encompassing, and Going Beyond." Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion 1985, pages 7-27), around 2,600 Before Common Era, temple power passed from entu (priestess) to en (priest), meaning that the en priest acquired political importance to become something of a ruler. This is probably the time when temple power changed from Uruk to Nippur because of the increased incidence of war. Uruk, as we all know, is Inanna´s city, whereas Nippur is Enlil´s. The Uruk system, where the ruler was still chosen by Inanna conflicted with these new northern attitudes, thus Her negative appearance in the Epic of Gilgamesh.
c) Clearly, Inanna/Ishtar does not belong to the domestic domain, but to the World Soul of Mesopotamia. As She is never the suffering mother or the sexless bride She does not fit in the agendas of post-Mesopotamian creeds, therefore having been subjected to one of the vilest persecutions the Divine has ever suffered in world religion.
All this to taint Her triumphant image as the Lover and Beloved, which, nevertheless, could never be suppressed and comes to life vibrant and passionate especially in the Courtship of Inanna and Dumuzi. Let it be said that there are many more sources that show us the radiant face of the goddess instead of the doom to the male of the species. Based on the above, I am delighted to affirm that it is the face of the Lover and Beloved united as One that prevailed in Mesopotamia.
3.4 THE HEROIC FEMININE: INANNA AND EBIH, THE DESCENT AND ENHEDUANNA´S POEMS
3.4.1 CHOICE OF TERMINOLOGY
Mesopotamian scholarship stumbles very much at loss when considering Inanna as the Goddess of both Love and War. This is not surprising because to understand how Love and War relate to each other, once they are the two faces of the same coin, one needs to go beyond all dualities and contemplate the complementarity of a wholer soul, something that is indeed a mighty task due to the dichotomies enforced by major fundamentalist world religions in the last 2,000 years at least. Mesopotamian worldview was centered on wholeness, whereas post-Mesopotamian reasoning and philosophy is based on irreconcilable pairs of opposites. To provide a wholer understanding of Inanna´s/Ishtar´s warrior nature, I decided to use the term the Heroic Feminine in Mesopotamia and will proceed to provide the reasons for the choice of terminology. The idea is to go beyond the paradoxes posed by scholarship when interpreting the goddess as a warrior by choosing a term that is both martial and faithful to Inanna´s character in the myths where She takes the heroic role.
Think with me: firstly, love is the energy of creation, the force that allows life to manifest. War is the denial of life, because it destroys the fabric of creation, it brings with it death and disunion. Now, to understand Love in its fullness, it is necessary to know its complete Loss, and this is the meaning of War. Contemplate the frailty of the Sumerian city-estates as described in the Lamentations to destroyed cities, for example, and you will perhaps start to understand what I am implying: love, order and fruition as the polar opposite/complement to war, chaos and destruction, and perhaps it is going to be easier to understand why the Great Goddess of Love is also the Goddess of War in Mesopotamia. The Land Between the Two Rivers had no physical barriers against the constant flood of invaders, and there was rivalry between city-states on top of everything.
Secondly, remember that Sumerians in special were farmers, that "the baskets built the cities (myth of the Creation of the Pickax). Farming and agriculture need peace and order to survive. Inanna, according to Thorkild Jacobsen is associated to the power of the storehouses relating to Inanna´s marriage to Dumuzi in the Second Millennium Before Common Era (Treasures of Darkness, 1976). Early on in the history of Uruk, the primary economic base was in dates, and while Dumuzi was the date harvest, Inanna was the storehouse of the dates as the Lady of the Date Clusters. Because of Her relation to the storehouse, which eventually covered wool, meat and grain, Inanna´s symbols were the reed bundle and the rolled up screen of the gate of the storehouse. Thus, it seems logical that as the patroness of the fruits of the land, Inanna had to protect them against the conflicts, because the fruits of man´s labors on earth are also one of the most coveted bounties of war. This may be very well the reason why Jacobsen in Treasures of the Darkness (1976) says that other lands feared Her and that battle was the "dance of Inanna". There is another reference quoted by Jacobsen (1970) that says that the function of young, unmarried women was to go out to the battlefield and encourage the warriors to fight if not with praise, with taunts and jeering.
Thirdly, Inanna´s warrior aspect was an important feature of the work of Enheduanna, the royal princess and high priestess of Ur, daughter of Sargon of Akkad, who is also acknowledged as the first author in world literature and whose work was fundamental to establish Inanna´s importance as a Great Goddess in Mesopotamia. Enheduanna´s poems tell of Inanna as the Lady of a Myriad Offices and the heroic warrior goddess who defeats the enemies and is the doom to those who attack the lands of Sumer and Akkad. Inanna is described therefore as "a ferocious lion, who makes the enemy silence and opens the Door of Battle, the Wise One of Heaven, Inanna" (from The Sumerian Temple Hymns compiled by Enheduanna. We will analyse some of Enheduanna´s poems below.
Based on the above, we choose the Heroic Feminine to define Inanna´s warrior nature as more encompassing and appropriate to the context of the Mespotamian greatest and most beloved goddess.
3.4.2 INANNA AND EBIH
This myth was first published by Stephen Langdon and Edward Chiera in 1934, as stated by Kramer in Sumerian Mythology. It is composed on similar lines as the songs of Enheduanna praising the courage, resourcefulness and valor of Inanna as the fearless warrior and champion of the land, and may reflect the political events in the later part of Sargon´s reign, when the empire unified by Sargon struggled to maintain its unity. There is also an astrological interpretation for this myth which relate it to the temporary disappearance of Venus "behind the mountain" during the cycle of the year.
The myth tells us that how the goddess defeats the rebellious kur (mountain, country) Ebih, who refused to acknowledge Inanna´s superiority. She first appears as the "maiden", magnificent and coming forth like the Sun God, the great child of Suen, who fearlessly walks throughout the land and the mountains, and who demands to be respected by her brilliance and deeds by all. Ebih refuses to do so, therefore presenting itself to the Goddess as a rebelious land. Inanna does not feel intimidated and ascends to the Heights to ask for An´s approval to destroy Ebih. The Skyfather warns the young goddess that this might be a task much too great for her to engage in. But Inanna trusts her capability to pass through Ebih´s terror and fear, advancing step by step, fully garbed and fearlessly roaring like thunder. This way Inanna thus imposes her victory on Ebih.
3.4.3 THE DESCENT OF INANNA
Pagan Dawn, Samhain 1994, Revised September 1999
From the Great Above She opened Her ears to the Great Below
From the Great Above the Goddess opened Her ears to the Great Below
From the Great Above Inanna opened Her ears to the Great Below
My Lady abandoned heaven and earth to descend to the Underworld...
She abandoned Her office of Holy Priestess to descend to the Underworld
She gathered together the Measures of Heavenly and Earthly Powers
She took them into Her hands
With the Measures of Heavenly and Earthly Powers
She prepared HerSelf...
Inanna set out to the Underworld (1)
These are the haunting opening lines of the first full account of a Descent to the Underworld, the Descent of Inanna, recorded in clay tablets around 3,000 Before Common Era in cuneiform writing. This myth is a heroic epic journey to the Land of the Dead, centered on the confrontation between two goddesses, Inanna, the Queen of Heaven and Earth, and Ereshkigal, the Queen of the Underworld of Mesopotamia. To better apprehend the depth of this great myth, it is going to be broken down into the following sections:
a) The Call - Inanna's descent starts when she opens her ears to the Great Below. Until then, the young goddess´ understanding of life's mysteris is limited, because as the Queen of Heaven and Earth, she lacks the knowing of the Underworld, the Inner Reality that gives sustenance to everything there is and restores balances lost. Inanna also does not know Death and Rebirth, the other side of Life and Fertility She embodies in HerSelf. Thus Inanna readies herself for a Journey She might not get back from. First, the goddess gathers the Measures of Earthly and Divine Powers, next she visits her temples (prepare herself spiritually and mentally) and finally instructs her faithful vizir Ninshubur to set up a lamentation for her with the Great Gods in case she did not return in three days. Only then Inanna starts the Descent.
At the first gate to the Underworld, she is asked by the gatekeeper why She had come:
'Because of my older sister Ereshkigal,'she replies, 'Her husband, Gugulanna, the Bull of Heaven, has died. I came to witness the funeral rites'(2).
Inanna's response anticipates the mystery which is going to happen. She came to visit Ereshkigal, the Great Goddess of the Underworld, and witness the funeral rites of Ereshkigal's husband, who died recently.
A note on the meaning of the term sister, which is how Inanna defines her kinship to Ereshkigal. Sister or brother are terms of endearment that do indicate kinship, but not necessarily on a direct line as far as ancient texts are concerned. Ereshkigal is indeed much older than Inanna, belonging to the generation of gods who were born in the beginnings of Creation. In Sumer, life started with Nammu the Sea, who gave birth to An the Sky and Ki the Earth. Ereshkigal is daughter of Nammu the Sea and An the Skyfather, sister of Enki, the God of Magic and of Sweet Waters. She received the Underworld for her domain in the first days of creation, and there reigns as the All-Powerful Sovereign. Inanna belongs to a further generation of gods and goddesses, as the daughter of Nanna, the Moon God and Ningal, who is fathered by Enki. Sister in this context therefore means "equal to me in all levels, kin".
Secondly and fundamental to capture the depth of this great myth is to understand the complex character of Ereshkigal. As twin sister of Enki, the God of Magic, Wisdom and the Sweet Waters, Ereshkigal is both Enkips and Inanna´s Complement. What Enki knows in the Outer, Ereshkigal knows in the Inner, as well as Ereshkigal means the Inner Knowing of Death and Rebirth Inanna still has to conquer to become wholer. Inanna, on the other hand, brings the Lust and Enthusiasm for Life Ereshkigal should retrieve after being so long on her own in the bowels of the earth. Therefore, Inanna and Ereshkigal are bonded to each other, and their confrontation epitomizes the search for wholeness and integration of the conflicting aspects of the Self. Only Inanna can bring the riches of the Worlds Above to Ereshkigal, and only Ereshkigal can give Inanna the trials and experiences that will provide her with the Inner Realities that Sustain Life and Restore Balances lost in all levels.
b) Initiation - Ereshkigal allows Inanna's entrance to her domain on the condition that at each of the seven gates of the Underworld Inanna leaves one of her heavenly and earthly powers. Seven are the classical planets, seven are the degrees of initiation that Inanna must relinquish so that She can be reborn. Inanna first protests, but then bows heroically to the designs of the Underworld. She surrendered her role of Queen, Priestess and Lover, for only bowed low and naked Inanna could enter Eternity and face her darker Self and sister Ereshkigal. Ereshkigal strikes Inanna dead. Inanna is then left to rot hanging on the wall.
This is one of the highlights of this great myth. The Descent is the only account where a divine being experiments death as dissolution and decay to be reborn afterwards. Nevertheless, Inanna's death means that She is reborn in Ereshkigal. While Inanna rots hanged on the wall, Ereshkigal moans as a woman in labour. Thus, Inanna is both Ereshkigal's kinswoman, daughter and healer, so much as Ereshkigal is Inanna's Older, Wiser Self, Mother, Challenger and Initiator.
After three days, Inanna's faithful vizir, Ninshubur, pleads before the Great Gods of Sumer on behalf of Inanna. The Great Gods are Nanna, the Moon God and Inanna's father, Enlil, the Air God and Enki, the God of Wisdom. Ninshubur asks for Inanna's return. Only Enki, the God of Wisdom, Magic and of the Sweet Waters intercedes and takes action. It is so because only Enki can understand the full extent of Inanna's existence to all worlds, and only he can figure out the need for both Inanna and Ereshkigal have for each other. Without Inanna the land is barren, there is no love, poetic musing, laughter and daring. However, Enki does understand the need Inanna has for Ereshkigal's Inner Wisdom. Enki then creates from the dirt of his fingernails twin creatures endowed with empathy, capable of mirroring Ereshkigal's loneliness, her deep and unacknowledged emotions.
c) Compassion - The creatures descend to meet Ereshkigal, now moaning in labour. As she moans, they moan with her. The Dark Queen's anguish is then appeased, because She was shown concern as never before. Indeed, perhaps this is the mistake Inanna made when she failed to ask Ereshkigal the Question of All Questions, the one all initiates come across under so many forms in a lifetime. In Inanna's case, the Question could have been phrased in the following manner: "Sister, what ails thee and what can I do to relieve thy suffering?".
Ereshkigal asks the two creatures what their wishes are, because She wants to show them gratitude for the empathy She was given. The creatures refuse anything for their own gain, but ask for Inanna's corpse instead. Ereshkigal concedes and they sprinkle Inanna's body with water and food of life. So is Inanna reborn.
Inanna now wishes to leave, but no one ascends from the Underworld unmarked. A part of Inanna must stay in the Depths too. Thus, She has to find someone to replace her. In other words, from now on Inanna cannot leave Ereshkigal neglected or abandoned. A passageway between the Great Above and the Great Below must be kept open.
Who should replace Inanna in the Underworld? The one closest to her heart, who nevertheless did not miss her at all during the three days of her ordeal in the Underworld, acting as Inanna had not been lost to Middle and Upperworlds for three days. Dumuzi, Inanna's consort in the Sacred Marriage, the Shepherd and King, was the only person who did not mourn for Her while She was undergoing her Underworld initiation. The land and the people cried for the Lady, but Dumuzi did not notice Her absence at all.
d) Return and Redemption - Inanna choses Dumuzi to replace her in the Underworld. The meaning of this bitter choice lies in the fact that Dumuzi needed to undergo his own Underworld initiation to learn about reciprocation, self-sacrifice and love that goes beyond death itself. It is important to point out that Ereshkigal was mourning the loss of her husband, Gugulanna, at that time too. Perhaps only Dumuzi, Inanna's partner, could heal Ereshkigal's better than anyone else. Secondly, Dumuzi had also to learn to bow low and forget his dellusions of self-importance. Indeed, He had to undertake his own journey of Inner Transformation so that he could be the Chosen of the Goddess and King of the Land in full measure.
There is another element of wholeness in the Descent of Inanna, and this lies in the fact that Dumuzi, a mortal man, does not undertake the Underworld initiation for the whole humankind alone. Throughout the myth of Inanna, of which the Descent is only one chapter, there is a wonderful interplay of male and female energies. Thus, the Inanna and her Soul-Sister Ereshkigal would not accept only a male as their sole initiates to represent humanity. A mortal woman called Geshtinanna, Dumuzi's sister, who is full of compassion and understanding enters the scene. Geshtinanna mourns for her brother and king, and thus touches Inanna's heart. Inanna then decides that half the year Dumuzi will go to the Underworld, and the other half Geshtinanna will take his place. While Dumuzi ascends, Geshtinanna descends, when she goes up to the Heights of the Middleworld, Dumuzi descends to meet Ereshkigal. Therefore, two mortals, a man and a woman, are made imortals and initiates of both Inanna and Ereshkigal. At the end of the myth, Inanna takes the hands of both Dumuzi and Geshtinanna and places them on the hands of Ereshkigal.
Therefore, the first full written account of a descent to the Underworld is the Descent of the Great Goddess Inanna, Goddess of Love and War of the Sumerians, later known as Ishtar, Ashtoreth, Astarte. She went down to the bowels of the Earth in a true initiatory journey, because She wanted to Know and so She Willed, Dared and Surrendered to the Process of Becoming, leaving behind who She thought She was. And why did She do that? We may ask ourselves. Because She trusted more than anything else WHO and WHAT She could Become.
Below, my favorite version of The Descent of Inanna
THE DESCENT OF INANNA
Source: Ishtar Rising, by Robert Anton Wilson
At the first Gate the guardian forced Inanna to surrender her sandals, which the wise men say symbolise Will. And at the second gate Inanna had to surrender her jeweled anklets - which the wise say means giving up Ego. And at the third gate She surrendered her robe, which is the hardest of all, because it means giving up Mind itself. And at the fourth Gate Ishtar surrendered her golden breastcups, which is giving up Sex role. And at the fifth gate She surrendered her necklace, which is giving up the rapture of Illumination. And at the sixth Gate she surrendered her earrings, which is giving up Magick. And finally, at the seventh gate, Inanna surrendered her thousand petalled crown, which is giving up Goddesshead.
It was only thus, naked, that Inanna could enter Eternity.
3.4.4 ENHEDUANNA´S WRITINGS AND INANNA
a) Hymnal Prayer of Enheduanna - The Adoration of Inanna of Ur (translated by Samuel Noah Kramer in The Ancient Near East: A new anthology of Texts and Pictures, edited by James A. Pritchard, 1975) - also known as The Exhaltation of Inanna, first translated from the cuneiform by Hallo and van Dijk in 1968. This is the most widely known work by Enheduanna, containing about 153 lines. It is carefully set up in a format of two column stanzas that can often be read down as well as across. The hymn begins with the description of the powers of Inanna naming Her by a myriad of epithets, where the goddess is hailed as equal to An, the Skyfather and senior Mesopotamian god, in power and authority. Hallo suggests that when Enheduanna implies Inanna's equality with An, she is in actual fact suggesting that the kings of the Sargonid dynasty haved adhered to the Sumerian norms and beliefs, having therefore achieved legitimacy to rule over Sumer and Akkad.
Next Enheduanna depicts Inanna as disciplining mankind as a goddess of battle. She thereby unites the warlike Akkadian Ishtar's qualities to those of the gentler Sumerian goddess of love and fecundity. She likens Inanna to a great storm bird who swoops down on the lesser gods and sends them fluttering off like surprised bats.
Then, in probably the most interesting part of the hymn, Enheduanna herself steps forward in the first person to recite her achievements, establishing her credibility, and explaining her present plight. She has been banished as high priestess from the temple in the city of Ur and from Uruk and exiled to the steppe. She begs the moon god Nanna to intercede for her because the city of Uruk, under the ruler Lugalanne, has rebelled against Sargon. The rebel, Lugalanne, a generic name for the local ruler, has even attempted to destroy the temple Eanna, in Uruk, one of the greatest temples in the ancient world. Further, he has dared to equate himself as an equal to the new high priestess and --in the most ancient recorded instant of sexual harassment-- made sexual advances to the high priestess, his sister-in-law, in this case probably Enheduanna herself.
In the last lines of the poem, Enheduanna recites the divine attributes, exalting the greatness of the goddess, who is equal in power with Anu, the supreme god of Mesopotamia. The hymn moves on to a passage "unique to Sumerian literature describing the process of poetic inspiration" (Hallo, Exaltation 62), where the poet-scribe characterizes her creative labors as giving birth, i.e. "conceiving the word." Then in the next stanza (lines 143-50) Enheduanna reverts to the third person as the simultaneous exaltation of Inanna and the restoration of Enheduanna are proclaimed. The concluding three-line doxology conveys the sense of the goddess and her poetess emerging triumphant.
Clearly, in The Adoration of Inanna of Ur there is a strong authorial presence that may be unmatched in ancient literary creation until the time of Sappho. She is self-consciously present in the process of writing and in the poem. The double "I" of the creatrix, Enheduanna and Inanna, are always at the center.
Personally, I find this poem extremely modern. All of us who work with integrity and passion for the retrieval of the ancient Mesopotamian Mysteries are committed to the restoration of the true Light of the goddess here and now. As such, we stand at the threshold of heaven and earth, communicating the wisdom of our soul ancestors as it were through all possible means, cyberspace inclusive, o the modern generations of priests, priestesses, magicians and sorceresses who will succeed us.
b) In-nin sa-gur-ra - Stout-hearted Lady - Assyriologists traditionally title works by their first line, hence the title In-nin sa-gur-ra. This work, translated by Ake Sjoberg, and using 29 texts and fragments, is published (1976) as "In-nin-sa-gur-ra: A Hymn to the Goddess Inanna by the en-Priestess Enheduanna." Although at 274 lines, it is the longest work so far discovered by Enheduanna it is much less complete than the translation of The Exaltation of Inanna. In all 57 lines are missing at important points in the composition. The text breaks off entirely at the point that Enheduanna steps forward: "I am Enheduanna, the en-Priestess of Nanna,......, I am the ... Of Nanna" (199). The Sjoberg translation does not begin again until line 243 with Enheduanna still speaking in the first person. When the text resumes Enheduanna still speaks of her own experience of punishment. The translator speculates her punishment may have been sent by Inanna to discipline Enheduanna: "'I have experienced your great punishment'... this statement clearly indicates that Enheduanna had offended the goddess who then had punished her" (163). In a footnote on the same page, he notes that another translation is possible. "'My body has experienced your great punishment,'"...referring to a disease sent against the en-Priestess by Inanna" (163). In any case, her apparent recovery must have occurred because she ends the hymn praising Inanna "My Lady, I will proclaim your greatness in all lands and your glory!"
The structure and rhethoric of the hymn is similar to The Exaltation. Both works move from an opening address of Inanna in third person to addressing her in second person. In both hymns there is a section exalting Inanna. Since almost the entire section of In-nin sa-gur-ra in which Enheduanna steps forward in first person are missing, 24 of the most important lines in the hymn, it cannot be compared to The Exaltation except to say that this section which is the most personal contains the reason that Enheduanna speaks to Inanna, why she writes the hymn. It is in this personal section, that Enheduanna seems to explain her motivation and her process. In The Exaltation, she adds her metacommentary that helps to illuminate the meaning of the hymn on a personal, psychological, and universal level. Finally, both works conclude with a doxology to the goddess, once more returning to the theme of exaltation.
c) The Temple Hymns - The Temple Hymns consist of 42 hymns of various lengths addressed to the temples of the most important Mesopotamian deities and cities. They were translated by Ake Sjoberg in collaboration with E. Bergmann, S.J. in 1969, and our source in Gateways for them comes from the excellent Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature of the Oxford University, United Kingdom. Each hymn follows the same form, directly addressing the temple in second or third person by describing it in epithetical statements. For example the first Temple Hymn opens by naming the main temple in Eridu, identifying it, naming the city and the god or goddess to whom it is dedicated. The narratives move from the outside structure of the temple to its inner meaning, where the temple is addressed in the second person as a living, sacred being, the main rites and holy objects it contains, and/or are characteristics to it.
At the conclusion of the Temple Hymns, Enheduanna steps forward and names herself as the compiler of the tablet, and that "(here) no one has created (before)" . We need to point out that the Temple Hymns contain hymns added later by other scribes, i.e. hymns to temples that did not exist at the time Enheduanna wrote. Thus, her original creation was one that scribes continued to amend after Enheduanna´s death.
d) Additional Works - there are two additional works translated by scholar Joan Goodnick Westenholz, one by Enheduanna that she apparently wrote on the assumption of the en-ship (office of high priestess) to the moon god Nanna. The second fragmentary work, dedicated to Enheduanna and apparently written by an anonymous scribe, indicates her apotheosis during or immediately after her death, according to Westenholz. Unfortunately, I have just secondary references on them.
She is shining
The en-priestess chosen for the pure "divine offices,"
Enheduanna
may the she bring you your prayer to the abzu.
The one who is worthy for Suen,
my delight/pride...
Summing up, Enheduanna´s voice in her poems and hymns sounds confident, strong and powerful, telling us of values that go beyond the aesthetics of accomplished scribal training. Indeed, it is her vision for Inanna the Warrior Goddess and the ideal of unity for Sumer and Akkad that the goddess is there to defend, protect and guard as a fierce lioness that still fill us with wonder. As Roberta Binkley pointed out, Enheduanna lived, composed, and taught roughly two-thousand years before Aristotle and seventeen-hundred years prior to Sappho, and that in in The Adoration of Inanna of Ur she tells her own story of banishment and her ultimate restoration to sacred office by Inanna. This specific hymn became part of the cultural myths of Sumeria, and for the next thousand years it existed as a component of the wisdom tradition of that civilization and the cultures that followed. The High Priestess´ voice sang of a heroic goddess, and the human poetess and follower of the Mysteries made of her life a vibrant song to mirror the warrior character of the goddess that was the closest to her soul.
The values that guided Enheduanna's life and literary works are the ones of Inanna, the Lady of the Myriad Offices who serves Her people, defends the land and makes available to the whole of creation the Divine Measures of Earthly and Heavenly Power. Again we find the vision of the articulated, powerful, passionate and heroic feminine that encompasses the Image of Transcending Humanity in Triumph that goes beyond Death.
As for me, I am 100% certain that Enheduanna´s light and dedication continues to be a wellspring of inspiration for all of us who trail the paths of the Mesopotamian Mysteries passing on the Torch she carried with such integrity and grace for the glory of Everlasting Babylon and the generations to come.
And here's an excerpt from a PDF book called, "The Wes Penre Papers":
"In Sitchin's work, Inanna is portrayed as a female warrior, who had an engulfing appetite for men and sex. She slept with anyone she could find who had a phallus, figuratively speaking, and even opened up a whore house, which she ran and participated in. To put it mildly, Sitchin did not put Inanna in a positive light. He even claimed that she killed her lovers after they had satisfied her and she was a merciless war goddess, whose main attention was on power and sex. This is probably where the myth of the 'Black Widow' is originally coming from. Black Widow, for those who don't know, is also a spider who eats her male after she is impregnated.
Anton Parks, on the other hand, tell another story than that of Sitchin's. Parks claims that Sitchin has misinterpreted the Sumerian texts, and that Inanna in fact supported the 'Cult of the Mother Goddess', as he calls it, and was therefore a rebel and hated by the patriarchal controllers of the Earth at the time. Her courage to openly practice the Religion of the Divine Feminine brought her singular reprisals from the 'gods' in the Mesopotamian texts, and also from the adepts of Yahvé of the Bible, who is a composite of many 'gods', mostly the Anunnaki Lord, Nammur (the Enlil), and King Anu."
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