"Hail Mary Magdalene, the Lord has wed thee.

Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb and Jesus. Holy Mary, mother of kings, give aid to us seekers now and in the hour of our need." ---The Hail Mary adapted by Linda Seekins, Honorary Order member

She is the Stuff of Legends & Heresies

Church "authorities" have long considered Mary Magdalene a dangerous woman. So dangerous, they purposely labelled her a prostitute and covered up her role in Yeshua's life. Her true role in Christianity as co-Teacher with Jesus has been at best, obscured, and at worst -- purposely obliterated. What

were/are they so afraid of?

Our Order works to honor and restore the Magdala, the Sacred Feminine, to her rightful place as part of the Godhead. We are following Yeshua and Magdala's true tradition, long suppressed, violently removed from mainstream Christianity, but always surviving just below the surface, in the esoteric, heretical fringe......

Come join us, be a part of the Return

The Order of Mary Magdala is open to both women and men. An esoteric Christian order, we study the true teachings, mystical techniques, meditations and prayers of Yeshua and Mary Magdalene. Yeshua's band had several prominent female disciples, whose names are mentioned right in the Bible (Luke 8). The Gnostic scriptures mention seven female students by name (Pistis Sophia). We refer to the Order sometimes as our "cloister" but that should not imply we are a bunch of nuns! Yeshua taught balance between the sexes and (scandalously!) accepted females into his school. He and Mary Magdalene embodied and manifested the archetypes of divine masculine and divine feminine united in the sacred marriage. The sacred marriage is a process that occurs in the subconscious mind as well as in the collective unconscious of humanity. Our Order of Mary Magdala teaches techniques that actualize these powerful archetypes, inner guides, divine "entities," and show you how to bring them into your life. Getting to know your inner guides, practicing wholeness, and the alchemy of the sacred marriage will transform your awareness and lead to the highest form of ecstasy or "bliss". The sacred marriage is working in our lives whenever we balance pairs of opposites: heart and head, male and female, light and dark, heaven and earth, conscious and unconscious, ego
and soul, spirit and matter. Symbols such as the Yin-Yang, Star of David and Sufism's Lock & Key represent the sacred marriage. You can even find the sacred marriage archetype in the Tarot deck -- the Lovers card.

You can't keep archetypes down -- they will re-manifest eventually During the Dark Ages, the memory of Mary Magdalene's prominent role in true Christianity was kept alive in various secret heresies and legends. In the Golden Legend and the Grail heresy Mary Magdalene was the Holy Grail that carried the blood of Jesus (in her womb in the form of their child). Then came the tarot deck and the traveling minstrels -- the "ministers" of the underground alternative Church. The entire Tarot deck was a vehicle for heretical teaching in the days when the Roman Catholic Church was opposed to any individual personally seeking the Divine. If the Church couldn't control it, they condemned it -- even condemning valid and profound spiritual techniques such as Kabbalah, automatic writing, and using Tarot's picture cards to access the archetypes, our inner guides. Mary Magdalene's name is listed first in the Gospels whenever women are mentioned. The Gnostic Gospel of Phillip calls her koinonos, meaning the "spouse" or "partner" of Jesus in two places. This same Gospel, suppressed by the Church, also describes a scene where several of Jesus' male students became jealous because "Jesus kissed her often on the mouth". Magdalene was in all likelihood Yeshua's wife, and we believe co-Savior with him.

She was a manifestation of the sacred feminine, perhaps the daughter of Sophia and God-the-Father. Sophia, goddess of wisdom, called God's Spouse, lives in the pages of the Old and New Testaments as well as the Apocrypha, especially in such books as Song of Solomon (also called Song of Songs or Canticles). Other names of God-the-Father's spouse are Asherah and Shekinah. Sophia is just another name for our Heavenly Mother even as God-the-Father is called Yahweh, and El, Adonai, Elohim, and El Shaddai. (El is the oldest name for him, the root of god-names like Allah and Michael).

God-the-Father and God-the-Mother both chose to incarnate the active principal of themselves upon the earth together in order to draw their created selves (all of us) back to Them. We are their kin, they are our Divine Creators. Pictured left is an intriguing work by artist Barbara Getrost. She has "married" many universal symbols in this work entitled, "Marriage of Heaven and Earth." We can see two Vesica Piscis (fish) shapes in the middle created by the overlapping circles. The arms of the divine figures seem to be moving upward in a gesture of creation, a purple star bursting where their wrists cross or hands join. The pyramids are nifty, too, as is the squaring of the circle, that ancient symbol of the hieros gamos (sacred marriage). The figures are either Mother and Father God or Magdalene and Jesus.

Mary Magdalene is a dangerous figure to Church "authorities" because she teaches individuals how to connect directly to the Divine without using priests and donations but rather by activating symbols and using spiritual techniques. She represents dangerous teachings such as the sacred marriage and sexuality as opposed to celibacy and virginity. Her existence at the heart of Christianity proves sexuality is healthy rather than dysfunctional and "dirty." That is something the Church has tried to keep us from figuring out for centuries.

Even today people freak out over books like the DaVinci Code and think we're honoring a dangerous pagan goddess. She, they warn, is of the devil. Why are they threatened by alternative forms of Christianity such as Grail and Esoteric Christianity? Because the teachings Mary Magdalene presides over take power from the hands of the few, from the old-boy network, from the Church authorities and give it to every person, to you and me.

Power-hungry, sexually dysfunctional control-freaks do not share power. They want it all, and for many centuries they kept it all. Power and money was in the hands of a very few, all in the name of God.

As the year 2001 brought the third millennium there came a new awakening to the message of the Magdala, a new view of her not as the penitent prostitute -- nowhere in scripture does it ever say she was a prostitute-but as co-Teacher, even a Christian Goddess. To avoid execution by the Church for heresy, the early adherents of the alternative underground Church (sometimes called the "Grail Heresy") developed codes and secret symbols. Mary Magdalene was indicated in the occult (hidden), "heretical" and Gnostic world by her initials MM.

Mary, Mother of Yeshua, was indicated by one M. Margaret Starbird has pointed out in her books that the Roman numerals for 2000 are MM. Mary called Magdalene is therefore the Lady of the new Millennium. The Restoration of this Goddess in the Gospels to her rightful place in Judeo-Christianity may be the next step in the evolving faith called Christianity.

Answer the stirrings of your soul... Join the movement to restore the sacred feminine! Help humanity evolve! Do your own evolving, too. Enjoy the study program, transform your awareness and consciousness.
To sign up for the Order of Mary Magdala, please fill out the Mystery School Application. Then subscribe to our communication forum at MaryMagdalaOrder
About her Name: She was called Mary the Magdala, or in Greek, Magdalene. Magdala, is an Aramaic word meaning Tower of Strength. The original word in Hebrew is Migdal. In the Old Testament (Micah 4:8) the phrase Migdal-Eder, meaning Tower of the Flock, describes the Daughter of Tsion to whom "the Kingdom shall be returned". According to some Jewish scholars, Migdal-Eder refers to Rachel, the beloved wife of Israel. Rachel is mother to the "Children of Israel", and is symbolically the Queen Mother of Judaism. Migdal-Eder was a title also given to Mary Magdalene and she is the First Lady of Christianity.

Mary's first name is Miriam in Hebrew, Maria in Greek. More about her name from Margaret Starbird.

For more information on the YHVH Godhead of which Magdalene is a part (she's the second H!) please see our YHVH info, Rosary and Prayer Song. We use all of Margaret Starbird's books in our study program, as well as other texts, but Starbird's are most prominent. See our page Church of The Way for more about reconstructing the "church" Yeshua and MM started.

To sign up, please fill out the Mystery School Application. Then subscribe to our communication forum at MaryMagdalaOrder

Mary the Magdalene, Apostle to the Apostles

This painting shows Magdalene in a leadership, teaching role. She is the first one to break the news of the resurrection to Jesus disciples, earning herself the title, Apostle to the Apostles given her by the early church. In Johns gospel the risen Christ specifically commissions Magdalene, Go instead to my brothers and sisters and tell them I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God. Mary Magdalene went to the disciples with the news I have seen the Lord! and she told them that He had said these things to her. (John 20:17-18).

In this painting we see her carrying out her mission, preaching with the authority conferred on her by the risen Yeshua Christ, preparing the disciples, both female and male, for the work of the future.

Artist: Emer OBoyle, from Ireland. Painted in 2003

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The Creed of the Way

*I believe in One Godhead of Sacred Masculine and Sacred Feminine

by which all things, seen and unseen, came into being.

*I believe in the Incarnation of the Divine Son, Yeshua, Logos,

begotten by the Father and born of the Mother; Light of Light, true God of true God.

*I believe in Mary Theotokos, God-Bearer, who was the Divine Mother Incarnate.

*I believe in Pneuma, the Holy Spirit and Life-Giver; the Power, the Presence, Wisdom and Breath of Deity working in all worlds of matter, mind, and spirit.

*I believe in Mary Magdala, an incarnation of the Divine Feminine

who did anoint the Son of Man to seal his divine kingship; to prepare Him for His death, descent into Hell and Resurrection.

*For Yeshua and His Bride the Magdala did come in the flesh, were wed, and together showed us The Way to freedom from suffering, to gnosis, to balance and union with our Source.

*I acknowledge their continued presence among us. They are co-Redeemers in joint priest- and priestess- hood leading all back into kinship with the Creative Godhead.

*I embrace their guidance, embody that compassion,

and work for the awareness of All I AM that awakening

Amen

(Copyright 2008, Esoteric Theological Seminary)

"The phenomenon of the Black Virgin confronts us with the survival of a popular heresy that has been a source of great embarrassment to the Church. Her origins are shrouded in mystery and the extent of her cult and influence has only begun to be known. Jungian Ean Begg has gathered together the extant evidence in his survey, The Cult of the Black Virgin(1985), that includes a comprehensive gazeteer of more than five hundred images mostly from Western Europe but also from Latin America. There are 302 Black Virgins in France alone. The Church has tried to explain away the blackness of these images as accidental, the result of candle smoke or exposure to the elements. But this does not make sense. If the faces and hands of the Virgin and child have been blackened by the elements, why has their polychromed clothing not been similarly discolored and why has a similar process not occurred in the case of other venerated images. Perhaps the Virgin is black because she is the Earth Goddess and the blackest earth is the richest, the most fertile. Perhaps she is black because, like the Hindu Kali, she represents the dark, the night, and death, all those mysteries that Western culture has repressed through fear of women, of female sexuality, and of dying. The cult of the Black Virgin marks the resurgence of female personification of cosmic power and the female principal in a mysogynist religious culture. The worship of the Black Virgin is a complex, multifaceted phenomenon that began in the early Middle Ages but has persisted into the present despite opposition, often militant, by the established Church." "The unraveling of the Black Virgin's mysteries leads us to the underside of Christianity. Two streams of veneration of the Black Virgin can be identified. Both are viewed as heresy by the established Church:One is a continuation of the earth-and women- centered Goddess religion; the other is the carrier of the esoteric teachings and spiritual practices of the Hellenistic period. This diverse group includes the Gnostics, the Cathars, the Knights Templars, the Cult of the Holy Grail and the Church of Mary Magdalene. The cult of Mary Magdalene, which worships the Black Virgin, absorbed many of the esoteric teachings. It is linked to the Black Virgin because both continued to hold the female principal sacred and devine." "The Black Virgins posses great power, the mana of the old goddess of life, death and rebirth. Mana is extraphysical power immanent in and emanating from nature, viewed as the embodiment of all forces that produce and maintain the order of the universe. This is why they were so threatening to the Church."

Mary's original history had a place for Goddess to live in Christianity. She still does today. Bringing Mary back to her rightful place will bring balance to the world. The world cries out for the Feminine. The Black Virgin, Mary Magdalene and Mary, Mother of Yeshua, are all aspects of the Feminine and Goddess. ************************** Please write at least one paragraph answers for each of the following questions. Submit your answers via e-mail to the Mystery School with "RestoreGoddess Lesson C" in the subject line. Cut and paste the questions "Since 'Sacred Union' is the source of all life on this planet, the six-pointed star uniting the archetypal male and female triangles has long been acknowledged as the model for balance and wholeness. Medieval Alchemists called the Star the "philosopher's stone," adding a tiny dot on the upper right hand point to represent the presence of God and guidance of the Divine Spirit. In 1986 during a period of intense revelation and enlightenment, I was given the symbol of the six-pointed star with a dove brooding over it, wings outstretched, as a powerful sign for the New Age dawning. The star represented the entire living cosmos--"male and female," "heaven and earth," "spirit and matter," "light and dark" and all living things--under the Dove of Peace, "with healing in her wings." For years, I couldn't really talk about this image, but finally wrote about the meaning of the Star in the final chapter of my book, The Woman With the Alabaster Jar (Bear and Co, 1993). The Star of David appears on every page of that book as its guiding mandala, and the contents have been described by some readers as the "missing link" between Christianity and Judaism. That missing link is the "sacred marriage." "And now we discover that the Star of David will be weaving in and out of the heavens in the orbits of planets in our solar system over the next several weeks. As above, so below! This "gift" should be setting our hair on fire! Somewhere, somehow this blessing was set in motion at the beginning of time! And we have been given the "eyes to see!" This is an amazing "consciousness raising" event--like the birth of Miracle, the white buffalo calf or even the "Star of Bethlehem." The sign of the Star in the Heavens is a mighty clarion call to people everywhere." The birth of Miracle is important as it fulfills the Native American Lakota prophecy of world peace and the coming together of the rainbow tribe of the human race. It was foretold by White Buffalo Calf Woman when she gave the tribes the pipe and how to pray. I had the honor this summer of doing a sweatlodge ceremony to pray about Miracle's message and the donations were sent to Miracle's keepers. A few days after this, a white dove appeared in my yard. She kept coming down to the ground, but would not let anyone too close. As many stray cats hung around, I did not want her to get caught. I walked up to the tree she was in with a ladder and asked if she wanted to come inside. I reached up into the tree and picked her up. Spirit now lives with me and I continue to pray for peace and balance. This message is crucial for the survival of this earth. "I am spellbound when I contemplate the dates of the "conjunction" in the heavens. January 23rd--the "Birthday of the Trees" in Israel, "Nature's birthday" or the day when living things receive their "cosmic energy" is a beautiful reminder of the "sacred union" that is the source of life on the planet. And in February, what Feast is a more obvious reminder of "sacred union" than that of St. Valentine's Day? In the ancient world, the work of the Holy Spirit was known as "the net"--reflecting the belief that everything is interwoven and intermeshed. The "synchronicity" of the Star rising in New York and Jerusalem at the same instant on the 23rd of January--at the FULL MOON--is too incredible for words. The first full moon of the new millennium is a lunar eclipse. It is on Jan. 20 around 11 pm eastern. An excellent time for praying for peace and balance. "The message of the Star of David in the heavens is undoubtedly "peace on earth." But it is more than that. It is a reminder that we are not alone--that we are part of a whole and that the Living Force of the Cosmos is with us. Equality, mutuality, community and wisdom are all summed up in this beautiful mandala whose ultimate archetypal meaning is "harmony in diversity." Its rising now to bless and enlighten us is truly a gift for all peoples!" DIVINE WISDOM She will come out to meet him like a mother; She will receive him like a young bride. For food she will give him the bread of understanding and for drink the water of wisdom. (Sirach / Ecclus. 15:2-3 ) In the Old Testament book of Proverbs and the apocryphal (extra-Biblical) book of Wisdom of Solomon , Wisdom is personified as a female figure, one who was created before time, who works to create the world and who counsels God, sharing the throne as God's beloved. Because of Her role in creation, She mediates between God and humanity, coming from God and leading those who heed Her advice back to Him. Wisdom is our Mother and Teacher, as well as the Bride of God. As one Hebrew writer puts it, "Like a fine mist she rises from the power of God, a clear effluence from the glory of the Almighty...She is the radiance that streams from everlasting light, the flawless mirror of the active power of God, and the image of his goodness (Wisd. 7:25-26 ). She is one with God, yet, at the same time, exists as a separate being, as a divinity in Her own right. She calls out to us at all times and from all places, bringing us all into intimacy with our Divine Creator, Her Heavenly Spouse. She speaks directly and forcefully, asking us to give up our simplicity and complacency in spiritual matters so that we might be "filled with the spirit" and showered with Her riches, which are "more beautiful than the sun" and "better even than fine gold." While the importance of the Divine Sophia, Woman Wisdom, has long been obscured by the sexist theologians and priests of the patriarchal Church, there is currently a resurgence of interest in this mysterious figure. More and more thoughtful Christians and Jews are working to return Sophia to Her rightful place in the lives of all faithful people. For too long, the exoteric Church has failed to heed Her call to renewal. Perhaps, as we enter the new millennium, Wisdom's voice will finally ring out over the din of self-righteous God-talk and political posturing that so characterize our troubled age. Perhaps, it is the Second Coming of Sophia that will help to heal the wounds inflicted on our souls, bodies, and on our planet Earth by patriarchy. Excerpt: (p. 22) of Starbird's Goddess in the Gospels In worshiping an exclusively male image of God----a "God of power and might" glorified in liturgies and creeds of three major world religions---our institutions have entrenched a power-oriented value system that occasionally nods toward the feminine counterpart, especially if she is young and beautiful, but fails to honor her. The wisdom of the feminine, the unconscious, the body, the earth, has been "held bound" by our current institutions and customs. And we are not even aware to what great extent this is true! The subtle balance of the opposite energies has been lost for millennia, compounded in this current century with its high-technology discoveries and instant communications. What kind of world could we live in now if the founders of Christianity had acknowledged that the sacred union of male and female, of Bride and Bridegroom, once lay at the heart of the Christian message, embodied in the intimate relationship of Jesus and Mary Magdalene? What would the partnership mandala indigenous to Christianity have done for us if it hadn't been broken in the cradle of the new religion? What has the model of a "virgin mother" and a "celibate son" done to our collective psyche over the centuries?...

For two millennia, these doctrines have robbed us of a model for relating to one another as real and equal "flesh and blood" partners. We have not been taught to honor our bodies as sacred vessels of life, and this neglect of our own bodies has extended to our planet---our dear mother "vessel"---as well. How different our experience might have been if we had understood that sexual union is both sacred and holy! I am convinced that a model of Bride and Bridegroom, united in intimate mutuality and loving service, could have molded us into a different society---a more integrated, wholesome community---and I am convinced that reclaiming the lost model of sacred union in Christianity can help to heal us now. To reclaim this lost paradigm of wholeness and harmony, we must first restore the lost Bride of the Christian story [Mary Magdalene]---the Goddess in the Gospels---to her rightful place at the side of Jesus. Perhaps we should picture them holding hands. It was my love for Christ that led me to revisit the Gospel story in search of his lost Bride. Years of research had convinced me that the celibacy of Jesus was a false doctrine and that the interpretation of the New Testament needed to be revised to include his wife. But who was this wife, and why was she not mentioned in the Gospels? I wondered. What could have happened to her? According to Scripture, God's Messiah, the Anointed One, will give sight to the blind and cause the lame to walk; comfort the broken-hearted and proclaim liberty to captives; and set prisoners free and proclaim the day of God's favor. These messianic activities prophesied by Isaiah are recognized in the actions and miracles of Jesus in the Gospels. No mention here of bondage in heaven or on earth! The God of the Hebrew Scriptures did not wish his people to serve in bondage, but rescued them from slavery in Egypt and brought them home from captive exile in Babylon. Based on the New Testament texts, Christians are quick to claim that Jesus was the promised Messiah of Israel, fulfilling ancient prophecies from the Scriptures, but they almost universally fail to mention the woman who anointed Jesus -- the woman with the alabaster jar who knelt before him, poured her fragrant unguent over his head, and dried her tears from his feet with strands of her hair. And yet the Hebrew word *messiah* literally means "the Anointed One." And, although the details vary a little, there is only one story of an actual anointing of Jesus recorded in the canonical Gospels of the Christian faith: an anointing by a woman at a banquet in Bethany! My research had shown me that in the ancient rites of the Near East, it was a royal bride who anointed the king. Together they embodied the Divine in a lifesustaining partnership -- the *hieros gamous*. My revised interpretation of the anointing scene from the Gospels outlined in _The Woman with the Alabaster Jar_ sheds new light on the dangerous fracture in Christian doctrine, providing a partnership model to transform Christianity at the threshold of the approaching third millennium. The anointing of Jesus in the Gospels is an enactment of rites from the prevailing fertility cult of the ancient Middle East. In pouring her precious unguent of nard over the head of Jesus, the woman whom tradition has identified with "the Magdalene" (meaning "the Great"!) performed an act identical to the marriage rite of the *hieros gamous* -- the rite of the anointing of the chosen Bridegroom/King by the royal representative of the Great Goddess! Jesus recognized and acknowledged this rite himself, in the text of his role as the sacrificed king: "She has anointed me in preparation for burial" (Mark 14:8b). Those who heard the Gospel story of the anointing at the feast in Bethany would certainly have recognized the rite as the ceremonial anointing of the Sacred King, just as they would have recognized the woman, "the woman with the alabaster jar," who came to the garden sepulchre on the third day to finish the anointing for burial and to lament her tortured Bridegroom. She found an empty tomb. Highlights of this story recounted in the four Christian Gospels are reminiscent of myths celebrated in pagan fertility cults of the Middle East, those of Tammuz, Dumuzi, and Adonis. In the pagan rituals surrounding the ancient myths, the Goddess (the Sister-Bride) goes to the tomb in the garden to lament the death of her Bridegroom and rejoices to find him resurrected. "Love is stronger than death" is the poignant promise in the Song of Songs and similar love poetry of the Middle East celebrating these ancient rites of the Sacred Marriage. The other theme is the Virgin Goddess. The Mother Goddess Isis rules Egypt with her brother-husband, Osiris whose generative powers enabled the land watered by the Nile to be fertile and productive. Her cult centers on the death and resurrection of her beloved spouse. This myth was recounted and celebrated every year at the summer festival when the crop was planted. Osiris is killed and Isis, weeping bitterly for her lost love, wanders the world in search of his body. When she finds his corpse, she restores it to eternal life, performing the rites of mummification for the first time. Through her charm and magical powers, the Goddess then reanimates his corpse and conceives their son, Horus. The death and resurrection of the consort/son, the Year God who must be sacrificed in order to assure the yearly cycle of renewal, was absorbed into the sacred story of Christianity. Women in the Near East had continued to mourn for Tammuz (Dumuzi) up to the time of Jesus. And 'although there exist no Christian examples before the Middle Ages, the image of the Piet may have been influenced by the image of Isis and the dead Osiris' across her knees. "Many Goddesses were called virgin, but this did not mean that chastity was considered a virtue in the pagan world. Some, like 'Venus, Ishtar, Astarte, and Anath, the love goddesses of the Near East and classical mythology, are entitled virgin despite their lovers, who die and rise again for them each year.' For others, like Artemis and Athena, virginity symbolized autonomy and independence, freedom to take or reject lovers. Virgin meant one-in-herself, to be true to her own nature and instinct, not maiden inviolate." "The critical misinterpretation of Mary's physical state was a translator's error; the Hebrew word almah denoting the social and legal status of an unmarried girl, was read as the Greek parthenos that refer to a physiological and psychological fact. Parthenogenesis is the conception of a child by a female without a fertilization of male seed. "But Christianity, by insisting on the chastity of the Mother Goddess, utterly transformed the meaning of the matriarchal image even though to all outward appearances it remained unchanged. The image of the Mother Goddess with her child represented her sexuality and procreative power, whereas that of the Virgin and child stood for

Was there a tradition of women living and working at the Temple in Jerusalem? Many pagan temples of the day had priestesses and the Hebrew Temple did have a "Women's Court." It is very likely that both Mary Magdalene and Mother Mary were representatives of the Goddess and served as priestesses in a Temple, be it the Second (Hebrew) Temple on the Temple Mount or one of the many pagan temples built by Solomon, the Romans or Greeks which existed and thrived during Yeshua's day in the city of Jerusalem, the province of Galilee and other cities of Israel. On the left is a painting depicting one of these women's courts from Roman times. We know there was the Women's Court at both Solomon's Temple and the Second Temple in Jerusalem, and we know there is mention of the practice of sending young women there to "work." Mother Mary is said to have been dedicated to Temple work, she lived there, wove tapestries, altar cloths, prayed for the betterment of the people, etc. She is repeatedly called a "Temple Virgin" and apocryphal books tell of her adventures there under the Highpriest Zacharius. [Gospel of the Birth of Mary, written 300's AD, supposedly written by Matthew, and the Protevangelion, written by James, Yeshua's brother, one of Mary's other sons]. At one point another priest, Abiathar, wants Mary, known as a magikally powerful and beautiful priestess, to marry his son.

It was custom after their service to the Temple, to give the Temple "Virgins" in marriage to prominent men of the community, usually nobles or priests. The Highpriest is perplexed what to do with Mary, she cannot marry just anyone, and so he enters the Holy of Holies and asks the Divine to send a sign. That's how she ends up betrothed to Joseph. Ancient pagan temples of both Old and New Testament times were populated with sacred "prostitutes." But these women were NOT what we consider prostitutes today. They were highly respected representatives of whichever goddess whose temple they served in. The words used to indicate them are not "whore" or prostitute, but Hierodules or Hetera (singular) heterae (plural), meaning sacred dedicant, sacred temple-worker. My friend, a sort of historical columnist, Joseph Kerrick writes: Truly sacred prostitutes existed in past cultures, like the heterae of Greece and the shaktis of India. In fact, the words "prostitute" and "prostitution" have such an indelibly negative imprint in the modern Western mind that in order to properly grasp the meaning of these things we should resort to one of the older terms -- so I'll use "hetera" and its derivatives. So: the purpose of heterism is not mere sexual gratification, but first of all healing, and secondly transcendence. In the first function, the hetera is what we would today call a therapist, who specializes in the use of sex to accomplish the aim of healing. The second function [transcendence] has been practically forgotten in the postmodern world, and can only be understood in a societal context where the higher forms of spirituality are practiced. The process of negating the ego to perform selfless service to God and his children is only known in the West in a matrix of ascetic monasticism; but there have been, and are, other cultures where these same principles are applied in a specialized form of sexual relationships -- namely, heterism in its higher form, in which it can not only heal people of pathologies, but help them transcend the human condition and become better than they could ever hope to be in "normal" life. When Mary Magdalene was called a hetera or prostitute back in the early centuries of Christianity, the people of the time knew perfectly well what that meant, she was a Temple Priestess, serving the Goddess. Perhaps she was such a priestess, the ubiquitous name of "Mary" has been attributed to the fact that it might not be a woman's specific name at all, but might mean a priestess of the goddess religion. Either way, Mary Magdalene did have a life before she joined Yeshua's ministry, but we now know it was not selling her body on the street like modern-day prostitutes. What about Mother Mary? Did she actually sleep with men in the Temple? We will never know, but we do know the story of Pantera, a Greek-born Roman soldier assigned to guard the Temple precinct in Jerusalem. "News" records of the time say he met, and perhaps wooed, a Temple Tapestry weaver named Mary then got her with child, a child later claimed to be conceived of God. This story is historically recorded in the Jewish writings of the time, the Talmud, and even in a Roman record book. Jewish writings from the first century go on to say it was the same Mary who gave birth to the Christian messiah, Jesus. Even more fascinating, in the 1990's, the grave of Pantera was uncovered in Germany, and sure enough he lived during the time of Jesus' birth and was even stationed in Jerusalem at the time! He was the head of a legion in his later years and had been transferred to fight in Germany, but died there in his late 40's. Ian Wilson discusses the Pantera evidence in his book Jesus the Evidence. We know that Yeshua was divinely conceived, but some religionists like to think he still had a human "sperm donor" to make the baby start growing inside Mary's womb. Those of this camp assume that was Joseph, but since he protested having never slept with her, perhaps God used this Greco-Roman soldier with the fascinating name. Pantera may be a mixed form of Hebrew and Latin, Ben-Terra, which means Son of the Earth Goddess). Ah, the stuff of legends...

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