Nor is there any model for the male in marriage to an individuated female.

Now, the moon dies into the sun once a month, to be born from it again, just as the body of the first sacrifice died into the earth, to be born again as food. In this early, goddess-centered mythology, therefore, the sun, like the Earth, is female. Or, according to another image, the male moon begets itself in the sun: the creative fire of the sun

In the first kind of planting, the work is women’s and digging sticks are used: a little hole is made in the earth, and the slips are put in. With the coming of seed planting and the plow, however, the obvious analogy to the sexual act is recognized, and the act of planting is turned over to the males. In fact, the early plows in Mesopotamia seeded

They are moving into the field and jungle of individual quest, achievement, and self-realization, for which there are no female models.

So this Indian thing was becoming a smash. And what was it? It was the religion of putting yourself back in accord with nature in all of its aspects.

The three great crimes in India are killing a cow, killing a brahmin, and killing a woman, because they all represent the sacred powers.

The Earth brings forth life, and the Earth nourishes life, and so is analogous to the powers of the woman.

My definition of mythology is “other people’s religion,” which suggests that ours must be something else. My definition of religion, then, is “misunderstood mythology”—and the misunderstanding consists in mistaking the symbol for the reference. So all the historic events that are so important to us in our tradition should not be important to us in

vital importance of the female spirit and its creative potential to birth the meaning of women’s experiences into mythic and creative form.