"Cut it off, and SERVE ME!"

When God was a woman much was different, and some of it I find hard to understand. For instance, why would many female supreme gods - and many of them are even being called "Fertility goddesses" by modern scholars - want to be served by eunuchs??? Being supreme deities, whom everybody are supposed to bow down to, wouldn't they want to live "fast lives" with a lot of handsome and potent lovers??? Or put another way: Why don't they have male harems??? As far as I know only one (human) Chinese empress, namely WuZetian, did have a male harem, and although she may have been seen as divine, she doesn't come out as an early female goddess, like e.g. Tiamat, Cybele, Asherah, etc.. 

 

There are many of these goddesses, and to guarantee interest in modern times may be difficult. However, being worshipped in non-literary times they rely on good scholarship by modern scholars. In some ways the ancient female gods seem quite mysterious to me, first and foremost because these modern scholars often present them as luscious fertility goddesses. It's as if they can't fathom these age old divinities, except in their role as mothers.

 

The modern scholars keep talking about "sexual orgies", which doesn't fit another aspect of the goddesses: Many of the most important men in their lives are eunuchs, and their castration seems to be part of their allure for the goddesses. They may be in love with a handsome youth, but they are not lusting for every man in the vicinity, like e.g. the male god Zeus is out to seduce every woman who catches his eye. Also, the castrated youths are often their sons as well as their lovers which makes it even more confusing. 

 

 

Cybele's lover and consort, Attis, is often depicted as a young, handsome shepherd, but some see him as both her son and lover. He is supposed to have castrated himself so he was a eunuch who loved and served the supreme god, Cybele. 

 

 

It strikes me as very strange indeed that the consort or lover of the female god doesn't have what is needed to procreate. As I see religions as mirrors of (historically well-known) social settlements, I find it difficult to wrap my brain around something like that. 

 

 

https://www.popsci.com/science/lucy-ancient-human-walking-bipedal

 

https://www.greekmyths-greekmythology.com/myth-aphrodite-adonis/ 

 

https://www.the-tls.com/regular-features/mary-beard-a-dons-life/roman-roosters-and-religious-eunuchs-blog-post-mary-beard 

 

Wikipedia

 

Britannica