The Transit of Venus 2012

The Transit of Venus is a rare astronomical event that occurs when the planet Venus crosses between the sun and the earth. The last Transit happened in 2004, and after June 5-6, 2012, the next one will be in December 2117. I'll be 140 years old then.

Transits of Venus can only occur in June and December, the solstice months. The Transit is not an eclipse; it does not block out the sun.

The 2004 Transit of Venus, photographed by Jan Herold.  Creative Commons

In a post related to the 2004 Transit, astrologer Susan Custer wrote that the Transit of June 1761 was one of the first events in world history - if not the first - over which scientists across the world worked together to share their observations. This caused the world (at least the science world) to have to think about global interconnectedness - astrologically appropriate, Custer maintains, because Venus is the planet of relationships.

I'm a Higher Power believer and a Goddess worshiper, and I also have a scientific mentality. I don't place any faith in astrology, but I am a folklore junkie, and there is no aspect of folklore I appreciate more than goddess lore. The rare Transit of Venus, then, seems like the perfect time to discuss she whom the ancient Romans called Venus.

William Adolphe Bouguereau, 1879; alterations by  Lieutenant Waaxe. Creative Commons. 

I said in the Bowl of Light review post that the Polynesians traditionally associate women with the West/sunset/death (but also healing) and the planet Venus. This resonated with the "If I Die Young" post, in which I wrote (based on sources I name there):

"The ancient Romans held the rose to be a symbol of Venus; its petals reminded them of a woman’s genitals. Venus the Rose-Goddess was Christianized as Saint Rosalia, the patron saint of Palermo. Like many European Pagans who associated the goddess of love with death, the Romans also considered roses a symbol of death. This association was not considered negative; rather, death was seen as a return to the goddess, the source of life. Being taken back by the goddess could lead to rebirth."


Venus, Kris Waldherr writes in The Book of Goddesses, "was born of sea foam and water and was described as 'the star of the sea' [Stella Maris in Latin] by her worshipers. As the goddess of love, she was 'the queen of pleasure;' she was also honored as the mother of the Roman people."

The title "Star of the Sea" explicitly links Venus with other goddess figures, including Mary the Mother of Jesus. The Roman emperors especially liked to claim symbolic descent from Venus, similar to the Japanese imperial family's claim (held right up to the 20th century) to be descended from sun-goddess Amaterasu. A major Italian city, Venice, is still named after her.

In Much Ado About Nothing, Claudio - wrongly believing that his intended bride, Hero, has cheated on him - tells Hero:

"You seem to me as Dian in her orb,

As chaste as is the bud ere it be blown.

But you are more intemperate in your blood

Than Venus..."

...and means the goddess' name as an insult, a synonym for slut. Claudio expects a virgin bride, like Diana, the virgin moon goddess.

According to The Woman's Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets by Barbara G. Walker, for centuries, Venice's duke would mark the Christian feast day of the Assumption of Mary (August 15, still a public holiday in Italy) by casting a golden ring into the sea. This was a holdout from ancient times, when Roman rulers would symbolically marry Venus once a year.

Note once again that ancients didn't really have a problem conflating "mother" and "wife." Nor did the supposed dichotomy between Jesus' virgin mother and the sexually adventurous Venus give them much pause. They still understood that women, goddesses and the moon all had phases.

Peter Paul Rubens, c. 1614. "The Death of Adonis." Public domain.

In Classical Roman myth, Venus had many consorts and lovers. Her version of the Annually Dying and Returning Vegetation God is Adonis, a beautiful young hunter who is annually slain, and then Venus and Persephone argue over who gets to keep him. Where the drops of his blood touch the earth, red anemones bloom.




I wrote in "Blood Sugar Sex Magik:"

" [A witch friend of mine said,] 'One of the classic ways of sexual magic is to invoke Venus, and should you wish more information on this subject, I suggest you summon her and beseech her for an interview. But beware of her price.' That price sounded rather ominous, so I chose not to invoke the wrath of the goddess by disturbing her."

Why was I afraid of Venus? I'm not afraid of her anymore. Whatever her price is, I'll pay it. She already holds my heart in the palm of her hands anyway.

Besides Venice, Venus also gave her name to Venus observa, the Latin term for the missionary position. It's used mainly in church documents. (It would make a cool band name, if it's not already taken.)

Venus at GoddessGift.com: http://www.goddessgift.com/goddess-myths/roman_goddess_venus.html

Review: 'The Bowl of Light' by Hank Wesselman

In this book, Hank Wesselman, Ph.D., an anthropologist who has spent extensive time with indigenous African peoples, details some of the wisdom he and his wife Jill Kuykendall gained from an extraordinary friendship with Hawaiian elder Hale Makua. In American English usage we use the Hawaiian word kahuna to mean "boss," but Makua was a true kahuna, a spiritual shaman.

Wesselman and Makua met at one of Wesselman's lectures. Given the floor to speak, Makua told Wesselman he'd read Wesselman's previous book Spiritwalker, talked about it with the Ancestors, and the Ancestors told him everything Wesselman wrote in that book is true. One of Makua's most memorable teachings is that "each of us comes into the world from the great beyond with our bowl of light," and we can either let the light shine or fill the bowl with stones (hurtful actions). When the light grows too dim, we must pour out the bowl and cast away the stones, allowing our bowls to shine once more.

Makua taught Wesselman the Polynesian lore of how the Ancestors came down from the stars, guided by whales and dolphins, the reason these creatures are so sacred in Hawaiian culture. These guardians gave the human race two assignments: grow, and love one another. Native Hawaiian spiritual teachings will be unfamiliar to most Americans, so this book serves as a wonderful introduction, just as Black Elk Speaks introduced Lakota teachings to mainstream American. People of all faiths can learn much from the late Hale Makua through this book.

In his work of fiction The Sacred Book of the Werewolf, Russian author Victor Pelevin wrote, "The energy that serves for the conception of life does not belong to people. Entering into the act of love, a human being becomes a channel for this energy and is transformed from a sealed vessel to a pipe that is connected for a few seconds to the bottomless source of the life force. I simply require access to that source, that's all."

Makua, like Pelevin's character A Hu-Li, believed this. Makua told Wesselman,"Sexuality is one of the great gateways to transcendent experience...In fact, sexuality is probably the fastest way we can reach spirit."

In another fascinating passage, Makua discussed the four directions. By traditional association in Polynesia, men correspond to the east and women to the west. Women and the west are also in charge of both healing and death and influenced by the planet Venus. This is remarkably resonant with the mythology I explored in the "If I Die Young" post. Greco-Roman civilization called Venus/Aphrodite the goddess of love, but also associated her with death. The rose was her symbol, the reason why we still bury our loved ones with roses. Aphrodite collected the souls of the dead in her dove form, as the Valkyries of northern European mythology swooped down to collect warriors slain in battle. The sun setting in the west is a natural symbol of death, so it all makes a great deal of sense that west, feminine energy and death belong together. Hawaiians, like the Greco-Roman cultures, believe in reincarnation, so death always brings the possibility of rebirth.

I received this book at no charge through the Amazon Vine program. I received no other compensation.