Adam and Eve - bringing shadow to LIFE!

Genesis 3: 1-7


1 Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?
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2 And the woman said unto the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden;

3 But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the Garden, God hast said: Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die.

4 And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall surely not die;

5 For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.

6 And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat.

7 And the eyes of them both were opened ...

(Source - The Holy Bible, King James Version)


It's long been wondered what really happened in the Garden of Eden. What it really means. In fact, even the Rider-Waite-Smith version of the Tarot shows an undeniable reference to this on the Lovers card of the Major Arcana. The symbolism is undeniable, the man and woman, naked, with the woman standing before a tree wrapped in a serpent. Perhaps the angel behind them is Cherubim with his flaming sword (the Sun) protecting the Tree of Life (mentioned at the end of Genesis, ch 3).

Adam stands before the burning tree, Eden gone, representing what is often referred to as the "Fall of Man" (not the fall of Woman).

Just the other day I was talking with someone for some reason about the Garden of Eden and what it was all about. What's with the serpent (aka Satan?). What was he doing there? Why was he interested in tempting Eve?

I've heard possible explanations for it, but as I pondered it the other day, I had an idea come up for me. I'd like to share it with you.

The Bible states that God created all creatures and that "it was good." (Ch1, Verses 24-25). It specifically mentions "creeping things." That to me sounds like serpents. God intentionally put serpents in the garden, and when he did, he thought of them as "good." So why would a good creature, intentionally put into the Garden by the creator himself, tempt Eve to disobey? It doesn't make sense. Even if you don't take the scripture literally, the verses clearly insinuate that God only allowed in the Garden - in his "perfect world" - exactly what he wanted in the Garden. Briars and thorns weren't introduced until after the disobedience. If we assume that the Serpent truly was Satan, I can't see that he "snuck in" to God's sanctuary. He had to be there with the permission of God. And what is a sanctuary riddled with temptation and "evil". No, the serpent wasn't evil. He was the most "clever" but not evil.

Now the first five books of the bible were supposedly written by Moses. If I remember correctly (and I may not) these writings were carried around in the Ark of the Covenant. These writing didn't reach the European or American continents en masse, as books of religious doctrine hundreds if not thousands of years after they were written. In the meantime, cultures thrived across the planet that had no access to the Adam and Eve story. These cultures had their own interpretation of the symbolism of the serpent. Interestingly enough, snakes were often associated with fertility, birth, life and eternity. They also have access to hidden things, hidden information, and secrets. I'm not really seeing any culture that views snakes as evil, or vessels for the evil lord Satan. Source

So let's put two and two together here. A snake tempts Eve to eat the fruit, become mortal, introduce pain and suffering into the earth, lose her innocence perhaps through sex and be ejected from the Garden of Eden. Ok. And snakes have long mythology of being associated with fertility, birth, life and eternity. Sounds to me like one clever creature. Sounds to me like that creature's temptation served Eve to fulfill a commandment to multiply and replenish the Earth.
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Let's change gears. I want to return to the vision I had as I pondered Adam and Eve several days ago.

If I'm in a room, a normal room, let's say I'm in your bedroom, and I shine a really bright spotlight in the room, what happens to the darkness? Does it disappear? Think about it.

I argue that darkness does not disappear. It gathers. It gathers into deeper, darker shadows. The more light I shine, the harder it is to see into the shadows. The shadows in that room become impenetrable. Now if I take everything out of the room, and it's empty, sure, there will be almost no shadow, just feint shadows on the walls, but what good is an empty room? An empty room is beside the point. I want a fullfillinig room, so it has to have substance.

Do we agree that the shadow gathers into deep, dark shadows?

Now, let's say I take that light away. What happens to the darkness? It spreads all over the room. And there's always enough darkness to go around. All light WILL leave the room. There is such a thing as pure dark. There is no such thing as pure light, unless it is actively and equally shined from every possible angle, with no objects to block the light.

It's interesting about darkness, isn't it? And the more accustomed we become to light, the harder it is to penetrate and see into darkness. The less light there is, the more perceptible darkness becomes.

Darkness is like a teenager. The harder you fight against it, the more mysterious it becomes. But you can't leave it unattended or it will take over everything. You have to find a balance with it. Enough light so that you can function, but little enough light that you can look into it and see what's there.
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So let's go back to the Garden of Eden. Oh, everything in the Garden was oh so light, oh so bright. Everything was so bright and so perfect, that let's pretend darkness got cornered into one spot. Darkness was cornered into the holes of the earth. The rabbit holes, the gopher holes, etc. Now mythologically the serpent can be seen as a messenger from the underground. A messenger from the Earth. God (male diety) created Earth (female diety), to be the womb of his creations. Likewise, Adam (male) was given Eve (female) to be the womb of his posterity. Light (male) gives us an opportunity to see into the dark wombs of our souls (female) so that we can become enlightened and we can learn and grow. So the serpent, messenger of the dark underworld, crawls upon Mother Earth, once Father Sky has given his commandment, and approaches the woman. Says "Yo, if light keeps darkness cornered like this there will never be the power of life on this planet. You gotta let the dark (female) mingle with the light (male) so that this Earth serves it's purpose."

If Adam's rib had always stayed inside of his body, he never would have had a fertile womb to gestate his posterity. The rib had to come out. The rib becomes female. Likewise, the darkness of the Earth's womb had to be allowed to roam on Earth. Mother Earth sent her umbilical cord (serpent) to connect to her child (Eve) and teach her how to own her power as a woman.

Eve partook of the fruit, and instantly light and darkness existed in a balance upon the Earth! The seen and the unseen mingled! The unconscious - Adam and Eve's innocent souls - connected to their minds, their egoes, and they realized they were naked! It was like Eve plugged in and everything finally sprang to life AND death! What a miracle!

And for those of us believing this all has to do with sex, that's fantastic. Think about it: the light (phallus) enters darkness (womb) and the balance of the two, the partnership of opposites creates new life. Bingo!
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And so now we live in a world of darkness and light. We're on this crusade, it seems, to destroy darkness and live only in light. Sounds flat and boring to me. Not only that, we all know that darkness doesn't destroy, it just gathers. Is it any wonder that the world has lived primarily in patriarchal order for so many years? It is any wonder that pagan religions of Europe who celebrated the Goddess are considered "dark and evil" by patriarchal cultures - cultures obsessed with "overcoming darkness?" Funny! Darkness isn't here to be overcome! It's here to be explored! It's here to feed creativity (womb) and imagination! The most effective way of exploring darkness is by approaching it with some light. Balance. Balance. Balance.

As a woman, by the way, I am NOT insinuating that because women are represented by darkness that is makes them evil. To associate darkness with evil is to completely miss the point of this blog. Darkness is simply the counterbalance to light. Period. This association with women is cross-cultural anyways. In Greek mythology Apollo and Artemis were twins, with Apollo (male) ruling the sun, and Artemis (female) ruling the moon. Women's menstruation follows closely the cycles of the moons as well. And there's no missing the physiolocial fact that male genitalia is outside of the body (exposed to light) while female genitalia is hidden inside of her body (darkness). Etc, etc.


One last image that I'd like to share from the Rider-Waite-Smith Tarot. The Devil card. Notice its similarities to the Lovers card presented above. Notice, if you dare, that both male and female are equally at risk of choosing bondage in life. It's not about the serpent. It never is. In fact, these two people could easily free themselves from bondage - their chains are not tight. But they are comfortable here, so comfortable, in fact, that they're naked - nothing to hide. These two have never had their consciousness awakened - they're still staring blankly off into space. I imagine this card representing Adam and Eve had they stayed in the Garden. Neutralized, simplified, unprogressing. If you stare too long at the sun, your eyes go blind. If you stare too long at the sun and go blind ... darkness wins and takes over. You lose light forever.
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God asks Adam and Eve what happened. Eve says "the serpent beguiled me." God curses Eve and the serpent. Eve is told to be accountable to her husband. Sounds like a perfect ending for a patriarchal story. Sounds like the reaction of a male diety. Does it change my feelings about the story? Nope. Our Earth carries the burdens of rainforests AND deserts. She lives in a constant balance of light AND darkness. She allows seasons of summer AND winter. All at the same time, all at once. In a perfect balance. Feel free to call that a curse, I call it a beautiful miracle, and I enjoy climbing her mountains and living in her valleys.


Her deep pains of labor, much like a woman's childlabor, is her opportunity to explore pain and sacrifice. Her connection to these depths are like the mysteries of the ocean. The serpent crawls upon it's belly, it's "curse," keeping ever in close contact with the womb of all life ("From dust to dust...").


Well, whatever. Call it a curse. That's ok. I'm still awed and honored to be a part of it!

Our Mother Earth : High Priestess meets the Empress

Yesterday I sat in one of my final intuition classes with my incredible coach Marinna Siri, focusing on communicating with Mother Earth. I was challenged (as was the rest of my class) to connect to "Mother Earth". Ahhhh the GREAT GODDESS!

Ok, so we all started focusing on opening our chakras, allowing an intuitive channel. And as members of the class began to share their experiences I made contact.

The first thing She - the GREAT She - had to say to me was, "Why are you calling me mother? Is that all I am to you? Someone to cuddle you, clean you, feed you, nurture you? Am I nothing else?" I've had a previous conversation with Her where She has asked me to stop calling her Mother Earth. She even gave me a name : Sahashara - which happens to be the Sanscrit name for the crown chakra. But naturally, as a social creature of culture, I promptly returned to calling her the more known "Mother Earth."

This question, though left me surprised at myself. Why was I calling her mother? How would I feel about EVERYONE calling ME mother? (For the record I have no children right now.) More so, how would I feel about being expected to mother everyone. Yuck. Blech vomit vomit. There is nothing less appealing to me than being in a room chock full of children who's parents are inattentive, and these children expecting me to mother them. And I LOVE children. But I don't ever want to be identified in life as simply a "mother." (Mother meets astrophysicist, sure.)

But seriously, when was the last time you referred to Mother Earth as "Mother meets Weatherwoman" or whatever?

Recently I read a book by Jean Shinoda Bolen called "Goddesses in Everywoman." (Ironically her featured book today is called "Urgent Message From Mother" - what are the odds?). In the book she loosely follows Jungian psychology to identify the 7 main archetypes of a woman's psyche and outlines those archetypes using the stories of 7 Greek Goddesses. It's an incredible book and I recommend it to everyone. You see, Demeter is Mother Earth. She's the nurturer, the one who brings harvest, the one who obsesses over caring for children, caring for the elderly, etc. But Demeter is only 1 of the 7 faces of the Great Goddess.

And so "Mother" is one of the many appropriate titles for our Goddess Earth.

And now we get to Tarot (thank God!). In Tarot, the Great Goddess is divided into two characters, two Major Arcana cards (though She shows Her faces throughout the deck). Card #2, the High Priestess, and Card #3, the Empress. The Empress is traditionally pictured (I am currently calling Rider-Waite imagery the "tradition" which I know some consider a faux pas), ahem, she's traditionally pictured outdoors, sitting very relaxed in a comfortably flowing gown, arguably pregnant, with pomegranates and golden wheat symbolizing her fertility. She is Mother Earth in all of her Demeter qualities. And our culture tends to leave Her there. But that's the Empress -card number 3. Before the Goddess was ever the Empress, She was the High Priestess.

The High Priestess is pictured indoors, seated between two pillars (labeled for two pillars in the temple at Jerusalem). She has a curtain of behind her that hangs from the two pillars. And behind that curtain is a great mystery. She holds a scroll or a book entitled "Tora" - perhaps representing the mysteries of the Jewish Bible. The High Priestess is the inner woman, the inner Great Goddess. She is no Mother. In fact, the High Priestess in Greek Mythology was Persephone, Queen of the Underworld. And, not coincidentally, Persephone is the Daughter of Demeter. Before the Goddess was ever a mother, she was a daughter and a queen.

The High Priestess is, as is Persephone, the gatekeeper to the underworld, or that is, the unconscious. She is the agent who grants us passage into our deepest selves. She gives you passage to the moonworld, the world ruled by Artemis - the fearless huntress.

Think about this. Water symbolically represents emotions. The most significant water on our planet is ruled by the moon - that is to say, the ocean's tides are controlled by the moon. One cannot look into the depths of raging waters, but only into the depths of relatively still water. The same way, emotions are controlled by our inner selves, not our rational selves. Not the Empress who sits outdoors, but by the High Priestess who lives within. Raging emotions must be stilled before they can be understood, and the moon, or Priestess, is the gatekeeper to still waters.

The Earth is 70%-ish water. Our bodies are 70%-ish water. As I was intuitively connecting to "Mother" Earth yesterday, she reminded me that we only occupy 30% of her surface. That is to say, she is only 30% our Mother. The other 70%, of her surface, the gateway to the deep, dark, mysterious depths of her, are covered in water. The doorway to her other 70% is guarded by the Queen of the Underworld. The Goddess before she became the Mother.

Have I lost you? The bottom line is this: we oversimplify the Goddess every time we say "Mother" Earth. Tarot shows this - it defines her using two cards, two faces. This is a mirror of our culture. How many of us squeeze ourselves into one role in life? How many of us feel "wicked" for not feeling like the Empress at all times? How many of us consider it a guilty pleasure to explore the underworld of our consciousness?

It's not healthy. It's not natural. And bottom line, to limit oneself is an illusion anyways. Our best example of the this is the very planet we live upon. Who are we to say we are masters of it - we who are land-dwellers by nature. Sure technology can get us up into the air, or down into the water, but we as a species are not capable of living, as a species, in water or in the air. We are land-dwellers and we are truly masters of only one of her elements: Land (Earth). We limit her to this, because we feel limited.

Perhaps, if we broaden our perspective of her, and of all things, especially ourselves, we will evolve.