Selene, Wild Woman, Goddess of the Moon
Selene, Greek goddess of the Moon (Luna in Roman mythology), is a wild woman moon goddess who had many lovers, including Zeus, Pan, and a mortal shepherd, Endymion, who was given eternal life, albeit asleep, and with whom she begat 50 children.
She is part of the lunar Triple Goddess. In this triumvirate, Selene represents the fruitful mother, the full moon. Artemis, nature goddess of the hunt, represents the waxing moon crescent, while Hecate, the Old One, the One Who Knows, stands for the waning moon crescent.
On this full moon in Scorpio, my rising sign, I feel the call of the Wild Woman. This archetype keeps us connected to our instinctual nature, which women have pretty near had shamed out of them over the millennia.
When the patriarchal religions began defining and splitting off the masculine (sun, heavens) from the feminine (moon, earth), the power shift would have long-term repercussions.
In the dualistic worldview of western culture and religion, God, the father, was heavenly, pure and good, while God the Mother, like Satan, was cast out, and linked to evil, witchcraft, and dark sexuality.
If she was personified in any deified form, like Mary, she was a virgin, split off from her sexuality, or a whore, like Lilith, the goddess who refused to lie beneath Adam in a subservient role and was thrown over for the more compliant Eve.
And look what happened to Lilith: she’s been described as a demon, a succubus, a killer of children and a seductress who will steal another woman’s man. She was banished from the Garden of Eden for demanding equality and has had a bad reputation ever since. We can now see her as a wild woman, who would not be tamed or defined by conventional authority.
Clarissa Pinkola Estes, in Women Who Run With the Wolves, describes the wild woman as our true nature: “This Self must have freedom to move, to speak, to be angry, and to create. This Self is durable, resilient, and possesses high intuition. It is a Self which is knowledgeable in the spiritual dealings of death and birth.
Today the old one inside you is collecting bones. What is she re-making? She is the soul Self, the builder of the soul-home… she makes and remakes the soul by hand. What is she making for you?”
For a deeper understanding of the Triple Goddess as represented by the classic Greek trinity of Persephone, Demeter and Hecate (Maiden, Mother, Crone), and to find out how they are active in your life, order my 30 page, 3-chapter edition, or the entire 58-page SoulWork book, In the Lap of the Goddess: Connecting With the Divine Feminine.
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