What is patriarchy? Is a patriarchy the same as a society led by men, or is it more, a society led by fear and a feeling of scarcity, that happens to be an environment in which the masculine takes charge?
.jpeg)
,
Secretly I have hidden my answer in the title of this pondering session.
But I'm hoping you'll stick with me till the end anyway.
What is patriarchy for you?
For me it is a culturally formed social system based upon the belief in scarcity.
In other words: There is not enough and we are not taken care of.When put like this it sounds a lot like a social system based upon a cultural abandonment wound.
Which I actually think it is.How did this come to be?
It has a lot to do with the myth our western culture is based up on:The story of Adam and Eve.
One of the symptoms of modern patriarchic culture is that we don't give much value to stories, especially ones that the non-christian world has dubbed 'mythical', which is almost synonymus with 'made up' or 'non-existent'
The part of our being that stories work very strongly on is our subconcious/our feminine side. The biggest part of the iceberg that silently lives under water, which effects how we feel about life more then our logical mind does.
Eventhough patriarchy has taught us to think little of myths as they are part of our feminine legacy, in certain parts of patriarchy, this truth about the impact of myths and symbols on us is well known and purpousfully used to create strong emotions that are then used to manipulate people into supporting certain political beliefs.
I will include the story from the bible here for those of you that are not familiar with it. It's from the first testament of the Christian bible.
The content of the first testament including this story below of Genesis is also the religious fundament for the Tora of the jews and the Koran of the muslims. There are some differences between how the story is told in the Koran as oposed to how the story is told in The Bible and the Tora, but it is very similar.
What's interesting about that is that this is thus a very wide spread myth. Not only the christian world, but also the jewish and the muslim world have this story as their cultural/religious fundament.
So here is the story the way it is told in the Bible.
Genesis 3
(New living translation)
The Man and Woman Sin
1The serpent was the shrewdest of all the wild animals the LORD God had made. One day he asked the woman, “Did God really say you must not eat the fruit from any of the trees in the garden?”
2“Of course we may eat fruit from the trees in the garden,” the woman replied. 3“It’s only the fruit from the tree in the middle of the garden that we are not allowed to eat. God said, ‘You must not eat it or even touch it; if you do, you will die.’”
4“You won’t die!” the serpent replied to the woman. 5“God knows that your eyes will be opened as soon as you eat it, and you will be like God, knowing both good and evil.”
6The woman was convinced. She saw that the tree was beautiful and its fruit looked delicious, and she wanted the wisdom it would give her. So she took some of the fruit and ate it. Then she gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it, too. 7At that moment their eyes were opened, and they suddenly felt shame at their nakedness. So they sewed fig leaves together to cover themselves.
8When the cool evening breezes were blowing, the mana and his wife heard the LORD God walking about in the garden. So they hid from the LORD God among the trees. 9Then the LORD God called to the man, “Where are you?”
10He replied, “I heard you walking in the garden, so I hid. I was afraid because I was naked.”
11“Who told you that you were naked?” the LORD God asked. “Have you eaten from the tree whose fruit I commanded you not to eat?”
12The man replied, “It was the woman you gave me who gave me the fruit, and I ate it.”
13Then the LORD God asked the woman, “What have you done?”
“The serpent deceived me,” she replied. “That’s why I ate it.”
14Then the LORD God said to the serpent,
“Because you have done this, you are cursed
more than all animals, domestic and wild.
You will crawl on your belly,
groveling in the dust as long as you live.
15And I will cause hostility between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and her offspring.
He will strikeb your head,
and you will strike his heel.”
16Then he said to the woman,
“I will sharpen the pain of your pregnancy,
and in pain you will give birth.
And you will desire to control your husband,
but he will rule over you.c”
17And to the man he said,
“Since you listened to your wife and ate from the tree
whose fruit I commanded you not to eat,
the ground is cursed because of you.
All your life you will struggle to scratch a living from it.
18It will grow thorns and thistles for you,
though you will eat of its grains.
19By the sweat of your brow
will you have food to eat
until you return to the ground
from which you were made.
For you were made from dust,
and to dust you will return.”
( All Rights Reserved: www.biblehub.com )
So we live our lives in the vibration of a myth about or origins, that tells us of abandonement.
And not only that, but we have caused this abandonement ourselves, at least the women did, we are guilty. And our men are guilty for not having kept us in check. Women are guilty for being curious.
For that, we were abandoned, left in a place that was harsh, where we were not provided for. There was no abundance and we had to work the earth and basically water it with our own sweat and women were hence forward punished with painful childbirth.
Well, what a sad story that is.
Does it resonate, do you recognise it as a story our values have been based upon?
Where does it come from?
Has it got any truth to it?
Do we want to go in to that?
I seems inevitable to do so, to get to the bottom of this. So here goes nothing:
It seems that slowly, slowly, people are starting to remember the long journey their soul has made over many lifetimes and the moment where the split from their wholeness happened.
Many similar stories are surfacing. Stories of alien interference with our DNA in a past far away. (The snake that seduced Eve.)
What might be a bit hard to digest is that different sources have remebered that it was indeed the women who were aproached, by the alien race, with pretty promises and misled into cooperating with something that would create a split in the settings of our human bodies. Bodies that were, before that moment, programmed for bliss, became programmed with fear of not belonging, not having enough, by being blocked from our originally divinely encoded dna, which some call 'original innocence'
So we were not sent from the Garden of original innocence, but cut off from a place of innocense, peace, wholeness and belonging within ourselves by having our dna encoded with programmes of ilusionairy seperation.
The event did not just create disharmony in ourselves, but also caused a rift between ourselves and the outer world. Between women and men and between people and animals, and people and our Earth Mother.
Eventhough She is still our Mother who'd happily provide for us, She is also an energy matrix, cocreating with our way of thinking.
She creates what our reality is. Is it abundance, she creates abundance. Is it scarcety, we will meet scarcety on the earth.
So this is a bit of what I believe is our history and not 'merely' a myth.
A believe system based upon a 'mistake' that led us to feeling abandoned.
A short and simplified recap of what happened since the rift:
What do you want to do when you feel abandoned by the Divine itself?
Huddle together?
And after that? Crying doesn't get you anywhere does it?
The way of the feminine is what got you in this shit in the first place.
So let's just stop feeling and start working. Logically find your way in this new unsuportive reality you are left in.
Stopping feeling, starting to use logic to strategically make your way in life, working with all you got for a better future created with your own hands are all very manly/yang qualities.
In this case mostly men took over in this new harsh reality as the way of the masculine seemed the only way out. Protecting women, creating a life for men and women, but also telling women what to do because the trust was broken. Or so it seemed.
What realy happened was that women had been misled, they had not been presented with truth by the aliens and did not have any experience with that.
So it wasn't really their fault either, nor was the feminine way, a way that led to disaster. It was a way that had kept humanity living in bliss for thousands of years. Wouldn't that make breaking the trust in the feminine way the most obvious and eficient way in messing humanity up?
Now we were all believing the lies:
In fact churches should spread the fact that:
'Women all are temptresses by origin and should be beaten daily to keep evil at bay.'
So that what happened (the orriginal sin) can never happen again.
But what we didn't know was, that this very way of life kept the 'original sin' alive.
Creating a split between feminine and masculine, by feeding into idea's of shame and blame and distrust and turning the sexes against each other.
This came about not only by the dna alterations but also because the story of the 'original sin was now our legacy.
No longer being able to easily form a bond in sacred union as a man and woman made us stand much weaker in life. Sacred union between an man and a woman is a very strong bond of trust and truth and bliss.
We've all been misled, not only the women. The men have been misled by buying into the whole story of shame and blame and mistrust of the feminine, facilitated by the new dna coding.
Their acces to their own feminine side had become blocked in the proces too, leaving them feeling miserably incomplete and longing for the feminine while at the same time fearing it.
The weakened bond between the sexes and seeing each other as the enemy was giving the aliens and counter forces exactly what they hoped for. Unhappy relationships with stagnant life force/sexual energy.
Siphening off of our energy of despair, making us into easy-to-fool-because-miserable-and-will-do-anything-to feel-better sheep.
And what was more: our personal recevoirs of power, our sexuality was left totally ungaurded because our lost wholeness was blamed on the feminine and all feminine qualities, believing our sexuality was sinfull.
Because we started to believe our sexuality was sinful our awareness was far from our sexual centres leaving them open to mingel with and siphen off.
The thing I am really wondering about is:
WHY DID NO ONE BLAME THE SNAKE?????
That is because the snake ( aliens/counter-forces) worked like the 'trickster'. Meaning we were tricked in our blind spot, where the light of our consciousness did not yet shine, resulting in us blaming ourselves and each other and giving the trickster all the fun.
'Why did any of this happen in the first place?' you might ask.
What's an interesting difference between the stories of the Old Testament/Tora and the Koran is that in the Koran it is said that Satan/counter-forces only exist by the grace of God. The snake was not in the garden by accident. Allah says people have been given free wil to learn to discern between what is good/bad, or a bit more nicely put between what's serving love and what is not. And the snake was in the garden of original innocence to bring the challenge.
(according to Masjid Al Muslimiin from: https://www.almasjid.com/content/story_adam_and_eve)
So maybe, when seen from a higher perspective it could have happened to create experiences, leading us on a roundabout towards consciousness and reclaiming our feminine ways.
Conclussion:
It has been more the 'masculine' then men in particular that has been leading since the time of the rift. And this has been a form of the masculine which has been distorted, this happened due to shutting down the feminine side, because of the abandonment wounding which occurred when the snake/aliens betrayed us and altered our DNA,
which was blamed on the feminine.
Each human has both feminine and masculine qualities, but that masculine qualities are in general ( there are exceptions) reached more easily by men then by women. As feminine qualities are usually more easily reached by women.
Since the alterations of our DNA, both men and women have been entertaining mostly their masculine qualities. The feminine qualities have been present, but under the surface as they were not honoured, leading to distortion of the masculine qualities. Because the masculine qualities can only be whole and thrive in an environment where the feminine is also honoured and allowed to thrive.
In the same way the feminine qualities can only thrive and be whole in an environment where the masculine qualities are also honoured and allowed to thrive.But more about that next time with some hopefull messages in my coming article around the question of the week from ecotrain:
'What is matriarchy?'
I hope that wasn't too hard to digest for you.
Keep in mind that we are well on our way to reintegrating the feminine qualities and healing the abandonment wound.
Lots of Love Clara
If you found this post inspiring please upvote and follow for more.
Check out @ecotrain for more answers to this same question from different passionate writers this week.
Complex. It is not the mythical bible story, it is the interpretation of the church that sew the seeds. But where i lose you, is the relation of scarcity to this story. Complex :-)
The relation to scarcity in this story is the abandonment wounding. When we feel abandoned we feel like there is not enough, no one is there to take care of us, we feel unsafe. This happened when our DNA was altered, we basically couldn't reach our own divinity/source of abundance anymore like we could before. On top of that our acces to our feminine side was barred by judgement and shame, which made us feel even more abandoned.
I quote the story of Adam and Eve because for me it is an encrypted version of what really happened when extra terestrial life forms came to take advantage of us by altering our DNA in a time long ago. The actual meaning of the story got lost and the symbols became real for the church. And indeed the church made things worse by going further in to shame and blame towards the feminine and all of mankind carrying the original sin on their shoulders, anew with every new birth. Which only means that the altered DNA is being past on with every new birth until we decode it. How to do that you can read in my next articles in this line. ;-)
really great response clara, and i really appreciate you forming the questions in the first place. i have spent a lot of time reflecting on these topics in my life and they're very dear to me!
you wrapped it all up really well. i grew up in the church too and the creation myth is so damaging of a story that
yeah that really sums it up. and the deranged masculine energy that has "ruled" the planet for so long does try to kill curiosity, flow, change and seeks to control women so much through that and, of course, that aspect of men, too.
also what you said about the resulting influence of sexuality is so true. growing up in the church i always wondered why sex was so bad. i came to the conclusion that men were afraid of it, afraid of the power of the woman's body and the feeling of being connected to someone so deeply. for in truly joining, there is that depth and deep vulnerability.
i like your conclusion too and will give it some thoughts.
oh an as another point, as i started to re read the biblical garden myth, i started to see the snake as a good thing- the enlightening principle and not an evil thing. i think the snake has been twisted into an evil thing. but the snake could represent the life force and true knowing that is available to us all. the separation from the divine and subsequent abandonment that happened in the biblical stories (and yes i def see this in our cultures today) i see as a weird story from a religion based on pain and control. it's not the way it truly is or has to be. we have to remember ourselves and our connection to the earth.
<3, wren
Yes, and on top of that this story has not only been a tool to enforce the split, it is an encrypted account of real events that happened when an alien race coded our DNA for scarcity and fear. Underneath that coding the strong connection to ourselves, each other and the earth is still there, we just have to get back in touch with it. I 'm traveling now, but will read your take on this in your post soon. xx
YESSS! I started thinking the same at some stage: the snake wanted them to see the truth that was kept from them, how could that be a bad thing? There was something I found in the Koran some time ago, it said: Do not idolize false gods, for god is a jealous god....That to me meant there were other entities, while the books clearly state there is only one...
As I mention in my post, the snake is indeed seen as something to sharpen our discernment in the Koran. But the snake is seen more like something that is tolerated by Allah instead of an equal. I feel that God is always One, while S/He is many.
Wow you really jumped into this, I totally agree with you about the huge divide that has been driven between male and female, that this has been a huge weakness in itself. Most religion's are based around the masculine, and certainly where I grew up the catholic religion has a very aggressive and violent history. But even before Christianity came about there was a move to a more masculine ruling within the Celts and Vikings. In Ireland, religion definitely cemented the patriarchy. I believe balance is the only way we can heal and move forward. For me I see the move away from earth based spirituality, being told to look now to the sky's, to look out side ourselves for all the answers. When really each and everyone one of us hold the power and balance inside of us, we just lost the way in which we can tap into it. But it is coming back, the awakening is happening. '
Thanks so much for these questions, I feel like I could write another article just about Patriarchy, well another few, it really brought up so much that I could not cover in just one post.
Great post x
Thanks, it is for sure the spirituality that is connected to the earth and the balance we can find inside of our own bodies that could bring us back to wholeness as that is what is representing the feminine side of things and that is exactly what is missing. I wasn't referring to Christianity having made partriarchy happen. It's just that the story of the split in our wholeness that happened long before christianity even existed, has been recorded in the bible in encrypted form. The story itself has nothing to do with christianity either bbut speaks of a time when we were peacefully coexisting with nature and each other and then something happened ( the DNA coding) that interfered with our sense of wholeness ( the snake/alien race) and made us live with a feeling of abandonement which set off partriarchism.
Hi @clara-andriessen!
I'm happy to include this post in the CTR Crossword Puzzle No.-16. All participants for this puzzle will land on this post to find their answers to it.
Thank you for creating awesome content which is just perfect for our participants!
P.S.:
Hey, all readers of this post! If you want to participate in this contest, you’ve got a slight edge over others as you have already read this post. All of you are welcome to participate and have fun. Check the posts containing hints for the Crossword Puzzle here.
Thanks!
Wonderful post Clara! I just LOVE how you have brought together three religions and their perspectives in this one post.It is very strange how even religion is Patriarchal and does make me sort of shudder reading even the words of the Bible!!
Thank you for suggesting this weeks question Clara!
You got a 39.22% upvote from @upmewhale courtesy of @eco-alex!
A lot of this really resonates with me. Having been brought up Christian but turning to deep Torah study several years ago, I have pondered the meaning of that story. Some Jewish views on the story see the snake as one who enlightened the man and woman and then they were different from the animals. They then had free will. They don’t see the snake as Satan. Their view of ha Satan is as an angel that is an agent of God. His name means the accuser.
The more I study this, I agree that it is symbolic of our journey as humans. I tried to ignore the theory of alien intervention, but looking into the Sumerian records and other evidence is so very convincing. If that is the case, how do we discern how to live? I believe it all comes down to love and honoring each other as equals.
Wow thanks stillwatersart, I feel like you really took the time to read it. I appreciate it! So you did an in depth study of the Tora? That must have been very interesting huh? I studied religions for a year in college.
Which was also very interesting and it seems it still is my area of interest. Yes, a symbolic story can be interpreted in many ways, I guess in a sense it's correct that human free will only was put to the test from that symbolic moment of choice of Adam and Eve onwards, whatever the choice was. I think it did indeed point towards an terrestrial race interfering with our DNA and also have had dreams about it. I will write more about it in my two next posts about matriarchy and where were heading. Yes, regaining the trust in ourselves that we can discern how to live if we listen well and loving and honouring each other as equals is definitely a good way to get back in touch with our original coding.
Totally wowed by this Clara! What a unique and super interesting take on this question!
I love thinking about the femininity of myths and how important storytelling is to the feminine energy. I love the stories. In particular thinking of this story in that way. For a long time I saw this story as a tool of control, and of course that is how the church portrays it. It's interesting to think of it in different lights. I eventually began to see the story as similar to what is expressed in the Koran. I started to see that the gifts were discernment and free will. Of course discernment can easily fall into judgement, and that is, of course, the big danger. Ultimately free will is such a beautiful thing because then we return to the garden by choice.
All that said, the idea that the snake represents the aliens is a fascinating one. The idea that we may have been reprogrammed in an effort to drive a division and destroy our society is disarming but very feasible. I'm interested to learn more. To be sure, if that is the case, it has certainly been incredibly effective in dividing us and destroying our culture. Everyone being suspicious of the feminine is. An absolute breaking point.
I love, love, love the question of why did no one blame the snake!! Oh my goodness, such a valid question. I always thought blamin eve was so dumb. Everyone is curious, and it's almost always a good thing. It's the source of all creation.
Finally, I love that you talked about how the masculine needs the balance with the feminine to truly express the fullness of the beauty of the masculine. So, so very accurate.
Thanks again for posing this question. I enjoyed writing, reading and discussing. It's been absolutely lovely.
Myth and story vs tool of control/ my view of the story and Koran interpretation/ aliens/blaming the snake/ trickster and pitting us against each other/masculine needs feminine for healthy expression
Wow, I 'm so impressed with how you really took the time to read it and fully felt where I was going with it! Yay! I love how you say: 'Ultimately free will is such a beautiful thing because then we return to the garden by choice.' That made me emotional because that is indeed the hopeful conclusion of it all. Beautifully said Solar supermama. Thank you!
I really enjoyed reading this and I'm every time again pleasantly surprised how much us ecotrain passengers have in common in regards to our views on life. I couldn't agree more that the story of the original sin has had more impact on people than most of us realize. The pain during child-birth is something women and men have been conditioned with, and that's why women feel that pain in the first place...they expect it, so that's what they get. Creating their own realities. As a mother of four, of which 2 have been born unassisted and completely painless, I now know for a fact that that birth pain process is only there because people believe it is. Nothing else. And YES! I always asked the same question: why does no one blame the snake? What I always thought too was that god himself created the serpent, surely he must have known what a vile creature it was....I questioned my religion teacher about this when I was in school, told him that I thought that if the god he was telling us about existed, then he had been playing tricks with Adam and Eve and was trying to set them up for failure, because besides knowing the nature of the snake, he must have also known the curious nature of humans and their obsession to try anything they were forbidden to do...and he hated me for it but had no answer. That to me later resulted in the conclusion that all these stories were told for one reason only: suppression. Nothing else. Free will my butt, lol. These stories and teachings were not made so people could exercise free will, it was anything but. Maybe the illusion of free will, but it wasn't really was it? Oh and when you mention the feminine and masculinity. Yeah, we're supposed to complement each other. The man is the bringer of life, the woman the giver of life. Separation of those two was created, that's for sure. I couldn't agree more. Excellent job @clara-andriessen, I am looking forward to read your next question of the week.
The story of Adam and Eve is to me an actual account of events that happened long ago. It tells in an encrypted way about an alien race that encoded our genes with scarcity, pain, shame, blame and fear, trapping us in third dimension. But we can get out again, remembering we don't need to suffer when birthing for example. I'm so glad you manage to birth two children without pain!
Thank you. I'm quite happy about the experience too. With my second child (at home with a incompetent midwife) I had such a bad experience that I said this would never happen again. So when I fell pregnant again, I was quite certain to do it alone fairly shortly after I knew I was pregnant. It is when we're allowed to listen to our own bodies and age old powers, that the body will just take over and do what needs to be done. I managed to stay relaxed and without fear, and that makes all the difference. With my first unassisted birth, I still had some trauma to work through, so it took a bit longer (still not long at all, but longer than the other births before). But with my youngest, it all went so fast that I wished it'd all slow down a bit. I would have done it again that same night if it were possible!
Wow, way to go girl! So you didn't have any assistence at all? Is that even allowed in your country? Where are you from? So how did you arrange that? You had the option of going to a hospital last minute in case things were complicated? I'm interested to know because if I get pregnant I would like to do it alone too. And how did you handle the umbilical cord etc?
I had my eldest son unassisted in Holland. It's not illegal there. The hospital was 5 minutes from our house, but trusting yourself and body is important and with that you can't have doubts take over (doubts meaning: if things go wrong etc...that's almost like a self-fulfilling prophecy). I did have to deal with CPS in Holland, partly because of that, partly because of meddling parents in law...I had my youngest son here in Ireland. Here unassisted birth is also not illegal, but of course frowned upon. I chose to go completely unassisted, even the pregnancy here. Because here the most check-ups are done at the family doctor's office and I knew he would have caused problems for me that I didn't need. I cut the umbilical cord myself, twice. I left it until it stopped thumping, that's the trick to cutting without blood streaming out. Cutting the cord right away like they often do in hospitals is wrong in so many ways...Here because of new laws about insurance for midwives, the mother to be basically has two choices: hospital or unassisted. So the choice was quite easy for me. The only thing I had was Shepard's purse tincture and black (I think, could be blue) cohosh just in case the placenta would take too long (with too long I mean more than 75 minutes...something that's not done in hospitals) or a haemorrhage. I only used the Shepard's purse because my ex was on his way and I didn't want to have to deal with all that when he was there. Other than that, no issues. I lived an hour from the hospital, my friend was with me to help, and if I would have had to depend on her to drive me (it took her a bit to get to me) I would have had my son in the car! So this was the best option for me. I am more than happy to chat some more about this if and whenever you want. I have lists and lists of information that was very useful to me. I might even write about it at some stage. :)
That was very brave of you. Wonderful! I'm sure many women would like to read about it. I am from Holland, but thought you were from America. It's good to trust yourself fully, that is the best base to do anything. I also like to tie my camel to the tree though. (Trust in Allah, but tie your camel.) I believe we can do both. When I get pregnant I 'll keep it in mind that I can contact you. Thanks for sharing. <3