Fertility was often mentioned in many mythological tales. In mythology, fertility deities exist in different belief systems or religions.
Fertility was often mentioned in many mythological tales. In mythology, fertility deities exist in different belief systems or religions.
A fertility deity is a god or goddess in mythology associated with fertility, pregnancy, and birth. In some cases these deities are directly associated with sex, and in others they simply embody related attributes.
Fertility rites are religious rituals that reenact sexual acts actually or symbolically. They may include sacrifices of animals and at times humans. [1]
Demeter was the central deity in fertility rites held in classical Greece. Her rites included celebrating the change of seasons. [2] Most women's festivals related in some way to woman's proper function as a fertile being (believed to allow women to promote the fertility of crops). [3] Because of his link to the grape harvest, however, it is not surprising to see Dionysus associated with Demeter and Kore in the Eleusinian Mysteries. [4]
In Ancient Phoenicia, a special sacrifice was conducted in the harvest season to reawaken the spirit of the vine; while another winter fertility rite was performed to restore the spirit of the withering vine. The sacrifice included cooking a kid in the milk of its mother, a Canaanite custom which Mosaic law condemned and formally forbade. [5]
According to Ibn Ishaq, the Kaaba was formerly worshipped as a female deity. [6] Circumambulation was often performed naked by male and sometimes female pilgrims, [7] and worship associated with fertility goddesses. [8] Some have noted the apparent similarity of the Black Stone and its silver frame to the external female genitalia. [9] [10]
Fertility symbols were generally considered to have been used since Prehistoric times for encouraging fertility in women, although it is also used to show creation in some cultures.
Wedding cakes are a form of fertility symbols. In Ancient Rome, the custom was for the groom to break a cakes over the bride's head to symbolize the end of the bride's virginal state, ensure fertility, and the beginning of her husband's power over her.
Fertility symbols were used by Native Americans, the most common being a supernatural figure called Kokopelli, a fertility deity usually depicted as a hunchback, dancing flute player carrying a sack also shown with a large phallus. The deity presides over childbirth and agriculture. [11]
In Hinduism, Lingam is the most powerful fertility symbol, showing the critical union of Shiva and Shakti. Shiva is depicted with River Ganges and moon on his head. He wears garlands of snakes called Naga. The Ganga, moon and snakes are fertility symbols, and associated with fertility rituals in Hinduism. [12]
In the Judeo-Christian bible, the Song of Songs emphasizes the navel as an important element of a woman's beauty. [13] [14] It contains imagery similar to that in the love songs of ancient Egyptian literature. [13] Song of Songs 7:2 states: "Your navel is a rounded bowl." [15] The verse preceding the line mentioning the navel (Song of Songs 7:1) states, "your rounded thighs are like jewels, the work of a master hand", [15] ) and the verse following states, "Your belly is a heap of wheat." [15] Thus the treatment of the navel appears placed textually in between the description of the curves of a woman through thigh and the stomach or midriff. [14] "Belly" also suggests the womb, and the combination of the imagery of the womb with that of wheat suggests the link between romance, eroticism and fertility through the imagery of the navel and curvaceous thighs. [14] These passages also celebrate a curvaceous stomach and midriff and plumpness as aspects of female physical attractiveness. [14]
The Bible states that the purpose of sex is to fertilize a woman, and God, for example, punishes Onan, who wastes his semen, with death. [16]
The religious discourse, in particular Christians, Muslim and Jew values the virginity of the young girl before the marriage and associates the deflowering with the idea of fertility. On the wedding night, is the first time that the bride and groom have sex with each other. The young couple is advised and even ordered to have sex on the first night after marriage.[ citation needed ]
Fertility rites or fertility cult are religious rituals that are intended to stimulate reproduction in humans or in the natural world. Such rites may involve the sacrifice of "a primal animal, which must be sacrificed in the cause of fertility or even creation".
In Arabian mythology, Hubal was a god worshipped in pre-Islamic Arabia, notably by the Quraysh at the Kaaba in Mecca. The god's idol was a human figure believed to control acts of divination, which was performed by tossing arrows before the statue. The direction in which the arrows pointed answered questions asked of the idol. The specific powers and identity attributed to Hubal are equally unclear.
Hieros gamos, or hierogamy is a sacred marriage that takes place between gods, especially when enacted in a symbolic ritual where human participants represent the deities.
al-Lat, also spelled Allat, Allatu, and Alilat, is a pre-Islamic Arabian goddess, at one time worshipped under various associations throughout the entire Arabian Peninsula, including Mecca, where she was worshipped alongside Al-Uzza and Manat as one of the daughters of Allah. The word Allat or Elat has been used to refer to various goddesses in the ancient Near East, including the goddess Asherah-Athirat.
Umm ʿUbays or Umm ʿUmays was a companion of the Islamic prophet Muhammad.
ʿAbd al-ʿUzzā ibn ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib , better known as Abū Lahab was the Islamic prophet Muhammad's half paternal uncle. He was one of the Meccan Qurayshi leaders who opposed Muhammad and was condemned in Surat Al-Masad of the Quran.
Al-Ḥārith ibn ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib was one of the uncles of Muhammad. He was the son of Abd al-Muttalib, of the Quraysh in Mecca, by his first wife, Sumra bint Jundab, who was from Hawazin tribe. For a long time his father, who took from him the kunya Abu al-Harith, had no other children.
Ruqayya bint Muhammad was the second eldest daughter of the Islamic prophet Muhammad and Khadija. She married the third caliph Uthman and the couple had a 2 sons Fadl ibn Uthman Abd Allah. In 624, Ruqayya died from an illness.
Khunays ibn Ḥudhāfa was a companion of Muhammad. He died at the beginning of twenty-five months after Muhammad went to Medina.
Alfred Guillaume was a British Christian Arabist, scholar of the Hebrew Bible / Old Testament and Islam.
Kenana ibn al-Rabi' also known as Kenana ibn al-Rabi'a and Kenana ibn al-Rabi ibn Abu al-Huqayq, was a Jewish Arab tribal leader of seventh-century Arabia and an opponent of Muhammad. He was from the Arab tribe Banu Nadir. He was a son of the poet al-Rabi ibn Abu al-Huqayq. Ibn al-Rabi' was killed during early Muslim clashes with the Banu Nadir.
Fihr ibn Malik, is counted among the direct ancestors of the Islamic prophet Muhammad. In the lineage of Muhammad from Adnan, he precedes Muhammad by eleven generations.
Ḥabiba bint Jaḥsh was a female companion of Muhammad.
The postulation that Allah originated as a moon god first arose in 1901 in the scholarship of archaeologist Hugo Winckler. He identified Allah with a pre-Islamic Arabian deity known as Lah or Hubal, which he called a lunar deity. This notion has been dismissed by modern scholarship as being without basis.
Rayṭa bint Abī Ṭālib, was a companion and first cousin of the Islamic prophet Muhammad.
Sumra bint Jundab, also known as Ṣafiyya bint Junaydib, was the first wife of Abd al-Muttalib.
Banu 'Akk or simply 'Akk, was one of the main pre-Islamic Arab tribes. The tribe inhabited Yemen in the Jahiliyyah.
Sirat Rasul Allah is a biography of the Islamic prophet Muhammad. Ibn Hisham published a further revised version of the book, under the same title Al-Sirah al-Nabawiyyah.