Woman Girt with a Sword
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Let the woman be girt with a sword before me - Liber Legis, III:11
What does it mean for a woman to be 'girt with a sword'? Intuitively I am reminded of the words attributed to Isis:
I am the female who has made herself male.
...as well as verse 114 from The Gospel of Thomas:
Jesus said, "Look, I will guide her to make her male, so that she too may become a living spirit resembling you males. For every female who makes herself male will enter the kingdom of Heaven."
Are thses all talking about the same concept? If so, then what are they implying? Is it a reference to women aquiring an active rather than a passive nature?
R.E.D.
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"Are thses all talking about the same concept? If so, then what are they implying? Is it a reference to women aquiring an active rather than a passive nature?"
I'm not sure if they are talking about the same concept but, and I'm taking a shot in the dark here, I think this 'becoming male' thing is referring to the creative force of the universe which is a symbolicly Phallus.
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@Red Eagle of Death said
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"Let the woman be girt with a sword before me - Liber Legis, III:11"What does it mean for a woman to be 'girt with a sword'?"
There are at least a couple of levels.
At one level, the sword is specifically a symbol of the intellect. Though it may seem bizarre a century after the Aeon began, the basic meaning in this sense is that a woman is to have (and own) a mind of her own and to develop and deploy her intellect. - In 1904, this was a radical concept.
Another level of sword symbolism is the pure idea of the weapon, especially as a symbol of freedom.
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@Jim Eshelman said
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@Red Eagle of Death said
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"Let the woman be girt with a sword before me - Liber Legis, III:11"What does it mean for a woman to be 'girt with a sword'?"
There are at least a couple of levels.
At one level, the sword is specifically a symbol of the intellect. Though it may seem bizarre a century after the Aeon began, the basic meaning in this sense is that a woman is to have (and own) a mind of her own and to develop and deploy her intellect. - In 1904, this was a radical concept.
Another level of sword symbolism is the pure idea of the weapon, especially as a symbol of freedom."
That's great. I always tend to forget placing works in their own time and the first level explained by you is probably spot on.
Thanks for this insight. -
This is an old post but Ive been thinking about this verse lately, in the exact same terms as the OP. Studying the symbols of alchemy we have the red king and white queen who represent on one level the uniting of opposites. Now these energies are something internal that get projected and ideally integrated, but what about a society where the gender division is blurring/loosening? I'll be honest, the other day this verse popped in my head and I imagined a transexual archetype, or at least a feminine energy that had balanced its masculine energy. So i did a search on here and I can see I'm not the first to think about it in that terms. Anyway, I'm posting an article here about a sexual practice called pegging that we will all probably become more familiar with as it creeps up from the fringe into common knowledge: jezebel.com/5987888/if-you-want-a-more-thoughtful-boyfriend-try-pegging-him
Guys who identify as hetero, imagine yourself in this role and imagine what that would do to your psyche in a ritualistic context.
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"Girt" is the past tense of "gird" which means to surround or enclose.
The most direct meaning was mentioned by Jim.
To expand a bit on it and interject some of my own thoughts:
A woman "girt with a sword" posses her own mind, her own sense of individual being.
Considering in the terms of a relationship,
Both the Man and Woman are two distinct wholes, that upon forming a relationship create a third.