Asherah Quotes

“From the Religious Revolution of Akhenaten in Ancient Egypt,
To the demonisation of Jezebel in the Bible, and the others who followed,
We are the light, shining truth upon all the deceit, we come, and we go, and we come back again.”
― Lord Avatar II, The Righteous Jardacia

“Eve is a different sort of girl. She tries to make herself fit. She works tirelessly, exhaustingly at it. There certainly is a safety to the prescribed, neat little boxes. But the snake touches an ache that finds healing in every hiss. And when Eve sits at the roots of the tree, they wrapped around her like a mother's hug, welcoming her home, too.

She breathes in the mossy bark, the flowers that grow around it, finds comfort in the way the wind whistles through its dancing leaves. In reply she murmurs, not a prayer, but a portrait of the seeds she hides in the depths of her soul. And the tree at the heart of the walled garden called Paradise listens.

Sometimes, she thinks, I am not the name he's given me and therefore maybe neither is the grass or that animal in the distance or even the sky.

Words become their own walls of sort, especially when everything is made to fit his definition.

Eve swears she can feel a rumble from deep within the bark, a bumble bee's hum. If you wish to own something, you give it a name, comes the answer. If you wish to know something, you listen to what it tells you.

Yes, the snake hisses.

- excerpt from “Her True Name: A Story from the Grandmother Tree” – featured in Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree.”
― Ellie Lieberman

“Isis
Astarte
Diana
Hecate
Demeter
Kali
Inanna


Over and over their voices filled the
air calling in these Ancient ones,
their energies, magic and wisdom,
their rage and righteous anger as
shouts of No More and Never Again
filled the air.
 
Asherah
Erishkigal
Cerridwen
Brigid
Maat
Hathor
Freya
Skadi
Sigyn


Voices invoked the battle energies
as the Warrior Goddesses arrived.


Lilith
Andraste
Durga
Athena
Hel
Mami Wata
Pele
Ixchel
Freya
An’ Morrighan
Boudicca of the Iceni
Zenobia of Palmyra
Lakshmi Bai of Jhansi


Through the night they chanted
the invocation “show us another way”
to the ancient Mothers, Queens,
Warrioresses, Witches.


Voices raising power and
raised IN power as both
Queen Boudicca and
An’ Morrighan
held the circle, swords in hand
symbols of both peace and truth
as well as strength and protection.


Eyes of the night still held vigil
for this sacred activist work
as each woman plucked
her part of the web
weaving new threads of hope
and spinning the wheel of change.


Fox, wolf and coyote
opossum, turtle and deer
bear, raccoon and hare
held vigil as the
moths danced,
spiders wove webs,
and serpents shed skins
no longer needed,
all while the calls of the
owls and night birds echoed
in synchronous harmony.


As the darkness of night
gave way to the light
of a new dawn, the Ravens
and Crows and birds of the day
arrived calling out as the
women prayed their work
had been enough to alter
the events of this day...


They prayed it was enough
to alter the events
of the Coming Days.


As they walked back
through the woods,
sunlight streaming through
the trees and with eyes still
watching, the women held the
Rim of the Eternal Circle
safely in their hearts and womb space,
encased in a deep knowing that


Whatever this new day held...


Whatever and Whomever was to come...


Their work, the ancient ways and this
Rim of Power would always continue


For the Circle never ends and the
Weaver always weaves.

Excerpt from "Holding the Rim", featured in Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree”
― Arlene Bailey

“So, what have the redactors left us?

They replaced El with Yahweh and soon erased Asherah. She ends up being Yahweh’s consort for a while and then Baal’s consort so she can be demonized along with him and the rest of the host of heaven. We are left with only hints of the divine feminine—the tree of life in the garden of Eden, wisdom (Sophia) as the fruit-bearing tree of life to those who lay hold of her, the prophetess and judge Deborah rendering her judgements under her tree.

Some of the redactions are almost blatantly obvious. For example, in Genesis 49:25, the male god bestows “blessings of the breasts and of the womb.” In Deuteronomy 32:18, there is a reference to the male “god who gave you birth.”

We have also lost much of Asherah in the archeological record because most of her representations were trees and carved wooden images—items from the natural world that can easily be cut down and burned. But traces of her can still be found there.

-Excerpt from “Roots Too Deep for the Redactors,” featured in, Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree.”
― Duann Kier

“The story of the bible is the redacted or rewritten version of a narrative portraying Yahweh as not only the only god of Israel, but portraying him as the one and only god. There were no others. And there had definitely never been a Goddess Asherah worshipped on the high places or in the temple. She was reduced to just a tree or wooden pole known as the asherah or the asherim.

-Excerpt from “Roots Too Deep for the Redactors,” featured in, Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree.”
― Duann Kier

“When we partake of her fruit as Eve did, our eyes are open to all knowledge and understanding. We become divine. We learn to look inward rather than outward for our reference points and find we are connected to all that there is—both the physical and nonphysical. There is no need to worship anyone or anything outside of ourselves for all is made of the same essence.

And she is returning.

This time she will be coming with her own Elohim. These powerful ones will set the record straight about our origins and history, including religion. They will set the record straight about the Heresy of Monotheism—that the One Original Source of All Creation does not equate to one male god who demands obedience and worship at the threat of torture and death.

-Excerpt from “Roots Too Deep for the Redactors,” featured in Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree.”
― Duann Kier

“Asherah was the Goddess of sacred trees. She embodied Mother Earth, representing fertility and, some would say, the Tree of Life. As the embodiment of Mother Earth, she is a protector and provides a safe container for us all.
-Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree”
― DeeAnna Merz Nagel

“Goddess Asherah guides us to embrace the sacred wisdom of the trees—rooted, resilient, and ever-nurturing. Through scent, ritual, and remembrance, we call upon her presence, finding sanctuary in her embrace and strength in her deep, grounding power.
-Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree”
― DeeAnna Merz Nagel

“The ancient land of Canaan was home to a pantheon of gods and goddesses worshiped by the Israelites and the Canaanites. Among them stood Asherah, whose name was uttered in hymns and prayers within the walls of the Jerusalem temple and in the ancient city of Bethel (Ackerman 1993). Consort to the chief Canaanite god, El, later, Yahweh, Asherah held a prominent place in the hearts of the people. In the Bronze and Iron age Asherah was worshipped as the primordial mother goddess or “creatress of the gods,” and revered as the mother of 70 gods (Martin-Gardner 2020). She was considered the matriarch (Creatress) and El was the Patriarch (Creator). Asherah's historical importance as a powerful divine figure has been concealed, causing her influence and legacy to fade into obscurity over time.

While Hellenic and Celtic goddesses are receiving increasing recognition, Canaanite goddesses like Asherah are just beginning to regain popularity, allowing for her prominence to be restored as a deity in the modern world. Archaeological evidence recovered Ugaritic texts (before 1200 BCE), and the King James version of the Bible reveal that Asherah was widely regarded and worshiped.

“Goddess Asherah, Queen of Heaven, Creatress of Gods” - Featured in Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree.”
― Deanna Marie Riddick PhD

“Given that Asherah (Athirat) was an ancient goddess, widely worshipped, and at times, officially sanctioned, how did she disappear entirely into the sands of time? How did the wife of Yahweh disappear?

Even a cursory review of the Old Testament reveals how Asherah was perceived as a monster, an abominable figure whose worship would later become prohibited. She was consciously eradicated from worship by religious authority figures.

Excerpt from “Goddess Asherah, Queen of Heaven, Creatress of Gods” - Featured in Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree.”
― Deanna Marie Riddick PhD

“The suppression of Asherah as a powerful supreme deity compels us to question prevailing narratives of the divine. In the modern world the divine consists of a male dominated perspective, that being God the father, with the maternal aspect being deliberately erased. Modern religion often leads us to believe that creation is a solitary endeavor, despite the reality that it is a result of the union between male and female. In contemporary society, the divine feminine remains largely unrecognized, yet women are working to make the divine more inclusive by reintroducing goddesses like Asherah and reclaiming their ancestral power. By unearthing Asherah’s history, we have the opportunity to restore her rightful place amongst the powerful goddesses of the past.

excerpt from “Goddess Asherah, Queen of Heaven, Creatress of Gods” - Featured in Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree.”
― Deanna Marie Riddick PhD

“Asherah’s roots are an ancient patient potency with their own uncompromisable Source. Her patience guarantees her potency. We are her walking trees.”
-Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree”
― Trinity Thomas

“You know of a girl and her apple,” The old woman's voice is steady, cutting through the noise. A patient presence that ensnares even the attention of the trees, their branches and thinning leaves stilling as the tongues below them do, too. “Or some version of it. You know of the snake, wise and guiding. The 'me too' and 'I know the way because I've walked the path' in its hiss and slither. But you do not know the tree itself.”

And her story begins.

You do not know the tree itself, but once you did. Once, all did. Every house had an altar and there the pillar sat. But, by the time the books were written, they found her impossible to erase, so they took her name and called her nothing but an object.

It is no accident that the fruit and the snake found home in a tree. Just as it is no accident that the tree becomes a stationary fixture. But, surely, it, too was just as breathing, just as alive.

As the old woman in red speaks, the children's very imaginations dance wildly around her blaze, some primal knowing stirring deep within.

They meant to bury her, but like most of the stories they tried to eliminate through the permanence of ink and binding of pages, they hadn't realized she became a seed. A dew drop on all of our own spiderwebs, if we care to listen.

The more you listen, the more you hear. You see. You feel. And the more you come to know…

-Excerpt from “Her True Name: A Story from the Grandmother Tree” – featured in Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree.”
― Ellie Lieberman

“I call on your many names!
Inanna!
Asherah!
Ishtar!
Astarte!
Isis!
Aphrodite!
Great lady of the stars, sea and soil!!

From the Kopet Mountains to the Caspian Sea,
From my heart to the vault of the skies,
I am devoted to you in all languages and in all hearts,
And in all your names.
in all the rain soaked earth and in all the stars.
Asherah I cherish you,
My unbridled Queen of queens,
I bow to you,
I am bound to you,
Oh Sacred heart,
Great goddess of love and hate,
Of life and death, of passion and peace,
Of all the holy contradictions,
maiden of the ascension and descension,
of the looping serpent’s Ouroboros,
Guide me through my darkness,
So I may see the light.
So that I may rise from the fall,
With the wings of the dawn,
of your everlasting Arammu
Of your all-embracing Ahavah!

Excerpt from “Asherah: High Queen of Queens” - Featured in Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree.”
― Katie Ness

“Unnamed She:

I sustain all who seek out my shade and feed all who gather my dates. I am the Life-Giving Tree!

An icon, crafted from hands that praised me long ago. Place me in your sacred spaces.

I am the Pillar
Trace my triangle of life
I am the Life-Giving Tree

Asherah:

I am the Word and in the beginning was my lullaby. My song soothed the crying babe of Creation.

I am the Life-Sustaining Tree. All are welcome in my shade. All can be fed from the fruit of my branches. All can be soothed from the breeze rushing through my leaves.

I am the beginning
I am the creatrix
I am the eternal Tree of Life

Featured in Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree.”
― Hayley Arrington

“For she was not uprooted, she did not disappear. Her worship continues, in other forms and names. Images of a life-giving Goddess identified with trees, poles, and pillars are found everywhere in women's folk art and ceremonial customs throughout North Africa and the Near East. The Tree of Life remains a central symbol in textile motifs, jewellery designs, and seasonal ceremonies.”
― Laura Shannon, Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree

“According to Miriam Robbins Dexter, another possible Semitic root of Asherah is the Hebrew ʾāšar, 'to tread, to go straight on.' In the footsteps of the women, in their procession from water source to threshing ground under gentle raindrops from the sky, carrying their wooden pole dressed as a divine female figure to whom they pray for rain, I see how Asherah too, treads on. Even if hidden from view, her worship was not eradicated after all. It simply went underground, like streams of precious water. This water is there, for those with eyes to see. And it flows straight on.”
― Laura Shannon, Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree

“My name is so depthful, the casual observer only sees my surface. I invite you to dive into my essence, to explore my beauty and to share my visions.

I am the tree, the grove, the coolness of the mist-filled orchard. Like tree-rings, I am multi-layered. Like leaves which rustle in the wind, I whisper in harmony with the energies of the land. I am bones, trunk, spinal column, sap, blood. We are the same, you and I. Play with me in the forests, in the loamy soil of the earth, in the salt-filled vessel of the oceans, in the rapids of fresh waters, in the root systems that connect us all.

I fly and remain rooted. I reach out and stay centered. Singing is the workforce of my Goddesshood. My melodies lay out vibrational pathways for life’s journeys. My song-fueled undulations dance along with the tidal currents of the air.

Time moves, landscapes change, the song remains. . .and holds within, the ancestral memories and collected wisdoms of the Great Mystery.

I am the Great Goddess who birthed you. I am the egg, the seed, the sacred cauldron of life. The Song behind the song! Let me hold you, bathe you in my vibration, sing love songs. I will guide you to all the treasures I embody.”
― Janet Rudolph, Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree

“In my training as a psychologist and sex therapist, I have spent years helping others reclaim their bodies from the grip of trauma, repression, and disconnection. I have seen firsthand the ways in which the body becomes a battleground, the ways we learn to leave ourselves in order to just survive… to get by with the bare minimum. But I have also witnessed the profound healing that comes when we return—not just to sensation, but to reverence.

When I move, when I breathe with awareness, when I touch my own skin with kindness, I am not merely engaging in self-care. I am performing a ritual of reclamation. I am standing at the base of the Mother Tree, placing my hands against her bark, feeling the pulse of something ancient move through me. This is what I invite those I work with into—not just healing, but remembering.”

-Dr. Denise Renye, excerpt from “The Embodied Goddess: Healing, Sensuality, and the Legacy of Asherah” - featured in our upcoming anthology, Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree.”
― Denise Renye

“To reclaim the Mother Tree is to reclaim ourselves. It is to honor the body as holy ground, to see pleasure as prayer, to root into the truth that we were never meant to be separate from the Divine. In my own life, this has meant surrendering to the wisdom of my own rhythms, embracing slowness, honoring desire, and trusting the deep knowing that lives in my body.

For those of us who have spent years estranged from ourselves, this is not always an easy journey. There are times when the old stories—of unworthiness, of shame—rise up like ghosts among the roots. But the tree is patient. She waits for us to return, offering her strength when we feel weak, her shade when we need rest, her roots when we long for grounding.”

-Dr. Denise Renye, excerpt from “The Embodied Goddess: Healing, Sensuality, and the Legacy of Asherah” - featured in our upcoming anthology, Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree.”
― Denise Renye

“Fortunately for us, the roots of the mother tree were too deep for these redactors. Asherah can still be found throughout the texts if one looks closely. It is in the very fact that most of the biblical narrative is about unsuccessfully trying to eradicate her. The most glaring examples are how many of the kings and their wives were condemned by the Yahweh prophets for still paying homage to her. And the only kings who are judged good in the narrative are those who keep having to destroy any signs of her presence over and over again.

-Excerpt from “Roots Too Deep for the Redactors,” featured in Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree.”
― Duann Kier

“Asherah is the Great Mother Goddess and the Queen of Heaven. She is among the most powerful members of the Elohim, the host of heaven who came to earth. She taught us how to work with mother nature as an active life force of our planet, and she left us the Tree of Life as her representation.

When we partake of her fruit as Eve did, our eyes are open to all knowledge and understanding. We become divine. We learn to look inward rather than outward for our reference points and find we are connected to all that there is—both the physical and nonphysical. There is no need to worship anyone or anything outside of ourselves for all is made of the same essence.

-Excerpt from “Roots Too Deep for the Redactors,” featured in Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree.”
― Duann Kier

“This time she will be coming with her own Elohim. These powerful ones will set the record straight about our origins and history, including religion. They will set the record straight about the Heresy of Monotheism—that the One Original Source of All Creation does not equate to one male god who demands obedience and worship at the threat of torture and death.

We hasten her return by nurturing the mother tree of life still alive within each one of us. We ground our roots and fortify our trunks and spread our branches to the sky—connecting our place here on earth with her place in heaven. We stop giving our fruit to those who demand our blind faith and devotion whether they be family, friends, co-workers, bosses, businesses, religious institutions or political parties. We connect our roots with others who are of like mind and spirit and from where we give and receive nourishment.

And we each celebrate her return in our own ways. We gather our wood. We kindle our fires. We pour our libations. We do our weaving. We knead our dough. We bake our cakes and mark them with her image. We make offerings to her on high places and under every green tree.

She calls not for our worship, but for the embodiment of our divinity.


-Excerpt from “Roots Too Deep for the Redactors,” featured in, Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree.”
― Duann Kier

“The roots of the mother tree were too deep for the redactors of the biblical narrative, and her roots are still too deep for the archeologists who desire to relegate her representations to mere fertility or sex objects. That is not who she is and it is not who we are.

She could not be eradicated.

And neither can we.

-Excerpt from “Roots Too Deep for the Redactors,” featured in, Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree.”
― Duann Kier

“As a tree goddess, Asherah connects us all just as trees connect the earth to the sky. Yet, she, like trees, does more than that. In a way, perhaps, she is the Jewish version of Gaia. For, trees provide animals, including humans, with food, medicine, and shelter. Their leaves provide cool shade from the heat and their bodies warmth in the cold. Trees keep soil in place and displace the heat generated within cities. Trees also delight in the joy of existence and the renewal of the seasons as they bud and flower and their early lime green leaves emerge. Trees trap carbon from the atmosphere and are essential for mitigating the ravishes of patriarchal environmental destruction. We need to plant more of them, not just in the high places but everywhere.

Excerpt from “Asherah and the Trees” - Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree.”
― Ivy Helman

“If it wasn’t for the campaign of King Josiah, Asherah might still be a significant figure within Judaism. In the first temple, built by King Solomon, there were her ritual objects (2 Kings 23:4) and an image of her (2 Kings 23:6). In addition, women would spend time in the temple weaving for Asherah (2 Kings 23:7). She was worshipped on high places and poles were erected in her honor (2 Chronicles 14:3). In addition, throughout Canaan and the lands of Judah and Israel, where the Israelites lived, there was regular worship by the Israelites of various other deities as well: the sun, the moon, the stars, and the hosts of heaven (2 Kings 23:5). It was only with the reforms of King Josiah, who reigned from roughly 640 to 610 BCE, that the argument for monotheism came to the fore, and even he struggled to instill it resorting to violent clashes with adherents. In the end, his reforms did succeed, and it is often said that his ending of Israelite polytheism also signifies the end of the worship of Asherah and the other Israelite/Canaanite deities.

While this is the case with other deities, it is not the case with Asherah. She appears in various forms with-in Judaism.

Excerpt from “Asherah and the Trees” - featured Asherah: Roots of the Mother Tree.”
― Ivy Helman