Showing posts with label Queen of Heaven. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Queen of Heaven. Show all posts

Monday, October 17, 2011

Christian Queen of Heaven

Virgin Mary

There is also another Queen of Heaven:

"The Catholic teaching on this subject is expressed in the papal encyclical Ad Caeli Reginam,[1] issued by Pope Pius XII. It states Mary is called the Queen of Heaven because her Son, Jesus Christ, is the King of Israel and heavenly King of the Universe. In the Hebrew tradition, the mother of the king is the queen (see queen mother). Catholic dogma (Apostolic Constitution Munificentissimus Deus) states that the Virgin Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory.

The title Queen of Heaven has long been a Catholic tradition, included in prayers and devotional literature, and seen in Western art in the subject of the Coronation of the Virgin, from the High Middle Ages, long before it was given a formal dogmatic definition status by the Church. For centuries, Catholics, while reciting the Litany of Loreto were already invoking Mary as "Queen of Heaven".
(wikipedia)

Queen of Heaven

The women added, “When we burned incense to the Queen of Heaven and poured out drink offerings to her, did not our husbands know that we were making cakes impressed with her image and pouring out drink offerings to her?”
Jeremiah 44:19

 למלכת השׁמים  to the queen of heavens

The Book of Jeremiah takes us to early 6th century Judea in the Babylonian period. We hear the women talk about their and their agreeing husbands religious worship of Queen of Heavens. The people of Jerusalem burn good smelling incense to make her happy, bake for her cakes and pour out drink offerings at altars. As is the habit in religions all over the world.

In the Bible a female sky goddess is mentioned only in the Book of Jeremiah, once in Chapter 7:18 and four times in chapter 44 verses 17-19 and 25 in strongly cultic context. She is not just a religious idea in some belief system but gets active worship from her followers.

This goddess is probably related to the ancient Mesopotamian divinity known as Ishtar, goddess of love, bright planet Venus of the early morning and a beautiful sight in the evening after sunset when prostitutes went to their work in the streets of Babylon.

"Queen of Heaven was a title given to a number of ancient goddesses in the ancient Mediterranean and Near East, in particular Anat, Isis, Innana, Astarte. Hera and possibly Asherah (by the prophet Jeremiah). Elsewhere, Nordic Frigg also bore this title. In Greco-Roman times Hera, and her Roman aspect Juno bore this title. Forms and content of worship varied."
(wikipedia)