Customer Reviews

Evoking the Primal Goddess: Discovery of the Eternal Feminine Within (Llewellyn's New World Magic Series)

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Despite the completely erroneous hyperbole on the back cover, in which it is stated that; "For the first time ever, [Gray] shows that the search for the Holy Grail was actually a movement within the Christian Church to bring back the feminine element into the concept of Deity." (So typical of Llewellyn Press' self-aggrandizement and their seeming complete lack of knowledge of what's been published outside of their own little myopic press.) there is nothing new in this little volume, except perhaps, Gray's truly bizarre and completely irrelevant flights of fantasy. These totally ridiculous tangents abound throughout this little volume and appear to be nothing more than deluded ramblings designed merely to add pages to this anemic little tome. Two of the most laughable of these irrelevant flights of fancy include a truly weird four and a half page explanation of how primitive man must have perceived the "...Space-beings that commenced our initial insemination" (pg. 74) which reads like some rejected scrap of script for a Star Trek episode. The other is two pages exploring the question of whether or not, "...Forming a feminine Goddess-Ideal will not promote homosexuality among males." Gray is so far out of his element at this point as to simply leave one scratching one's head in wonderment as to how this kind of tripe actually makes it into print in this day and age. Though the book was printed in 1989 Gray's thinking here reads more like turn of the century. (the 20th, not the 21st.)

Gray also has a propensity for stating his fantastic ideas as facts with absolutely no reference to sources, but then, this too is a trademark of Llewellyn press in general. But the book is not all trash. If you filter out the bizarre tangents and clumsy filler you'll find a few pearls. Gray's explanation of how the feminine aspect of the Eucharist was removed by the Western Church is both relevant and interesting. And statements such as, "In our times we have not as yet encountered an Avatar capable of convincing our consciousness as to the validity and practical application of acceptable God concepts, or else we have met far too many of them to cope with comfortably." and, "Virtually all the legends connected to with the Grail leave those familiar with it in no doubt of it's feminine significance." Show that Gray is not completely in the dark about what he's talking about, alien insemination of the human race notwithstanding.

Be that as it may, if you are interested in the topic of this book then do yourself a favor, look into Gareth Knight's "Evoking the Goddess" and leave this little beauty for the New Age wingnuts and the UFO chasers. Otherwise, buy this book for the fifteen or twenty percent of it that has something of value to say. Overall, it is a strange read indeed.

I would like to know where Anotherheathen has seen literature stating that the search for the Holy Grail was actually a movement within the Christian Church to bring back the feminine element into the concept of Deity other than in this book. I haven't seen any. Also, I never thought of Lllwellyn Publishing as being self-aggrandizing, but I have been disappointed with them in recent years because they seem to publish mostly shallow pulp for the masses who want to dabble very lightly in the occult. This book was obviously written before that time.

As for what the primitives thought of the "aliens," I don't know why Anotherheathen thinks that is something of major importance to be complained about. It doesn't take much of a stretch of the imagination to figure out why the primitives thought they were gods. My guess is that they were Atlanteans. Prior to that time, Atlantis was situated in the area of the current British Isles indicating that that was the real cradle of civilization, not the Middle East, as those who would do anything to maintain male domination of both religion and the world want you to believe. According to Beaumont's "The Riddle of Prehistoric Britain," (and he states that he can prove all that he says) that area was hit by a comet which changed the earth's axis, not to mention devastated the area and changed the climate to a much harsher one than previously enjoyed. Many survivors of this catastophe left the area and scattered all over the world. These people were so far ahead of peoples in other parts of the world in evolvement and technological advancement that it's not hard to imagine that when they arrived in other lands, the primitive inhabitants thought they were gods. I have no personal objections to Gray's dramatization of their meeting in order to make the book more readable.

Gray spends a lot of time on ancient history, giving me almost more than I want to know or could find interesting, which tends to make the book bog down a bit in the middle, but I'm glad I pursued it to the end because of all the wonderful words I would have missed had I given up. True he is not saying anything new when he says that there is an imbalance between the male and female principles in religion and the world that is causing major problems that may end in the total destruction of this planet. But why get upset about the fact that it's not new. The upsetting part is that nothing has been done about the situation. There has been no change in the twenty years since this book was written, and we still seem to be headed down the road to destruction. Men are stil insisting on dominating the world no matter what the cost to everybody.

Gray says that we must change our way of thinking and worshipping as individuals and as a group if we want to have a truly peaceful world to live in. Many women and a few men have changed by leaving the orthodox churches and joining Wicca and other goddess religions, but apparently not enough to make the orthodoxy realize there is something fatally wrong with their churches.

My take on men is that they have an incredible fear of their feminine sides, so much so that they'd rather die than admit they have one even though they were made that way for a good reason, a beneficial reason just as women are made with a masculine side for a beneficial reason. Gray explains this beautifully showing that it's not only not something to fear but something to cultivate, even revel in. The power of man and woman working together is power indeed.

There are a few tidbits in the history part that I think would probably curl the hair of Catholic and Protestant clergy alike if they read them. In particular I liked the part about how a virgin birth was effected in ancient days. It reminds me of Clinton's famous comment, "I never had sex with that woman." I couldn't stop laughing when I read the explanation of a virgin birth. I could just see pompous old priests and fundamentalist preachers turn red and start sputtering when they read that. Or maybe it wouldn't be good if they read it. Some of them might have heart attacks on the spot. I would think that most certainly they would try to get this book banned as blasphemous.

As far as history is concerned, Gray's guess is probably as good as anybody's. I don't think anyone knows for sure what happened in the past, especially the far past. After all, it's a common but true saying that "History is written by the victors." However, I believe it is possible to piece a lot of things together if you are enough of an open-minded and independent thinker to read widely and draw your own conclusions.

I very highly recommend this book to everyone everywhere.

Despite the completely erroneous hyperbole on the back cover, in which it is stated that; "For the first time ever, [Gray] shows that the search for the Holy Grail was actually a movement within the Christian Church to bring back the feminine element into the concept of Deity." (So typical of Llewellyn Press' self-aggrandizement and their seeming complete lack of knowledge of what's been published outside of their own little myopic press.) there is nothing new in this little volume, except perhaps, Gray's truly bizarre and completely irrelevant flights of fantasy. These totally ridiculous tangents abound throughout this little volume and appear to be nothing more than deluded ramblings designed merely to add pages to this anemic little tome. Two of the most laughable of these irrelevant flights of fancy include a truly weird four and a half page explanation of how primitive man must have perceived the "...Space-beings that commenced our initial insemination" (pg. 74) which reads like some rejected scrap of script for an X-Files episode. The other is two pages exploring the question of whether or not, "...Forming a feminine Goddess-Ideal will not promote homosexuality among males." Gray is so far out of his element at this point as to simply leave one scratching one's head in wonderment as to how this kind of tripe actually makes it into print in this day and age. Though the book was printed in 1989 Gray's thinking here reads more like turn of the century. (the 20th, not the 21st.)

Gray also has a propensity for stating his fantastic ideas as facts with absolutely no reference to sources, but then, this too is a trademark of Llewellyn press in general. But the book is not all trash. If you filter out the bizarre tangents and clumsy filler you'll find a few pearls. Gray's explanation of how the feminine aspect of the Eucharist was removed by the Western Church is both relevant and interesting. And statements such as, "In our times we have not as yet encountered an Avatar capable of convincing our consciousness as to the validity and practical application of acceptable God concepts, or else we have met far too many of them to cope with comfortably." and, "Virtually all the legends connected to with the Grail leave those familiar with it in no doubt of it's feminine significance." Show that Gray is not completely in the dark about what he's talking about, alien insemination of the human race notwithstanding.

Be that as it may, if you are interested in the topic of this book then do yourself a favor, look into Gareth Knight's "Evoking the Goddess" and leave this little beauty for the New Age wingnuts and the UFO chasers. Otherwise, buy this book for the fifteen or twenty percent of it that has something of value to say. Overall, it is a strange read indeed.