KEYWORDS: Empowerment, desire.

The Strength card symbolizes the total integration and exaltation of the desire-nature. Women’s sexuality, which has so long been suppressed and treated as something dirty and sinful, is in fact a cornerstone of our empowerment.

I chose Asherah to symbolize this integration and resurgence of women’s sexual power and energies. She represents the persistence and tenacity of woman’s strength. She was worshipped in her temples as an upright pillar called an “Asherah.” The patriarchal Hebrews were horrified by their god Yahweh’s matriarchal predecessor, and they waged a centuries-long campaign against her joyfully orgiastic rites. Asherah was a key figure in the earlier matriarchal Hebrew religion. Evidence of the persistence of Goddess-worship within the Yahwist Hebrew tradition can be found in many biblical passages, for example (II Kings 17:9): “and the people of Israel did secretly against the Lord their God things that were not right. They built high places, set up pillars and asherim on every high hill and under every green tree, they served idols, made molten images of two calves, they made an Asherah and sold themselves to do evil in the sight of the Lord.”

The Levite priesthood was in fact the only segment of the Jewish religion that failed to defect, from time to time, back to the idyllic “milk and honey” matriarchal past. It was this priesthood that denounced the sexually autonomous woman with her ecstatic self-affirming rites, thus laying the groundwork for the denial of matrilineal descent and property ownership. Quite simply, to control women’s sexuality is to control women and all of society.

Another biblical passage indicates the lack of religious tolerance afforded the followers of Asherah (Exodus 34:11-16): “But ye shall destroy their altars, break their images and cut down their groves, for thou shalt worship no other god, for the Lord whose name is …. is a jealous God.”

In biblical Canaan the powerful ancient goddess was known by many names: Asherah, Astarte, Ashtoreth, Attoret, Anath, Elat or Baalat. Sumerians called her Ashman, “strength of all things” and a “kindly bountiful maiden.” Asherah is translated “grove,” without any explanation that the sacred grove represented the Goddess’s genital center, birthplace of all things. The pillar may stand as a single tree to represent the whole grove.

The Hebrews should in no way be singled out as “defeaters of the matriarchy,” as they were simply another cog in the wheel of a global patriarchal onslaught. The resistance by ancient Jewish women was fierce; but, as in all other cultures, they eventually succumbed under the power of the sword.

Originally, male ascetic practices seem to have evolved from a notion that extreme forms of self-denial would bring them the magical female capacity to give birth. Oriental myths claim that the first creatorgods acquired the ability to produce living things by “practicing fierce asceticism for 10,000 years.”

Sexuality is a very important facet of life. All religious beliefs which deny or limit this form of expression only serve to create deep-seated blockages and fears which fragment the psyche and, ultimately, society and the religions themselves.

Asherah, the Canaanite goddess, is shown naked riding her sacred lion. She has curly hair and she holds lilies and serpents in her upraised arms. The serpents in her hands symbolize her connection to oracular duties. Unlike some older versions of this card, she and the lion are as one; this unity is a metaphor for the total integration of the desire-nature, which leads to the integration of mind, body and spirit. How can one be whole if any part is disowned or fragmented?

The astrological ruler of this card is Leo. A large, bright yellow sun appears in the upper left corner, beaming its solar power on Asherah. The sun is also most powerfully expressed in the sign Leo. She appears in the desert at an oasis of sorts with an “Asherah” or upright pillar to her right.

Drawing this card is an indication that you are truly in touch with your own power and strength. Wherever it appears in a reading it denotes empowerment. You and your body and desires are in harmony. The serpent power or kundalini is rising inside you as you become more alive.