Vestal Virgins and Sex Magick

Ishtar, the Great Whore of Babylon, was sometimes called the Goddess Har since she was the mother of the Harlots. These Harlots were not prostitutes as we know them, but priestesses, sorceresses, prophets, and healers. Sacred Whores were known sometimes as the Holy Virgins of Goddesses such as Ishtar, Asherah, or Aphrodite. The famous Vestal Virgins were thought to have practiced secret sex magical rites in honor of the Roman Goddess Vesta, the same as the Greek goddess Hestia -- Goddess of the Hearth, or "center of the world."

"Virgin" did not mean possessing an intact hymen. A virgin was simply an unmarried woman, a woman who claimed ownership of herself. Think of Athena, the maiden goddess who jumped off a cliff rather than submit to wedlock. We see a similar story in the Hebraic tradition where Lilith, unwilling to subjugate herself to Adam in the male-dominant missionary position, exiled herself from paradise in exchange for her own sovereignty.

But Holy Whores weren't man-haters. Their function was dispensing the grace of the God/Goddess through sexual worship by sharing their bodies with worthy initiates and with each other.

The European idea of going into a womblike space -- cave, pit, hole, lake, or river -- in order to attain a new life of spirit stems from the Neolithic period (approx. 15,000 b.c.e. - 5,000 b.c.e.). During this time the common belief system deemed the main God/Goddess female. Gods were primarily consorts for the Great Goddess or her sons, such as Horus and Jesus. Reunite the polarities, put the Virgin Mary back together with Mary Magdalene and you have a Holy Whore who is the mother of a man/god, or evolved into.