Adonis is the Greek version of the Semitic Adonai, "The Lord," a castrated and sacrificed savior-god whose love-death united him with Aphrodite, or Asherah, or Mari. In Jerusalem, he was
known as Tammuz.
Adonis was born at Bethlehem, in the same sacred cave that Christians later
claimed as the birthplace of Jesus.1 He was the son of the Virgin
Myrrha, a temple-woman or hierdule, identified with Mary by early Christians who called Jesus's mother Myrrh of the sea.2 Myrrh was a symbol of the Lord's death, in both pagan and Christian traditions. He returned to his Great Mother, the sea, Aphrodite-Mari. Alenandrian priestesses celebrated the event by
throwing the god's image into the sea.3
Syrian Adonis idea at Easter time, with the flowering of the red anemone,
supposedly created from his blood. Its name was derived from his title, Naaman,
"darling." He was also called the Beautiful God, like other gods of the spring
flowering, such as Narcissus, Antheus, Hyacinthus.
Another form of the same god was Anchises, castrated after his mating with
Aprhodite. Adonis, too, was castrated: "gored in the groin" by Aphrodite's
boar-masked priest. His severed phallus became his "son," the ithyphalic god
Priapus, identified with Eros in Greece or Osirir-Min of Egypt. Priapus carried
a pruning knife in token of the Lord's necessary castration before new life could appear on the earth.4
Castrating the god was likened to reaping the grain, which Adonis
personified. His rebirth was a sprouting from the womb of the earth. Each year,
sacred pots called kernosor "gardens of Adonis" were planted with
millet or wheat, and allowed to sprout at Easter. The custom was followed in
Mediterranean countries up to the present century.5 The clay pot
signified the womb. Sometimes in processions it was a gigantic kernos
carried on a chariot, having the special name of kalanthos.6
Adonis died and rose again in periodic cycles, like all gods of vegetation
and fertility. He was also identified witht he sun that died and rose again in
heaven. An Orphic hymn said of him: "Thou shining and vanishing in the beauteous
circle of the Horae, dwelling at one time in gloomy Tartarus, at another
elevating thyself to Olympus, giving ripeness to fruits."7 He was
buried in the same cave (womb) that gave him birth. It was now the Milk Grotto,
whose dust is supposed to benefit bursing mothers; it was said Mary nursed Jesus
there.8 The Grotto was sealed as Jesus's sepulchre, for in the cults
of both Jesus and Adonis the virgin womb was the same as the virgin tomb,
"wherein never man before was laid."9
The Magic Papyri10 said Jesus and Adonis also shared the same
name-magic. "Adonai" was the highest god, having the true name that could work
miracles.11 Centuries later, Christian authorities declared that "Adonai" was a demon.
References and Notes: