|
History
The Time
Before
(before 2335 BCE) |
| During
the Neolithic Age, before the beginning of written history, the
traditions of human civilization were handed down from one
generation to the next through the maternal lineage. Mankind
worshipped mostly female goddesses, and the Great Mother was their supreme deity. The Sumerians called her
Nin-hursag or Antum.
Ishtar, who was known
by her Sumerian name Inanna (= Queen of Heaven), was only a minor
goddess in this time, since motherhood was not part of her cult.
Then, when the male
kings of the urban centers gained power, and when man began to write
down human history, the female goddesses were successively replaced by
predominantly male gods.
While the
mother goddess lost her dominant position, the violent and sexual aspects
of the war goddess Inanna, fitted much better into the new patriarchal society
turning her soon into the most important
female goddess in the Middle East. |
Image of the Great
Mother
|
|
Ina
Palę Ištar
(2334 BCE - 2124 BCE) |
Sargon was the
cupbearer of King Ur-Zababa of Kish. As the illegitimate son of an Inanna-priestess, who was traditionally not allowed to bear children,
He describes his childhood as following:
 My
mother was a priestess, my father I knew not. The brothers of my father
loved the hills. My city is Azupiranu, which is situated on the banks of
the Euphrates. My priestess mother conceived me, in secret she bore me.
She set me in a basket of rushes, with bitumen she sealed my lid. She
cast me into the river which rose over me. The river bore me up and
carried me to Akki, the drawer of water. Akki, the drawer of water, took
me as his son and reared me. Akki, the drawer of water, appointed me as
his gardener. While I was a gardener, Ishtar granted me her love, and
for fifty-four years I exercised kingship.
[Sargon of Akkad}
When Sargon had a dream
about gaining the favor of Inanna, and the king of Kish being drowned by
the goddess, King Ur-Zababa made several attempts to murder Sargon, but
the goddess Inanna saved his life every time. Finally Sargon
overthrew Ur-Zababa and proclaimed himself the new ruler of Kish. Immediately
he started a rebellion against King Lugalzagesi of Uruk, the capital of
Sumeria. Four years later he defeated the army of Lugalzagesi and captured
him. Then in 2334 BCE Sargon took the title of "King of the Four
Quarters" and founded Akkad, the new capital of the Ina
Palę Ištar,
the first multiethnic, centrally ruled empire of human history.
He
had neither rival
nor equal. His splendor, over the lands it diffused. He crossed the sea
in the east. In the eleventh year he conquered the western land to its
farthest point. He brought it under one authority. He set up his statues
there and ferried the west's booty across on barges. He stationed his
court officials at intervals of five double hours and ruled in unity the
tribes of the lands. He marched to Kazallu and turned Kazallu into a
ruin heap, so that there was not even a perch for a bird left.
[Chronicle of the
Early Kings]
Sargon captured Mari,
Yarmuti, and Ebla as far as the Cedar Forest (Amanus) and the silver
mountain (Taurus). The Reign of Ishtar secured trade routes and supplies
of wood and precious metals could be safely and freely floated down the
Euphrates to Akkad. In
the East, Sargon defeated an invasion by the four leaders of Elam, led by
the king of Awan. Their cities were sacked; the governors, viceroys and
kings of Susa, Barhashe, and neighboring districts became vassals of the
Reign of Ishtar, and the Akkadian language became the official language of
international discourse.
Afterward
in his old age all the lands revolted against him, and they besieged him
in Akkad; and Sargon went forth to battle and defeated them; he
accomplished their overthrow, and their wide spreading host he
destroyed. Afterward he attacked the land of Subartu in his might, and
they submitted to his arms, and Sargon settled that revolt, and defeated
them; he accomplished their overthrow, and their wide spreading host he
destroyed, and he brought their possessions into Akkad. The soil from
the trenches of Babylon he removed, and the boundaries of Akkad he made
like those of Babylon. But because of the evil which he had committed,
the great lord Marduk was angry, and he destroyed his people by famine.
From the rising of the sun unto the setting of the sun they opposed him
and gave him no rest.
[Chronicle of
the Early Kings]
When Sargon of Akkad died
in 2279 BCE his empire immediately revolted upon hearing of the king's
death. Most of the revolts were put down by his son and successor Rimush,
who managed to keep the Reign of Ishtar together as the dominating power
of the Middle East.
Kings List of the Ina
Palę Ištar
| Name |
From |
To |
Years |
Relation |
Comment |
| Sargon |
2334 |
2279 |
56 |
|
Founder
of the empire |
| Rimush |
2278 |
2269 |
9 |
son |
|
| Manishtishu |
2269 |
2254 |
15 |
brother |
|
| Naram-Sin |
2254 |
2218 |
36 |
son |
|
| Shar-Kali-Shari |
2218 |
2193 |
25 |
son |
|
| Interregnum |
2193 |
2190 |
3 |
4
kings fighting for power (Igigi, Nanum, Imi, Ilulu) |
| Dudu |
2190 |
2169 |
21 |
son |
|
| Shu-Turul |
2169 |
2154 |
15 |
son |
Fall
of Akkad, capital moved to Uruk |
| Ur-Nigin |
2154 |
2147 |
7 |
|
First
king of Uruk to rule the empire |
| Ur-Gigir |
2147 |
2141 |
6 |
son |
|
| Kuda |
2141 |
2135 |
6 |
|
|
| Puzur-Ili |
2135 |
2130 |
5 |
|
|
| Ur-Utu |
2130 |
2124 |
6 |
son
of Ur-Gigir |
Destroyed
by the Gutian hordes |
After the death of Shar-Kali-Shari
four kings fought for the rule of the empire. This interregnum took three
years before Dudu, another son of Shar-Kali-Shari became the undisputed
King of the Four Quarters (of the world). Under his son Shu-Turul the empire was
threatened by the Gutian hordes, savage barbarians from the Zagros
Mountains. They began with hit-and-run attacks against the infra-structure
and economy of the empire, which finally weakened it, so that the Gutian
hordes managed to capture and destroy Akkad in 2154 BCE. After the fall of
the city, Uruk became the capital the Ina Palę Ištar. But the
remnants of the empire couldn't withstand the barbarian invaders for long.
In 2124 BCE the Gutian hordes defeated Uruk. Since this time the Ina
Palę Ištar
has
been without a centralized organization.
Under the barbarian terror rule, a dark age of Mesopotamia began that
lasted for about 100 years.
|
The Time
After
(2125 BCE - 1300 BCE) |
| An alliance of
Uruk and Ur managed to defeat the Gutian hordes at last and the soldiers
of Ishtar led by King Utu-Hengal of Uruk expelled them from Mesopotamia.
Nevertheless the Reign of Ishtar was not re-erected, because Uruk was not
able to maintain its dominant role among the Sumerian cities. But Ishtar
continued to be worshipped in her sacred temples all over the Middle East.
Since the beginning of
written history, the Middle East was controlled by two main powers: Egypt
in the West and Mesopotamia in the East. In Mesopotamia Sumerians,
Akkadians, Babylonians and Assyrians succeeded each other. One of their
most important rulers of these centuries was King Hammurabi of Babylonia
who created the first code of law.
But Egypt had its own problems. While the Ina
Palę Ištar
struggled with the Gutian hordes, the Old Kingdom collapsed in Egypt due
to internal tensions. After an Intermediate Period, Amenemhet founded
the so called Middle Kingdom of Egypt, which
survived until it was destroyed in
1674 BCE by the Hyksos, semitic invaders from Asia. It was them who spread the cult of
Ashtaroth, which is the Canaanite
name of Ishtar, into Egypt.
The Hyksos managed to rule Egypt for about 100 years until they were defeated
and expelled by Ahmosis BCE,
who founded the New Kingdom in 1567.
During the time of the New Kingdom it happened that a new idea was born, the
concept of monotheism. Pharaoh Akhenaten established the cult of Aten as the
new state religion. All other gods were banned from Egypt in order to break
the power of their priests. Akhenaten's fanatism and intolerance
caused a major
crisis for Egypt and its influence in the East. But after his
death the old gods returned to Egypt and the cult of Aten was wiped out
in the kingdom.
In
order to escape persecution, an Egyptian prince and follower of the cult of
Aten, allied himself with the last remaining Hyksos prisoners in Egypt. He
negotiated their release and went with them to the East, where they settled
in the mountains of the Sinai
peninsula.
 This
area was inhabited by a people who worshipped an
evil demon who
ruled from the top of a volcano
named Mount Horeb. The demon was possessed
by an uncompromising
hatred against humanity. His only desire was to
subjugate mankind and finally to destroy them by an infernal apocalypse.
In the year 1300 BCE the former Egyptian prince Moses united the
inhabitants of the Sinai mountains with the Hyksos refugees who fled with
him from Egypt by a covenant. Their common language should be Hebrew,
which would also become the common name of the tribes. The demon took the place of the sun
god Aten in their new monotheist cult. This way Moses imposed Akhenaten's
faith on them and pleased the evil demon of Mount Horeb.
This was how the Enemy of man and the ancient gods rose from the desert.
Soon he would threaten the whole world with enslavement and destruction.
|
Eternal
War
(1300 BCE - today) |
|
The War
Begins (1300 BCE - 720 BCE)
|
About the year 1260 BCE the united
tribes
from the Sinai mountains went eastern and invaded Canaan destroying Jericho and massacring the local
population. All temples and shrines of any other gods were destroyed
including sacred sites of the goddess Astarte, which was the name by which
Ishtar was known in this land.
The Eternal War had begun. The priests and warriors of Astarte vowed not to
rest until the cult of the Great Demon would be wiped out.
In 1024 BCE
the invaders established a
Hebrew kingdom in Canaan ruled by a hierarchy of priests of the Great
Demon who suppressed
all other religions with the help of the royal court.
|
Invasion of Cannan
|
| Due
to internal conflicts the Hebrew kingdom was divided a century later into a southern kingdom consisting of
the tribe of Judah and the independent kingdom Israel in the North. |
|
Under
economic and political pressure from the Phoenician King Ithobaal, a former
high-priest of Astarte, and the influence of his daughter Jezebel who was
married with the King of Israel, the population of the northern kingdom enjoyed a certain
religious freedom and returned to the cults of Baal, Astarte and the other
ancient gods.
But
their freedom didn't last for long. In 841 BCE religious fanatics
led by the traitor Jehu assassinated Jezebel and re-established a
fundamentalist terror regime in the name of the Great Demon.
Six
years later Queen Athalia of Judah who had supported Jezebel, was also
overthrown by the priesthood of the Great Demon. Now both Hebrew kingdoms were
ruled by religious fanatics
|
Jezebel worshipping the goddess Astarte
|
|
Ishtar's Revenge (720 BCE - 540 BCE)
|
| Meanwhile
Ishtar and Assur had become the most powerful gods of the rising
Assyrian Empire. In 722 BCE Ishtar gathered her armies and sent them
west under the command of the King of Assyria. In her name Sargon II
conquered Samaria and destroyed the
kingdom of Israel. Two years
later he ordered the total extermination of the Hebrew population. The nation of
Israel ceased to exist. Only the tribe of Judah survived in the
independent southern kingdom.
Then, in 587 BCE,
when Babylon had replaced Assyria as the most powerful empire in the
world, Ishtar launched a
final strike against her enemies. |
Sargon II
|
|
She sent the Babylonian
army to invade the kingdom of Judah, which had remained under the yoke of
the Great Demon. The Babylonians conquered
Jerusalem, and destroyed the unholy temple of the demon. The population was killed
or abducted to Babylon. The cult of the Great Demon was discontinued.
After this
decisive victory the priests and warriors of Ishtar believed the
war to be finished and their task to be fulfilled. They were not aware of occult activities of the surviving
slaves of the Great Demon, and so they committed a fatal error.
Recovery of the Great Demon (550 BCE - 1 CE)
|
|
In 539 BCE the Persian
King Cyrus I conquered the Babylonian Empire. The cult of Ishtar lost its
predominant role in the Middle East and therefore was unable to
prevent Cyrus from ordering a new colonization of Judea and the
reconstruction of the vanished cult of the Great Demon.
Some of the colonists of Judea
were survivors from the tribe of Judah. Others were Babylonians or slaves, who had
been freed after the fall of the Babylonian Empire. Together they formed the
Jewish people and bowed down to the Great Demon. |
Cyrus I
|
| For
several centuries Judea remained under Persian rule. But finally the
Persian Empire was destroyed by Alexander the Great. After his death
his empire fell apart and the War of the Diadochi broke out. It was
a time of permanent fights between the rival successors of the great
conqueror. |
|
Judea came under the
rule of the Seleucid dynasty. In 167 BCE the Seleucid King Antiochus IV, abolished the
cult of the Great Demon in Jerusalem and the surrounding land on the pain of death. And soon the followers of the
Great Demon started
a revolt against the Seleucid rulers.
While
the Seleucids had to fight a war with the rising Roman Republic at the
same time, the Jewish revolt was successful, and protected by Rome an
independent Jewish theocracy was established.
Judea stayed under Roman
influence for the next centuries, though Herod Antipater was formally
imposed as King of Judea and Samaria by the Roman generals Octavian and
Anthony. |
Antiochus IV
|
|
Rise of Christianity (1 CE - 310 CE)
|
In
30 CE the charismatic Jewish preacher
Jesus of Nazareth was captured and executed.
However his disciples stole his corpse from the tomb and created the myth
of his resurrection using his name to spread their new sect of the Great
Demon even among non-Jews. Soon they became known as "Christians".
While the Great Demon attempted to spread his cult all over the Roman Empire, his
followers became more and more fanatic.
Because of their hatred against
the Roman civilization and eager to see the coming of the apocalypse, the
militants of the Great Demon caused the Great Fire of Rome in an unprecedented terrorist
attack, which destroyed a major part of the Roman capital. Finally the
Roman Emperor Nero realized the threat of the Great Demon and his cult was banned. Many
of his followers were arrested and executed. |
Jesus of Nazareth
|
| A
few years later, after an ill-fated
Jewish uprising Roman troops finally destroyed the temple of the Great
Demon in
Jerusalem. However the Jews attempted another revolt in 133. When this
last rebellion was crushed, the Roman Emperor Hadrian renamed the city in
'Aelia Capitolina'.
The Jewish nation ceased to exist. Hadrian
banned any Jew from entering the city, but they were allowed to travel
once every year to a fragment of the destroyed temple, the western wall,
which became known as the Wailing Wall. |
|
After centuries of
fainthearted persecutions by the Roman authorities, it was Emperor Diocletian
who
undertook finally a last serious attempt to stop the cult of the Great
Demon.
Christianity was banned in the whole Empire, all churches were destroyed,
The scriptures of the Great Demon were burned and his clerics arrested. However this last
persecution was unsuccessful, and Diocletian had to retire two years
later. Christianity had become one of the most important religions in the
Roman Empire. |
Diocletian
|
|
The Defeat (310 CE - 630 CE)
|
|
In 313 CE the Roman
general
Constantine defeated his rivals for the throne and became Roman Emperor.
He favored the cult of the Great Demon in order to bring the empire under one emperor and one god.
So he made Christianity into the official state religion.
The Great Demon had finally defeated the
ancient gods and established himself as the supreme god. Meanwhile the emperor
held the Council of Nicea, where the Christian religion was unified
into the "Catholic Church", and the the bible was issued as the
holy scripture of the new cult. |
Constantine
|
| After
many years of harassment against pagan religions, Emperor
Theodosius banned all
religions that didn't worship the Great Demon in the whole Roman
Empire in the year 392 CE. All
temples were closed or destroyed, their priests were murdered,
libraries burnt and philosophers persecuted. Women lost more and more
their civil rights and were banned from education. The Roman Empire was divided and decayed.
The surviving
followers of Astarte fled southwards out of the reach of the Roman persecutors.
In 610 CE the Arab caravan
guide Mohammad mingled the cult of the Great Demon with Arab traditions creating a new religion - Islam.
In 622 Mohammad and his disciples were expelled from
their home town Mecca by the pagan rulers and asked for refuge in the
mainly Jewish settlement of Yathrib. |
|
After
continued raids against the caravans from Mecca by Muslim thugs, a pagan
militia was formed in Mecca to deal with the new threat. In a
last attempt to stop the expansion of Mohammad and his fanatic followers,
the Meccan leader Abu Sufyan and his wife Hindah attacked Yathrib with a
major army, but finally failed to capture the city. It became obvious that
Mohammad's new religion could not be stopped anymore.
In 630 CE the
followers of Mohammad, conquered Mecca. All temples were destroyed. |
Abu Sufyan fighting
the Followers of Mohammad
|
|
At their last stand in the temple of al-Uzza (Arabic name of Ishtar), the
goddess ordered her followers to continue the Eternal War against the
Great Demon.
She appointed the sentinel who should keep the
memory of the goddess throughout the age of darkness, which was about to
come, and prepare her return.
The Great War
was lost. It was the end of the age of the ancient gods. Mankind had
fallen into the hands of its worst enemy, and the Great Demon began
to dominate the earth.
The Age of Darkness (630 CE - 1500 CE)
|
|
The Age of Darkness had
begun. The progress of human civilization had come to a sudden halt for an
entire millennium. There were no remarkable historic events for almost 1000
years. Europe suffered from the black plague and religious suppression.
Heretics and pagans were persecuted by the witch hunters of the
inquisition. The followers of the Great Demon fought cruel wars among themselves.
Torture and genocide were the only answers for anybody who questioned the
rule of the Great Demon. |
Inquisition
|
|
Rebirth of the Gods (1500 CE - 1790 CE)
At the end of
the fifteenth century a neo-platonist movement called
"Renaissance" (= rebirth) rose in Florence and spread soon all
over Europe.
Ancient arts
and culture were rediscovered, and the Florentine banker Cosimo de Medici
founded the Neo-Platonist Academy where neo-pagan classicism was openly
taught.
Civilization and science began to recover from one millennium of
stagnation under the oppression of the Great Demon..
|
|
In 1492 neo-pagan secret societies infiltrated high ranks of the
Catholic Church.
One of their leaders, Rodrigo Borgia, even achieved to become pope. He and
his daughter Lucrezia used their power to destroy the Church from within.
The Great Demon had lost control over his most powerful institution, and it had
turned against himself.
Borgia's successor Giovanni de Medici provoked the beginning of the Reformation, when his openly profane politics became
too obvious to the
public. |
Lucrezia Borgia
ruling the Vatican
in absence of her father Pope Alexander VI (Rodrigo Borgia)
|
| The
Christians
started to fight cruel wars among themselves, like the Peasants' Rebellion
in 1524 CE and the Thirty-Years-War 1618 CE - 1648 CE. Thus they were unable to
keep mankind under their yoke or to take efficient measures against the
hidden menace of neo-paganism and atheism which threatened the rule of the
Great Demon.
Fall of the Church
(since 1790 CE) |
In 1789 the pagan Jacobin Club starts a
revolution in France. The nobility and the clerics of the Great Demon were
systematically executed. The worship of a pagan Goddess of Reason became
the new state religion in France.
When Napoleon Bonaparte assumed power in France,
he destroyed the rule of the radical
Jacobins but also the power of the Holy Roman Empire and the Catholic Church.
TheGreat Demon had finally lost any direct political power, and secular
governments were established all over Europe. Freedom of religion has become one of the
most important civil rights of modern society. Pagan gods can openly be
worshipped in the Western world without the fear of being persecuted.
|
Liberty Leading the
People
|
Today
neo-pagan religions like
Wicca and Asatru begin to rise and are already the fastest growing
religions in North America and Europe. The ancient gods are about to return.
And together with them, Ishtar will return.
|
|
The history of
Ishtar's rule on earth.
Click on one of the four eras above for more detailed information.
|
