The Queen of Heaven

The Queen of Heaven
Loren Spendlove, PhD
One of my favorite hymns growing up spoke not only of a father in heaven, but also
of a mother in heaven. The final lines of that hymn teach this unique Christian doctrine that
we also have a heavenly mother:
In the heav'ns are parents single?

No, the thought makes reason stare!
Truth is reason; truth eternal
Tells me I've a mother there.
When I leave this frail existence,

When I lay this mortal by,
Father, Mother, may I meet you
In your royal courts on high?
Then, at length, when I've completed

All you sent me forth to do,
With your mutual approbation
Let me come and dwell with you1 [bolding mine].
Sixty years after this poem was set to music, Susa Gates, a leader of the women’s
organization of my church, wrote that our divine Mother is enthroned side by side with our
divine Father2 Even though this belief in a mother in heaven is in sharp contrast with
mainstream Christian beliefs, it has always felt right to me; in modern parlance I could say
that it speaks to my soul. Although this doctrine was not frequently taught in my Sunday
school classes, every now and then it would surface in a lesson, and every time it did I would
experience a sense of completeness knowing that I had two divine parents and not just one
unknowable and impersonal creator.
In this paper I present and synthesize the ideas of Margaret Barker3 – who I believe to
be a modern Christian Kabbalistic theologian – along with the observations of other scholars
1 Snow, Eliza R., Times and Seasons, 20 (1845): 1039. Snow’s poem was originally published under the title
My Father in Heaven, in October 1845 in an Illinois newspaper called The Times and Seasons. The words of
the poem were later set to previously scored music by James McGranahan. In 1856 the poem was
republished in a book of Snow’s poetry and renamed Invocation, or The Eternal Father and Mother.
2 Gates, Susa Y., “The Vision Beautiful,” Improvement Era 23, 6 (1920): 542.
3 A Methodist theologian and biblical scholar, Margaret Barker was awarded the Lambeth degree of Doctor of
Divinity by the Archbishop of Canterbury “in recognition of her work on the Jerusalem Temple and the
origins of Christian Liturgy.”
relative to the Queen of heaven. The Queen of heaven has many names, including the Lady,
the Shekhinah, and Wisdom, but Barker appears to prefer Ashratah, a name which is
etymologically related to, but should not be confused with, Asherah. Gesenius asserts that
Asherah (‫)א ֵׁש ָרה‬

ֲ is derived from the word ashar (‫)א ַׁשר‬,
ָ which means:
1. To be straight, right, especially used of a straight way, hence also of what is upright,
erect, whence comes the signification of firmness and strength, in the Talmud.
2. to guide, or lead straight.
3. to pronounce happy, or fortunate4 [bolding mine].
Although Barker does not provide the Hebrew spelling for Ashratah, she maintains
that it is derived from Athirat, a Ugaritic word. Like ashar, “the name meant ‘the one who
makes happy’ or ‘the one who keeps you on a straight path’.”5 However, Barker claims that
the Deuteronomist editors of the bible replaced Ashratah with Asherah, and that “with its
Canaanite associations, [this] was a way for later scribes to denigrate the Lady of
Jerusalem.”6 The temple priests “called the temple tree that Josiah removed an Asherah, but
all the Hebrew inscriptions with a similar name have it as Ashratah.”7 Even though they were
able to change Her name in the biblical text, they were unable to change physical inscriptions
which still bear the original name.
The Queen of Heaven and the Shekhinah
Barker connects the Queen of heaven, or the Lady of the temple, with the Divine
Presence, the Shekhinah that is mentioned in the Sefer HaBahir, an early Kabbalistic work.8
Of the ten attributes or emanations of Ein Sof (Endless or Infinite), called Sefirot, the last
4 Gesenius’s Hebrew and Chaldee Lexicon to the Old Testament Scriptures, (Samuel Bagster & Sons,
Limited, London, 1857), LXXXVIII, s.v. ‫א ַׁשר‬.ָ
5 Barker, M., Wisdom. The Lady of the Temple in a Lead Book from Jordan (2017), 5. Retrieved from: http://
www.margaretbarker.com/Papers/default.htm
6 Barker, M., The Lady known to Isaiah (2013), 7. Retrieved from:
http://www.margaretbarker.com/Papers/default.htm
7 Barker, M., Restoring Solomon’s Temple (2012), 5. Retrieved from: http://www.margaretbarker.com/Papers/
default.htm
8 The Sefer HaBahir (also known as the Book of Illumination) is attributed to Rabbi Nehunia ben haKana. In
this paper I use an English translation by Aryeh Kaplan.
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(Malkhut) is identified with the Shekhinah. Regarding the means of communication between
heaven and the material world, Barker writes: “The third power collects and transmits the
powers of the upper three powers to the seven lower powers, and the tenth power [Shekhinah]
transmits all the seven powers into the material world.”9 As such, in kabbalistic tradition the
Shekhinah becomes the point of contact between God and this lower world.
One the cherubim in Isaiah’s vision called out: “Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of
hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory” (Isa 6:3). In the Sefer HaBahir we read:
What is the meaning of, “the whole earth is filled with His glory”? This is the earth
that was created on the first day. It is on high, filled with God’s glory and paralleling
the Land of Israel. And what is [this glory]? It is Wisdom, as it is written (Proverbs
3:35), “The wise shall inherit glory”10 [bolding mine].
Likewise, the Shekhinah is connected with Wisdom and with the Lady of the temple.
The Lady is the mediator between God and His creations on earth; She bridges the chasm
between heaven and earth. As Devine explains: “The ‘lower’ Shekhinah [Malkhut] absorbs
the emanations and channels them to earth; she is ‘mediator’ between God and humanity, the
heavenly and corporeal worlds.”11 This mediating role of the Shekhinah has its “deepest roots
in traditions that surface in the Sefer HaBahir – traditions concerning Wisdom, the Queen of
heaven, and the lost Lady of the temple,” a role which many Christians also ascribe to Mary,
the mother of Jesus.12
However, the idea that the presence of God, or Shekhinah, is a feminine emanation or
creation is unique to Jewish kabbalah. Scholem informs us that:
In talmudic literature the Shekhinah is never a symbol of the feminine;… The
Shekhinah, in talmudic literature, is always simply God himself, that is, God insofar
9 Barker, M., “The Images of Mary in the Litany of Loreto,” Usus Antiquior, 1, 2 (2010), 129.
10 Kaplan, A., Sefer HaBahir, chapter 130.
11 Devine, L., “How Shekhinah Became the God(dess) of Jewish Feminism,” Feminist Theology, 23, 1 (2014):
76.
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as he is present in a particular place or at a particular event…. The noun is used only
to signify God's "dwelling," his presence, and never that of any created being.
Nowhere is it separated from God himself.13
In other words, the sages of the Talmud did not consider the Shekhinah to be a
separate entity from God; the Shekhinah was not a uniquely created being, nor was the term
considered feminine in nature. The fact that the word was a feminine noun was considered as
merely a grammatical coincidence. The word Shekhinah (‫ )שכינה‬is not found in the
Masoretic text of the Bible; rather, it is first encountered in the writings of the talmudic sages.
It is only from the kabbalistic conception of the Shekhinah that we can conceptualize a
distinct separation between God and his Shekhinah. In kabbalistic literature the Shekhinah
took on the female roles of queen, wife, lady, lover, mother, and daughter. Through this
literature we are able to link specific feminine aspects of God – the Queen and the Lady –
with the Shekhinah.
Barker asserts that in ancient Jewish sources the Shekhinah, or Lady of the temple,
had a central role in ancient temple worship:
Several passages in later Jewish mystical texts, the Merkavah texts, have suggested to
scholars that drawing the LORD or the Shekinah down into the temple was a major
element of the temple service. Moshe Idel concluded: ‘We can seriously consider the
possibility that temple service was conceived as inducing the presence of the
Shekinah in the Holy of Holies’.14
Josiah’s Reforms
According to Barker, Israelite temple worship underwent a significant and destructive
“cultural revolution” during the reign of king Josiah, just a few decades prior to the sacking
13 Scholem, G., Origins of the Kabbalah, (The Jewish Publication Society, Princeton, 1987), 163.
14 Barker, M., The Temple Roots of the Liturgy (2000), 5. Retrieved from:
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of the first temple.15 In fact, she makes the bold assertion that “before the Babylonians looted
and destroyed the temple buildings in about 600 BCE, Josiah had destroyed the first temple
cult.”16 How did Josiah accomplish that? In 623 BCE Josiah “began a series of violent purges
to rid his kingdom of the older ways, which he regarded as impure (2 Kings 22-23).”17 Many
of the original furnishings of the temple were removed, including the “golden chariot of
cherubim”18 (c.f. 1 Chronicles 28:18), and “all traces of a female figure, represented by a
great tree, which he burned by the sacred spring and had its ashes beaten to dust and
scattered.”19 This temple revolution was not new to Josiah’s time: “From the end of the eighth
century BCE, the time of the prophets Hosea and Isaiah, there had been pressures building in
Jerusalem to change the ways of the temple.”20 However, “the obvious moment for the final
and decisive rejection of Wisdom was Josiah’s purge.”21
Weinfeld wrote of the sacred marriage, or hieros gamos – “the union of the bride (the
Shekhinah) with the Holy One” – and of the Asherah, the sacred tree. “Both these phenomena
[the sacred marriage and the sacred tree] stand at the centre of Jewish mysticism (the so-
called Kabbalah) and have been brought to full expression in the texts of this movement.”22
He added: “The moment we move to the First Temple Period, the evidence about hieros
gamos [sacred marriage] and the Sacred Tree becomes more tangible and concrete.”23
16 Barker, M., First Temple Symbolism in the Fourth Gospel. Who Were the Jews? (2012), 1. Retrieved from:
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20 Barker, M., Restoring Solomon’s Temple (2012), 1-2. Retrieved from:
21 Barker, M., Wisdom and the Other Tree: A Temple Theology Reading of the Genesis Eden Story (2012), 2.
Retrieved from: http://www.margaretbarker.com/Papers/default.htm
22 Weinfeld, M., “Feminine Features in the Imagery of God in Israel: The Sacred Marriage and the Sacred
Tree,” Vetus Testamentum, 46, 4 (1996): 515.
23 Weinfeld, M., “Feminine Features in the Imagery of God in Israel: The Sacred Marriage and the Sacred
Tree,” Vetus Testamentum, 46, 4 (1996): 522.
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Weinfeld argued that it is at this point, during the first temple period, that we can witness the
adoration of the Queen of heaven.
The biblical account (2 Kings 24:1-4) informs us that the destruction of the temple in
586 BCE occurred because of Judah’s wicked kings, Manasseh in particular. There is an
inference in these verses that the kings had allowed and encouraged corrupt practices to
flourish in the temple. However, a non-biblical account (1 Enoch 93:9) “says that this was a
period when the temple priests lost their spiritual vision and abandoned Wisdom, and so the
temple was burned and the people were scattered.”24 The Wisdom that the temple priests had
abandoned was the Queen of heaven, or Ashratah. Barker asserts that She was always part of
the temple worship from the days of Solomon, and that “the monotheism that we now assume
as the religion of Israel was in fact a development introduced and imposed by the
Deuteronomists as part of Josiah’s purges.”25 Patai agrees that “the worship of Asherah as the
consort of Yahweh (‘his Asherah’!) was an integral element of religious life in ancient Israel
prior to the reforms introduced by King Joshiah in 621 B.C.E.”26
While Josiah claimed to be purging Canaanite cultic idols from the temple27 – more
specifically, the worship of Asherah – he was actually removing “the religion of the
patriarchs as described in Genesis.”28 God appeared to Abraham at the “oak of Moreh” where
he also built an altar to the Lord (Gen 12:6-7). Likewise, his grandson Jacob had a dream in
Bethel in which he also saw God, “and he took the stone which he had put under his head and
set it up for a pillar and poured oil on the top of it” (Gen 28:18). Judging by today’s religious
paradigm, these acts of Abraham and Jacob could possibly be considered as idolatrous.

25 Barker, M., First Temple Symbolism in the Fourth Gospel. Who Were the Jews? (2012), 5. Retrieved from:
26 Patai, R., The Hebrew Goddess, (Wayne State University Press, Detroit, 1990), 53.
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In 2 Kings 22 we are told that a “book of the law” was found while Josiah was
remodeling the temple. In chapter 23 we read that after reading this book, Josiah “brought out
the Asherah from the house of the LORD” and had it burned in the Kidron valley (verse 6).
This is when “the law” was enthroned in the place of Wisdom, or as Barker explained, “the
symbol of the Lady was dragged from the temple and burned, and the Law of Moses replaced
whatever she had been.”29 The Deuteronomists wrote: “Keep them [the laws] and do them;
for that will be your wisdom and your understanding” (Deut 4:6). Barker makes a direct
connection between this rejection of Ashratah, or Wisdom, and the destruction of Jerusalem a
few decades later. In the first chapter of Proverbs we are told that “Wisdom cries aloud” for
her people to hear her in the streets, in the markets, and at the city gates, but they “refused to
listen” and have “ignored” all her counsel. Wisdom then warns of the impending calamities
that will come upon the people, “for the simple are killed by their turning away, and the
complacence of fools destroys them” (verses 20-32).
The Effects of Josiah’s Purges
Barker believes that due to the influence of Josiah’s reforms during the first temple
period, “in the second temple period, texts were changed: the praise of Wisdom became the
praise of the Law.”30 For example, she cites a text from the book of Baruch as being an
obvious reworking of another from Proverbs:
Baruch 4:1 Proverbs 3:18

She is the book of the commandments of [Wisdom] is a tree of life to those who lay
God, and the law that endures for ever. All hold of her; those who hold her fast are called
who hold her fast will live, and those who happy.
forsake her will die.
In the verse from Proverbs we are told that Wisdom is a tree of life and that all who
“hold her fast” are happy. We saw similar wording to this when we defined the word ashar –
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to pronounce happy, or fortunate. It becomes even more obvious that Baruch 4:1 was
reworked when we read the next three verses in the book of Baruch:
Turn, O Jacob, and take her; walk toward the shining of her light. Do not give your
glory to another, or your advantages to an alien people. Happy are we, O Israel, for
we know what is pleasing to God (Baruch 4:2-4).
In these three verses we find descriptors that apply much more to Wisdom, the tree of
life, than to the law. For example: “take her” in verse 2 is nearly the same as “lay hold of her”
in the verse from Proverbs. The references to the shining light and glory are also symbols of
Wisdom, not of the law. Finally, “happy are we” and “called happy” are synonymous phrases.
This point is especially driven home when we read chapter 4 in context. The first word, She,
cannot be talking about the “book of the commandments” because book (‫ )ספר‬in Hebrew is a
masculine noun. However, in Baruk chapter 3 She is clearly identified as Wisdom: “they
perished because they had no Wisdom, they perished through their folly. Who has gone up
into heaven, and taken her, and brought her down from the clouds?” (Bar 3:28-29) Finally,
as contrasted with the law, 42 times in the Hebrew bible we read that “mercy endures
forever” (c.f. 1 Chron 16:34, Psa 106:1, Jer 33:1), but nowhere are we told that “the law
endures forever.” More than likely Baruch 4:1 originally read something like this: Wisdom
She is the book of the commandments of God, and the law that endures for ever. All who hold
her fast will live, and those who forsake her will die.
Barker added that “the practice of changing older Hebrew texts has long been
recognised, but described as ‘restorations of the scribes’. The scribes removed what later
generations perceived as blasphemies. “In other words, the religion changed and so the holy
texts had to change too.”31 The scribes had two distinct objectives when making revisions to

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the biblical text: to purge any mention of the Lady; and, to remove all references to the “sons
of God.” Barker continued:
So sensitive was the matter of the sons of God – the angels – that when the Hebrew
text clearly said ‘sons of God’ it was forbidden to translate it that way. Thus R Simeon
b. Yohai, in the mid-second century CE, said the words had to be translated ‘sons of
noblemen’, and he cursed anyone who translated the words as ‘sons of God’.32
Barker also outlines another possible change in the Hebrew text, this time with the
vowels, that she believes directly affects one of the names of the Queen of heaven – Qudshu,
or the Holy One. In 1 Kings 14:23-24 we read: “They built for themselves high places and
pillars and Asherim on every high hill and under every green tree, and there was also a male
prostitute [‫ ָק ֵדׁש‬qadesh] in the land.” Barker comments:
This sounds suspicious – one male prostitute – but if the word is read with different
vowels, it is the name Qudshu, one of the many names of the Lady. It means ‘Holy
One’. The same thing happened in the account of Josiah’s purges; he removed many
male prostitutes from the temple, but with different vowels, they become holy ones,
angels (2 Kings 23.7). Underneath the account of Josiah and the temple purges there
may once have been the Lady and her angels who were driven out.33
According to Barker, Ezekiel saw the time when the Queen Mother would be
removed from Jerusalem (Ezek 19:10-14). “The tree, which represented the Mother of the
anointed kings of Jerusalem, had been uprooted and taken to the wilderness, just as the
woman clothed with the sun had fled to the wilderness.”34

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34 Barker, M., Some Lead Books Found in Jordan (2017), 10. Retrieved from: http://www.margaretbarker.com/
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Isaiah described a time when the wicked men would “drag out the symbol of the Lady
from her hidden place in the holy of holies.”35 Those men would say: “Let him make haste,
let him speed his work that we may see it; let the plan of the Holy One of Israel draw near,
and let it come, that we may know it” (Isa.5.19). Here Barker says that there is wordplay with
the words plan and tree. Plan (‫ ֵע ָצה‬etsa) and tree (‫ ֵעץ‬ets) are visually similar, and plan could
be perceived as the feminine form of tree. “This taunt – ‘Let the plan of the Holy One of
Israel draw near, let it come, that we may know it’ – could also be: ‘Let the tree of the Holy
One [that is, the Lady] draw near, let her come that we may know her’, where ‘know’ has the
sexual meaning.”36
Isaiah’s prediction also came with a word of warning – if you remove Wisdom from
among you there will be consequences. The people “would hear but not understand, they
would see and not perceive, and their minds would be unable to comprehend. In other words,
they would be living without the gifts of Wisdom”37 (c.f. Isa 6:9). But even if the people
removed the Lady from her place, Isaiah prophesied that “there shall come forth a shoot from
the stump of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots” (Isa 11:1). “In the old temple,
the Lady Wisdom was the Mother of the Messiah, and her children were called the branches
of her tree. One of the titles for the Messiah was the Branch or the Shoot (e.g. Jeremiah 23.5-
6; Zechariah 5.12), and this is why Isaiah said that a new branch would grow up from the
stump of the tree.”38
Two Trees in the Garden
The story of the garden of Eden is really a temple story, and a story of parallels. In the
biblical account we are told that there were many trees in the garden, but two received special
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attention – the Tree of Life and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil (c.f. Gen 2:9).
Barker weaves a compelling narrative around these two trees. The Tree of Life represented
Wisdom, the Lady of the temple (since Eden was the first temple), and She offered eternal
life to all who ate of Her fruit. Adam and Eve were allowed to eat from that tree freely (Gen
2:16). “Eden was their temple, and the Lady’s tree of life fed them with her wise teaching.”39
The other tree, the one that offered knowledge of good and evil, was forbidden because it
brought only death (Gen 2:17). “All the LORD God could do was warn his Adam against it,
knowing that it would lead to death.”40 “Both were in Eden so both were in the temple.”41
This is where the story gets interesting. If the first tree represented Wisdom and
eternal life, the second tree must represent its opposite. “The other tree, which the LORD
God had warned against and forbidden, must have represented the alternative to wisdom
which had been established in the temple. It was the Law,”42 and it brought only death to
Adam and Eve. Similar to their choosing the second tree (the Tree of Law) over the Tree of
Life, Josiah and his priests chose the law over the Lady of the Temple. Both choices lead to
disastrous results; Adam and Eve were expelled from the garden and the Israelites were
exiled from Jerusalem, and their temple was destroyed. “Nobody knows the origin of the law
book in the temple, and nobody knows the origin of the second tree in Eden,”43 but we all
know how the two stories ended. Barker added: “It is not the Lady’s wisdom that now rules
our world, but the knowledge of good and evil that the snake, the great deceiver, offered to
Adam and Eve as something better. They lost everything.”44
39 Barker, M., Wisdom. The Lady of the Temple in a Lead Book from Jordan (2017), 7-8. Retrieved from:
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Jeremiah and the Refugees
According to Barker, “the second temple was very different in both form and theology from
its predecessor, and many heirs of the ancient Hebrews never accepted it as a legitimate
temple.”45 After Jerusalem was taken captive at the end of the first temple period, Jeremiah
was speaking to the Judean refugees in Egypt and told them that they needed to repent of
their evil ways, and especially their idolatry. But the people responded:
We will not listen to you. But we will do everything that we have vowed, burn incense
to the queen of heaven and pour out libations to her, as we did, both we and our
fathers, our kings and our princes, in the cities of Judah and in the streets of
Jerusalem; for then we had plenty of food, and prospered, and saw no evil. But since
we left off burning incense to the queen of heaven and pouring out libations to her, we
have lacked everything and have been consumed by the sword and by famine (Jer
44:16-18).
The refugees were convinced that the cause of their difficulties was something other
than what Jeremiah had described. This remnant of Judah “recognized that the calamity that
had overtaken them was a divine punishment for religious sin, but a sin which, they felt, they
had committed against the Queen of heaven, and not against Yahweh.”46 Jeremiah’s responses
to the refugees’ claims are somewhat enigmatic. First he asked: “did not the LORD remember
it? Did it not come into his mind?” (verse 21). This seems to infer some type of divine
approval, that the Lord had seen and remembered their offerings. However, his second
response appears to contradict that interpretation: “The LORD could no longer bear your evil
doings and the abominations which you committed.… It is because you burned incense, and
because you sinned against the LORD and did not obey the voice of the LORD or walk in his
law and in his statutes and in his testimonies, that this evil has befallen you, as at this day"
45 Barker, M., Belonging to the Temple (2007), 2. Retrieved from:

46 Patai, R., The Hebrew Goddess, (Wayne State University Press, Detroit, 1990), 63.
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(verses 22-23). His final words to the people add to the confusion; basically, he told them that
if they were intent on still offering incense and libations to the Queen of heaven to go ahead
and do it (verse 25). But, are we to understand this as sarcastic condemnation of the people’s
stubbornness or as an affirmation of their acts?
Cakes for the Queen of Heaven
In the 7th chapter of Jeremiah we are given the instructions that came to the prophet
“from the Lord” concerning the people of Judah:
As for you, do not pray for this people, or lift up cry or prayer for them, and do not
intercede with me, for I do not hear you. Do you not see what they are doing in the
cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem? The children gather wood, the fathers
kindle fire, and the women knead dough, to make cakes for the queen of heaven; and
they pour out drink offerings to other gods, to provoke me to anger (Jer 7:16-18).
Unlike the verses in Jeremiah 44 cited above, in this chapter we can clearly discern a
strong condemnation of the worship of the Queen of heaven and “other gods.” The Hebrew
word for cakes (‫ ַּכּוָ נִ ים‬kavvanim) is used only twice in the bible; it is used here (Jer 7:18) and
again in Jer 44:19, where we read:
And the women said, "When we burned incense to the queen of heaven and poured
out libations to her, was it without our husbands' approval that we made cakes for her
bearing her image and poured out libations to her?"
From these verses we can also observe several of the elements of established ritual
worship of the Queen of heaven. These include:
1. The children gathered wood;

2. The men kindled fire;
3. The women kneaded dough;
4. They made cakes for the Queen of heaven which bore Her image;
5. They burned incense to Her;
6. They poured out libations to Her, all done with their husbands’ approval.
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We can plainly see from these tasks that the worship of the Queen was a family affair
involving the children, the men, and the women; it was not just a practice relegated to the
women in Judah, although they appear to be the major participants. These “cakes” were
different from other baked goods made in Judah, as noted by Mandel:
Not only are [the women] physically baking and offering cakes; they have created
these cakes "in the likeness" of a deity. Within the context of a religious system that
ultimately bans the creation of any divine likeness …, the power implied by
images/offerings created by women would be seen as a threat.47
The unique feature of these cakes is that they bore the image of a deity, the Queen of
heaven, a practice that appears to be clearly forbidden in the ten commandments (see Exodus
20:4). Mandel also identified the offering of these cakes by women as a threat, but what kind
of threat? According to her, the ritual offering of food on the altar was the “privilege of the
men,” and that any offerings by women were suspect. The implication is that this may be a
gender-based prohibition. However, Mandel also states that “Jewish women never stopped
the task of ritual baking. Special foods for festival observances are traditionally made by
women in home kitchens. Challah baked for Shabbat tables is often understood as a
replacement for sacrificial offerings.”48 So, in Mandel’s opinion, challah (‫)חָּל ה‬,
ַ the typically
braided bread made for Shabbat meals, can be seen as a substitution for the cakes made for
the Queen of heaven by the women of Judah. Barker argues that the Queen of heaven, or
Wisdom, is the original provider of the divine bread.49 In Ben Sira we read:
Whoever fears the Lord will do this;

whoever is practiced in the Law will come to Wisdom.
She will meet him like a mother;
47 Mandel, N., “Spirituality, Baking, and the Queen of Heaven,” Nashim: A Journal of Jewish Women's
Studies & Gender Issues, 5 (2002): 49.
48 Mandel, N., “Spirituality, Baking, and the Queen of Heaven,” Nashim: A Journal of Jewish Women's
Studies & Gender Issues, 5 (2002): 49-50.
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like a young bride she will receive him,
She will feed him with the bread of learning,
and give him the water of understanding to drink.50
Elijah and the Prophets of Baal
During Ahab’s reign as the king of Israel, the northern kingdom, Elijah spoke to him
saying: “gather all Israel to me at Mount Carmel, and the four hundred and fifty prophets of
Baal and the four hundred prophets of Asherah, who eat at Jezebel's table."51 Once the
people had gathered, Elijah told them that they had to choose between YHWH and Baal, they
could not serve both. Elijah then proposed a competition – the prophets of Baal would make
an offering to their god and Elijah would make one to YHWH. Whichever sacrifice was
consumed by fire would be the winner. The story ended in utter failure for the prophets of
Baal as their god refused to light their sacrifice. On the other hand, fire came down from
heaven and consumed completely the sacrifice and the altar that Elijah had built. In the
people’s eyes this was a resounding victory for Elijah, the prophet of YHWH. Following this
success the people clamored “YHWH, he is the God; YHWH, he is the God,"52 and the
prophets of Baal were massacred at Elijah’s command.
Interestingly, Elijah had told Ahaz to invite three separate groups to the competition:
1. the people of Israel; 2. the prophets of Baal; and 3. the prophets of Asherah. We are
informed that Ahab agreed and “sent to all the people of Israel, and gathered the prophets
together at Mount Carmel.”53 However, once everyone was assembled, the gathering came
down to only a competition between Baal and Yahweh; as with the people of Israel, the
prophets of Asherah seem to have been invited as mere spectators. The prophets of Asherah
were not invited to sacrifice, and it appears that they were not taken “down to the brook
Kishon” and killed, as were the prophets of Baal. Patai commented:
50 Ben Sira 15:1-3

51 1 Kings 18:19
52 1 Kings 18:39
53 1 Kings 18:20
14
The inference must be that, not being part of the contest, no harm befell them. If so,
they must have continued unhindered to serve their goddess. Nor was "the Asherah"
which Ahab had "made" and set up in Samaria removed or in any way harmed either
as a result of Elijah's victory over the prophets of the Baal or during the remaining
years of Ahab's reign.54
So, what can we understand from this turn of events? Did Elijah consider the worship
of Asherah a sanctioned practice, or was it that her cult was not considered to be a danger
equal to Baal worship? Patai concludes that “evidently, the Phoenician Baal was the real rival
of Yahweh, not the goddess Asherah.”55 A parallel can be made with other Israelite prophets
as well. Hosea and Zephaniah were strong critics of the cult of Baal (c.f. Hos 2:13, 2:17,
13:1, Zeph 1:4), yet they did not speak out against Asherah. With the cult of Baal eliminated
it appears that any threat to the worship of YHWH was neutralized, even if the cult of
Asherah continued.
El, Asherah and Yahweh
The god El (𐎛𐎍 in Ugaritic and ‫ אל‬in Hebrew) was the principle god in the
Canaanite collection of gods. Cross noted that among the Canaanite gods, El was the “father
of the gods ('abu bani 'ilima), head of the pantheon.”56 He also observed that “the Old
Testament God of the Fathers was a family god as tradition had it, and that his proper name
was 'ēl šadday [El Shaddai].”57 Peterson added:
El was probably also the original god of Israel. In the earliest Israelite conception,
father El had a divine son named Jehovah or Yahweh. Gradually, however, the
Israelite conception of Yahweh absorbed the functions of El and, by the 10th century
B.C., King Solomon’s day, had come to be identified with him. Asherah was the chief
54 Patai, R., “The Goddess Asherah,” Journal of Near Eastern Studies, 24, 1/2 (1965): 46.
55 Patai, R., “The Goddess Asherah,” Journal of Near Eastern Studies, 24, 1/2 (1965): 46.
56 Cross, F., “Yahweh and the God of the Patriarchs,” The Harvard Theological Review, 55, 4 (1962): 234.
15
goddess of the Canaanites. She was El’s wife and the mother and wet nurse of the
other gods.58
So, according to this premise, in the beginning there was a divine family unit
consisting of El, the husband, Asherah (or Ashratah as Barker calls her), his wife, and
Yahweh, one of their sons. We learn from the Bible that El Shaddai was the name of the God
of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the Hebrew patriarchs (c.f. Gen 17:1, 28:3, 35:11, and 48:3).
However, as Peterson observed above, the functions of El, or El Shaddai, eventually merged
with those of YHWH.59 As a result, YHWH assumed the role of the principle Hebrew deity.
During the mid-1970s, Kuntillet Arjud in the eastern Sinai peninsula, close to the
border with Israel, was excavated. Found at this site were broken pottery storage jars with
drawings and ancient writing inscribed on them from approximately the 9th century BCE.
Two of the shards displayed anthropomorphic figures along with the phrases “Yahweh of
Samaria and his Asherah” and “YHWH of Têmān and his Asherah,” in early Hebrew script.60
Figure 1 displays the anthropomorphic figures found on one of the jars from Kuntillet Arjud,
and Figure 2 shows a tree of life drawn on the opposite side of the same jar, symbolic of
Asherah, or the Queen of heaven. Dever believes that the "Lady of 'Ajrûd," the seated female
figure in Figure 1, is not merely a depiction of a goddess, but that she is a specifically a
representation of Asherah. “Her appearance, both seated on a throne and mentioned in a text
coupling her with Yahweh and named as an agent of blessing, strongly suggests that she was
revered as the consort of Yahweh in some circles in ancient Israel.”61
58 Peterson, D., “Nephi and His Asherah,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 9/2 (2000): 18-19.
59 Except in Exodus 6:3, any mention of El Shaddai outside of the book of Genesis, the “El” is dropped from
the name in the Masoretic text and we are left with only “Shaddai,” an indication that El Shaddai may have
suffered a loss in prestige or honor among the redactors of the bible following the age of the patriarchs.
60 Mandell, A., “’I Bless You to YHWH and His Asherah’—Writing and Performativity at Kuntillet ʿAjrud,”
MAARAV, A Journal for the Study of the Northwest Semitic Languages and Literatures, 19, 1–2 (2012): 131-
162.
61 Dever, W., “Asherah, Consort of Yahweh? New Evidence from Kuntillet ʿAjrûd,” Bulletin of the American
Schools of Oriental Research, 255 (1984): 30.
16
Figure 1 Figure 2
Sperling
writes that “for most Israelites, Asherah and her pillar, the 'asherah, became legitimate
components of the cult of Yahweh, as shown by the new inscriptional finds.”62 However, in
contrast to the Masoretic text that has survived, “nowhere in the extant biblical texts do the
writers allow that Asherah or the 'asherah might be a legitimate component of the cult of
Yahweh.”63 Even though Asherah was worshiped by the Israelites from the conquest of
Canaan in the 12th century to the Babylonian exile in the early 6th century, she also was
Asherah was basically eliminated from the history of Israel and subsequent Judaism.
In the text of the Bible as we now read it, filtered and reshaped as it appears to have
been by the reforming Deuteronomist priests around 600 B.C., hints of the goddess
remain, but little survives that gives us a detailed understanding of her character or
nature.64
Jordanian Lead Books
Beginning in 2005, dozens of small lead books, or codices, were discovered in Jordan.
These books are small, made of ancient lead material, and are written using a mix of Hebrew
and Greek letters. Brought to the attention of the Jordanian Department of Antiquities (DoA)
in 2011, the DoA has claimed that “the codices are a kind of ‘professional’ forgery that was
62 Sperling, S., “Olyan's ‘Asherah and the Cult of Yahweh in Israel’,” The Jewish Quarterly Review, 81, 1/2
(1990): 207.
63 Sperling, S., “Olyan's ‘Asherah and the Cult of Yahweh in Israel’,” The Jewish Quarterly Review, 81, 1/2
(1990): 207.
64 Peterson, D., “Nephi and His Asherah,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 9/2 (2000): 20.
17
executed skillfully.”65 However, other than their assertion that the codices are fakes, the DoA
has not provided any evidence to support their claims. On the contrary, scientists with the
British Ion Beam Centre (IBC) “have reported that the codex did not demonstrate the
radioactivity arising from atmospheric polonium that is typical of modern lead samples,
indicating that the lead of the codex was smelted over a century ago, and is not a product of
modern-day manufacturing.”66 Matthew Hood, who has been studying these codices since
2009, added:
The level of corrosion exhibited in some of the artefacts [British spelling] within the
original collection, in particular the visible formation of mineral crystals as the metal
reverts to organic compounds, provides strong evidence of the great age of some of
these artefacts. While there may be variations in decay and corrosion that depend
upon the environmental conditions in which the objects were stored or hidden, there is
a strong underlying theme of decay from within the metal. It is oxidising and breaking
down at atomic level to revert to its natural state. This is not witnessed in lead objects
that are several centuries old and is not possible to produce by artificial acceleration
(e.g. through heating). This provides very strong evidence that the objects are of great
age, consistent with the studies of the text and designs that suggest an age of around
2000 years.67
Why all the interest in these codices, and why does the Jordanian DoA appear anxious
to prove them fraudulent? It may be a religiopolitical issue; the lead books, which were cast
rather than inscribed, are purported to contain the name of Jesus and possible images of him.
If so, they would be the earliest Christian Hebrew language documents ever found. But this
65 Mustafa, A. (2018, April 7). ‘Jordan Codices’ proven fake – DoA. The Jordanian Times. Retrieved from:
http://www.jordantimes.com/news/local/jordan-codices%E2%80%99-proven-fake-%E2%80%94-doa
66 Jordan Times. (2016, December 1). Jordan Lead Codices not modern forgeries – British experts. The
Jordanian Times. Retrieved from: http://www.jordantimes.com/news/local/jordan-lead-codices-not-modern-
forgeries-%E2%80%94-british-experts
67 Archaeology News Network. (2016, Dec 9). Jordan Lead Codices Not Modern Forgeries. Retrieved from:
https://archaeologynewsnetwork.blogspot.com/2016/12/jordan-lead-codices-not-modern-
forgeries.html#8uW2RDsPlGd1JgzA.97
18
aspect of the codices is not what interests us here. Other scholars, including Margaret Barker,
are curious about different details found on the codices. The lead books are reported to
demonstrate strong kabbalistic leanings, to contain multiple references to the Queen and the
Lady, and to display many visual depictions of the temple menorah and the tree of life,
symbols of the Queen of heaven.68
Figure 3 is a line drawing from one of the lead codices. Barker describes it as
containing two unique features that she has never seen before: the sprouting leaves at the base
of the menorah, and the 70 small circles that give the menorah its shape. The sprouting
Figure 3 Figure 4
menorah is a clear indicator that it represented a living plant, often interpreted as the tree of
life. Barker states that the “sprouting menorah was a symbol of the Lady of the first
temple.”69 Figure 4 is a photo of one of the Jordanian lead books. In 2015, the Economist
magazine heralded the creation of a new organization – The Centre for the Study of the
Jordanian Lead Books (http://www.leadbookcentre.com/) – headed by “a heavyweight team”
that includes religionists, scientists, politicians, and academics from several leading
universities.70 According to its website, the Centre’s purpose is to promote awareness of the
68 Zinner, S., Son of the Star: Bar Kokhba and the Jordanian Lead Books. (2017). Retrieved from:
https://www.academia.edu/33512415/Son_of_the_Star_Bar_Kokhba_and_the_Jordanian_Lead_Books._Ov
erview_Assessment_Interpretation._A_Free_Online_Educational_Report_By_Samuel_Zinner
69 Barker, M., Some Lead Books Found in Jordan (2017), 9. Retrieved from: http://www.margaretbarker.com/
Papers/default.htm
70 Erasmus. (2015, March 18). A chink of light. The Economist. Retrieved from:
https://www.economist.com/erasmus/2015/03/18/a-chink-of-light
19
lead codices and to support scholarly research of the same. If these codices are eventually
proven authentic, it is believed that they could provide unique insights into early kabbalistic
thought as well as a greater understanding of the role of the Queen of heaven in ancient
Israelite temple worship.
El Shaddai
In Exodus 6:3 we read: “I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, as God
Almighty [‫ ֵאל ַׁש ָּדי‬El Shaddai], but by my name the LORD [‫ יְהוָ ה‬Yahweh] I did not make
myself known to them.” Biale tells us that “with the exception of the tetragrammaton
YHWH, no divine name has generated so much controversy as El Shaddai or Shaddai.”71
Translated as Almighty in the KJV, Shaddai (‫ )שדי‬has been conjectured to have other
interpretations. For example, a midrashic interpretation renders it as shedai (‫)שדי‬, or “that
which is enough” or “that which is sufficient.”72 Following this line of interpretation, El
Shaddai would then become the “God who is self-sufficient.” Others have linked the word
‫ שדי‬with a similar Hebrew word, shad (‫ )שד‬meaning breast. According to Biale, “the
scholarly consensus is that the name [shaddai] must be a derivative of the Akkadian shadu,
meaning mountain…. Albright argued that the original meaning of shadu was probably
"breast" (shadwi in Old Akkadian).”73 Cross argues that based on its Akkadian etymology El
Shaddai “seems to mean ‘the mountain one’.”74 In agreement with Albright’s interpretation,
Barker argues for “God with breasts.” She describes El Shaddai as:
A name with many possible meanings, one of which is ‘God with breasts’. The
Judaean pillar figurines, which were widely used in Judah and Jerusalem until the
time of Josiah and were originally identified as dolls, were images of this God with
breasts. The figurines also had huge eyes, because the Lady had given sight, and those
71 Biale, D., “The God with Breasts: El Shaddai in the Bible,” History of Religions, 20 (1982): 240.
72 Emunah, N. (2014, June 14). Shaddai in the Midrash. Retrieved from:
https://netzarifaith.org/2014/06/14/shaddai-in-the-midrash/
73 Biale, D., “The God with Breasts: El Shaddai in the Bible,” History of Religions, 20 (1982): 240-241.
20
who rejected her lost their spiritual sight. The figurines have been found in almost
every site in Judah, most of them broken, but none from the second temple period.
They were probably the teraphim which Josiah destroyed.75 Figure 5
Barker’s claim is controversial, but it is based on archaeological
discoveries. Thousands of figurines (mostly broken) from the first temple
period have been found in and around Jerusalem and Judah. These figurines
appear to have represented an object of worship. They picture a woman
supporting her breasts with her hands (see Figure 5). Barker believes that
the female figurines represented the Lady of the temple, El Shaddai, the
God with breasts, and the God of the Patriarchs.76
These figurines are similar in form to the Asherah statues that have been found in
ancient Canaanite cities. However, as noted by Peterson:
There is one significant difference between the figurines from Israelite sites and those
recovered from pagan Canaanite locations: The lower body of the Israelite figurines
lacks the explicit detail characteristic of the Canaanite objects; indeed, the area below
the waist of the Israelite figurines is typically a simple plain column. Whereas the
pagan Canaanite objects depict a highly sexualized goddess of both childbearing and
erotic love, in the Israelite figurines the aspect of the dea nutrix, the nourishing or
nurturing goddess, comes to the fore.77
It is possible that the plain, pillar-shaped body of the Judean figurines represented a
tree trunk, but not just any tree trunk. More than likely it symbolized the tree of life that was
77 Peterson, D., “Nephi and His Asherah,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 9/2 (2000): 19.
21
in the garden of Eden. As Smith stated: “The religious symbol of the goddess, the asherah,
was in Israel a wooden pole, or perhaps a tree, representing the ‘tree of life’.”78
The Book of Enoch and the Lady
Barker asserts that since most references to the Lady have been edited out of our
canonical biblical text we must look elsewhere to discover information about the Lady of the
temple. One of those sources is 1 Enoch, which she says is “the most important of the
Hebrew books that did not become part of the final canon.79 1 Enoch is steeped in temple
symbolism and language:
Enoch was told by the archangel Michael that after the great judgement, the fragrant
and beautiful tree would be restored again to the temple of the LORD, and its fruit
would be given to the righteous and holy ones (1 Enoch 24.3-25.7). The menorah, the
tree of life, was a symbol of Wisdom (Proverbs 3.18), and restoring the tree to the
temple of the LORD represented restoring the Lady to the temple, restoring the so-
called Asherah that Josiah had removed and burned.80
Barker asserts that 1 Enoch provides us with a “stylised history” that describes the
events that lead up to the destruction of the first temple. In the Apocalypse of Weeks we read
that “in the sixth week all who live in it [the temple] shall become blind and the hearts of all
of them shall godlessly forsake Wisdom” (1 Enoch 93.8). Barker adds: “Wisdom’s first gift
had been the vision which was eternal life, and this loss of vision was remembered as the
significant change at the end of the first temple period. Wisdom was forsaken and vision was
lost.”81
78 Smith, M., “God Male and Female in the Old Testament: Yahweh and His ‘Asherah’,” Theological Studies,
48, 2 (1987): 334.
79 Barker, M., Belonging to the Temple (2007), 9. Retrieved from:

80 Barker, M., Restoring Solomon’s Temple (2012), 11. Retrieved from:
22
Isaiah 7:11 and the Great Isaiah Scroll
In Isaiah we read: “Again the LORD spoke to Ahaz, ‘Ask a sign of YHWH your God;
let it be deep as Sheol or high as heaven.’ But Ahaz said, ‘I will not ask, and I will not put the
LORD to the test’.”82 However, the Great Isaiah scroll (GIS) from Qumran can be rendered
with an alternate reading: “Isaiah told king Ahaz to ask for a sign from the Mother of YHWH
your God.”83 The difference in interpretation comes down to one letter – an aleph (‫ )א‬vs. an
ayin (‫ – )ע‬which on the GIS are even more similar than they are in modern Hebrew. In Figure
6 I have presented a picture of Isaiah 7:11 from the GIS84:
Figure 6
I have added several markings on this image. First, the red brackets indicate the
beginning and end of verse 11. Second, the green box identifies the word that interests us.
Third, the blue box is an example of the author’s ayin. In addition, since the scroll is ripped
and is missing letters from this verse I have added the missing letters to the right of the text to
make the verse complete. In the Masoretic Text (MT) the green-boxed word is spelled ‫ֵמ ִעם‬
(from with), while on the GIS it appears to be ‫( ֵמאם‬from mother). In order to clearly analyze
this scribe’s writing, I created the following comparison:
Figure 7
82 Isa 7:10-12
default.htm
84 Retrived from: http://dss.collections.imj.org.il/isaiah
23
For convenience, I have labeled the three images in Figure 7 as A, B, and C. Image A
is the word in the green box from our verse of Isaiah 7:11. B is the word in the blue box from
the same verse. C is from the same page on the GIS, and from the same scribe, but a few
verses lower on the page. As shown in the comparison, all three words begin with the letter
mem (‫)מ‬. The mem in B is followed by an ayin, and the mem in C is followed by an aleph.
Consistently throughout the text the scribe joins the aleph with the mem, as shown in C. Also,
consistently throughout the text the ayin is separated from the mem. Returning to A, we can
clearly see that the mem and the second letter touch each other, consistent with the mem-
aleph combination. If the second letter is actually an aleph rather than an ayin, then the text
can definitely be read “from the mother of Yahweh your God.” Barker believes that this may
be the correct reading.85 The ramification of this reading, of course, is that Isaiah would then
be confirming that Yahweh has a mother.
However, many critics have attacked Barker for pouncing on what they believe is
merely a scribal error or a run in the ink. In all fairness to those critics, the last two letters of
the green-boxed word do seem to be quite poorly written. In addition, critics have also
pointed out that the Septuagint has the words: παρὰ κυρίου θεοῦ σου (pará kyríou theoú sou),
or “from the Lord your God” with no mention of “mother,” indicating that the Qumran text
might be merely a scribal error.
Conclusion
Compelling arguments can be made for the existence of the Queen of heaven in
ancient Israelite religious worship. The Lady of the temple, the Sacred Tree, the Tree of Life,
Qudshu, Shekhinah, El Shaddai, and Wisdom may be some of her names. As the wife or
consort of El, and possibly the mother of Yahweh, her role in antiquity would have been
significant. But the question I need to ask is whether this Queen of heaven, as she has been

default.htm
24
described in this paper, is the Mother in heaven from my Sunday school lessons. Perhaps!
That is the best answer that I can give right now. Hopefully I will be able to give a more
definitive response with additional study and research. Since I began this literary journey
with a poem, I end in the same fashion:
Book of Love
The Book of Love, who wrote it? Amah, Antit, Almah

I did, Ashratah, Azariah, Tara, Sansaria,
I was the ONE, who wrote it, El Shaddai
my truth of it all in a book called Love, I am Eloah.
That book, is my Love for you, its been hidden that’s true
Who wrote it? I did, I wrote it, its my book of the Sun my auRA
we’ll call it, the true Book, its all there, in the Book of Love
If I say, that I did…and I did

Would you believe it was me?
And, would it finally set me free?
To be once again in heavens seat, my throne

just as I have always been
Would you have the Courage to see?
The Queen and that Wisdom is my divinity.86
86 Sigurdson. JC, Book of Love, retrieved from: https://julesofwisdom.wordpress.com/tag/ashratah/
25

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The Queen of Heaven

Loren Spendlove, PhD

we also have a heavenly mother:

In the heav'ns are parents single?

When I leave this frail existence,

Then, at length, when I've completed

unknowable and impersonal creator.

Asherah (‫)א ֵׁש ָרה‬

2. to guide, or lead straight.

3. to pronounce happy, or fortunate4 [bolding mine].

which still bear the original name.

The Queen of Heaven and the Shekhinah

3:35), “The wise shall inherit glory”10 [bolding mine].

the mother of Jesus.12

creation is unique to Jewish kabbalah. Scholem informs us that:

In talmudic literature the Shekhinah is never a symbol of the feminine;… The

Nowhere is it separated from God himself.13

with the Shekhinah.

had a central role in ancient temple worship:

Shekinah in the Holy of Holies’.14

According to Barker, Israelite temple worship underwent a significant and destructive

and decisive rejection of Wisdom was Josiah’s purge.”21

adoration of the Queen of heaven.

prior to the reforms introduced by King Joshiah in 621 B.C.E.”26

24 Barker, M., Restoring Solomon’s Temple (2012), 1-2. Retrieved from:

complacence of fools destroys them” (verses 20-32).

The Effects of Josiah’s Purges

obvious reworking of another from Proverbs:

Baruch 4:1 Proverbs 3:18

we know what is pleasing to God (Baruch 4:2-4).

31 Barker, M., Restoring Solomon’s Temple (2012), 5-6. Retrieved from:

of God.” Barker continued:

prostitute [‫ ָק ֵדׁש‬qadesh] in the land.” Barker comments:

woman clothed with the sun had fled to the wilderness.”34

32 Barker, M., Restoring Solomon’s Temple (2012), 5-6. Retrieved from:

stump of the tree.”38

Two Trees in the Garden

Adam and Eve as something better. They lost everything.”44

45 Barker, M., Belonging to the Temple (2007), 2. Retrieved from:

stubbornness or as an affirmation of their acts?

Cakes for the Queen of Heaven

“from the Lord” concerning the people of Judah:

again in Jer 44:19, where we read:

bearing her image and poured out libations to her?"

worship of the Queen of heaven. These include:

1. The children gathered wood;

different from other baked goods made in Judah, as noted by Mandel:

images/offerings created by women would be seen as a threat.47

Whoever fears the Lord will do this;

Elijah and the Prophets of Baal

prophets of Baal were massacred at Elijah’s command.

Kishon” and killed, as were the prophets of Baal. Patai commented:

50 Ben Sira 15:1-3

years of Ahab's reign.54

El, Asherah and Yahweh

was 'ēl šadday [El Shaddai].”57 Peterson added:

revered as the consort of Yahweh in some circles in ancient Israel.”61