A reading from the book "The Day the Lord Was Female"

Due to the scarcity of this book, this review summarizes Marilyn Stone‘s "When God Was a Woman," which discusses the earliest forms of worship when women were miraculously capable of creation, or what people perceived as creation. The book comprises thirteen chapters, in addition to the translator‘s introduction. It explores numerous places where the veneration of the female deity originated, from the Paleolithic era to the emergence of monotheistic religions (which the author refers to as religions that venerate the male god). These include Sumer, Akkad, Babylon, Ugarit, Crete, Cyprus, Greece, Egypt, Palestine, India, Cilicia, Anatolia, Iran, and other countries, particularly highlighted in Chapter Five. The author asserts that the northern invaders, or what are called the Indo-Europeans, were the first to degrade women, relegating them to a secondary, even inferior, status among creatures. Following the translator‘s introduction, the book begins with excerpts selected by Stone, the first of which is a quote from the French writer Simone de Beauvoir‘s book "The Second Sex," in which she says: "Man enjoys a great privilege: he has a God who approves the law he writes. Since man exercises ruling power over women, it is in his interest that this power be bestowed upon him by the Supreme Being. For Jews, Muslims, Christians, and others, man is master by divine right; therefore, the fear of God suppresses any rebellious impulse in the subjugated woman." Then, sixty important questions are posed, and half the book can be answered. The reader is asked: How did men gain control of the world? Another question could be added: How did women lose their position? The other half of the book answers this. "