The Name Allat or Elat means Goddess, as Allah, or the Semitic El, mean God. Allat is mostly referred to as Allah’s daughter, along with her sisters Al-Uzza and Manat. However, in some sources, she is referred to as Allah’s wife as well. Allat, also called variously Al-Lat, Lat, Alilat and some other names, has been associated later with the Greek Athena and her Roman equivalent Minerva.
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Her cult was predominantly centred in Northern Arabia and at the border to Yemen but also reached into other areas as well. Allat was considered to be a creator Goddess but held various other functions from mercy to solitude, protecting travellers, meting out vengeance, granting abundance and gifting booty from raids, as well as inflicting pain and disease on enemies.
In her temple, the common Arabian practice of casting divination arrows was a regular event and she was worshipped in the form of a granite cube. Around this shrine, the area was held sacred and it was forbidden to take any life, plant, animal or human there. This also had the advantage that all could worship without tribal blood feuds preventing anyone from having access to her shrine to pray and venerate the Goddess.
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The Islamic prophet Muhammad ordered the destruction of her shrine and with him, the Goddess cult was eradicated from the Arabian peninsula. Subsequently, an era of patriarchally structured culture and religion began which still lasts to the present day.
Allat was also associated with vegetation and grains, she is, therefore, a Goddess of creation, fertility and abundance, as well as of war and strife. She was worshipped by seven naked priestesses who circled her cubic stone in Mecca seven times, a ritual that is practised to this day in Islam by the pilgrims. The seven rounds represented the seven planets that were then known, Sun, Moon, Venus, Mars, Saturn, Jupiter and Mercury.
To this day, the men guarding the Kabaa (the cube) are called Beni Shaybah, which means son of the old woman or son of Saba. Saba, pronounced Shaybah, means midwife or wisdom of the old. At the time of the Goddess’ worship, the Kabaa was guarded by priestesses who were called Bathisheba, girls of the old wise woman, or Bathsheba, meaning daughter of Sheba.
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Allat is a strong Mothergoddess, a solar deity. The black stone at the Kabaa, which looks like a vulva with a baby’s head emerging, was used by women to rub their genitals against to increase their fertility and priestesses would smear menstrual blood on it as part of the cult. In all ancient cultures in which Goddess worship was part of the religious tradition, menstrual blood was seen as powerful and used in fertility and other magical rituals.
With the rise of patriarchy, women have systematically been oppressed and the menstrual blood has been associated with contamination, impurity and strong taboos were placed on it. For example, oftentimes a menstruating woman is not allowed to be touched by a man sexually as she is considered unclean and impure. In some religions, menstruating women are not allowed into temples and their shadows are not allowed to fall on the depictions or statues of deities, etc.
At her shrine at Ta’if, Onyx stones were found and have been considered sacred to her ever since. Black Onyx is a powerful protective stone that absorbs and transforms negative energies and aids the development of emotional and physical strength and stamina. Granting strength in times of stress and grief goes well in line with Allat’s properties of helping with vengeance, granting strength and abundance, as well as good health and emotional stability.
Source: https://t-tees.com
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