There is but one God, as all religions declare, but that One has been described in different ways, worshipped in different modes, and called by different names, as a Vedic Sage-Poet once perceptively said. Some of the ancient visions have been erased from humanity’s cultural heritage, and some have remained dormant for long and risen up again.

Consider, for example, Sekhmet, a goddess of ancient Egypt. It has been said that Sekhmet was all opposites heaped into a single whole. Darkness and light, genesis and disappearance, disease and cure: Everything was part of this ancient goddess. She means nothing today, but she touched the fancy and veneration of the people of Egypt millennia ago. Egyptians of yore believed, as others have always accepted about their respective gods, that She existed before earth and man came to be.

Sekhmet was a major personage in grand Egyptians mythologies. The great God Ra was once enraged by the human race, because it had conspired to kill  its maker. Whereupon sparks flew from his eyes which became the goddess Sekhmet with a leonine face. Sekhmet was now instructed to rid the world of humanity. But Ra changed his mind and to avert the ordered destruction. Instead. He created a pool of red libation which looked very much like human blood. Sekhmet drank this to the full and fell into a deep slumber. She was carried by Thoth, the god of Wisdom, all the way to a river in Egypt, and dunked into it. Sekhmet now woke up as the cat-faced Bastet, and thus was transformed into the loving Mother Goddess Hathor.

We may not fully comprehend the meaning behind this story which has its parallels in other traditions as well. Like all mythologies it could have arisen from pure fantasy,  from a profound experience,  as an encrypted message of something profound,  as an esoteric truth that only the initiated can decipher. Whatever it be, there is a magical power in such ancient tales that touches/touched many people deeply as embodying some inscrutable mystery.

Grand mythologies have a power of persistence, not just by their poetry, but also from their being amenable to multiple interpretations. Even many centuries later, different people have seen in Sekhmet different meanings and lessons. I take this story as painting the human predicament. Man’s destruction of Ra could be taken to signify our exploitation of Nature. Sekhmet from Ra could mean the response of Nature to Man’s irresponsible behavior. Ra’s change of heart could mean that Nature is giving us a second chance to behave better. Sekhmet’s drinking of the pseudo-blood could well be the environmental disasters that have come so close to us. Hathor stands for the compassion that Nature has shown us, giving us the knowledge and some wisdom to change.

Sekhmet is but one instance of many in various cultures where the relationship between the human and the animal species has found expression. Lamb and fish, monkey and pig, elephant and lion, boar and more have entered the pantheon of religions. In some cases, as with Sekhmet, the ancients conceived of anthropotherio divinities also. Today, sitting erect in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, is a slim Sekhmet in stone unearthed from Karnak, with human hands and bare feet with long toes, with hair like the wig of a British judge. So many gods and goddesses of ancient religions have found homes in museums all over the world, thanks to archeologists and guardians of culture. Some descendants of people who knew nothing of their ancient history and/or care nothing for it before these relics were uncovers and now preserved, want them back!

Sekhmet is not forgotten. There are groups that consecrate January 7 to this Egyptian goddess.