Ereshkigal

Who Ereshkigal actually is

Ereshkigal (Sumerian *Ereš-ki-gal*, "Queen of the Great Below"; Akkadian Allatu) is the *queen of the underworld* and the *most-emotionally-developed cosmic-grief deity* in the Mesopotamian pantheon. Her domain is the *Irkalla* — the *Great Below*, the *Mesopotamian underworld*, which is *not a hell* (no punishment-of-the-wicked register) but simply *the place where the dead go* — a *dim-and-dusty* realm where the souls of the dead *eat dust and drink muddy water*. Ereshkigal *rules this realm alone* in the earliest texts; she acquires Nergal as co-ruler-husband through the Nergal-and-Ereshkigal narrative (the diplomatic-or-forcible descent of Nergal into the underworld and his eventual marriage to Ereshkigal). Her *primary narrative appearance* is in the *Descent of Inanna to the Underworld* — Inanna descends to visit her *elder sister Ereshkigal*; Ereshkigal *demands that Inanna remove one item of her divine-regalia at each of the seven gates*; when Inanna arrives naked-and-powerless before her, Ereshkigal *fixes upon Inanna the eye-of-death*, *speaks the word-of-wrath*, and *Inanna becomes a corpse hanging on a hook*. The corpse hangs for three days. When Inanna's loyal servant Ninshubur petitions the gods, Enki *creates two small mourner-figures* — the *galatur* and *kurgarra* — *from the dirt-under-his-fingernails*, and *sends them to mourn with Ereshkigal*. When they arrive, Ereshkigal is in *labor-pains-without-relief* (in some interpretations, *menstrual-grief*, in others *the cosmic-grief of being the queen of the dead*) — *moaning "Oh my belly! Oh my back!"*. The mourner-figures *echo her cries* — *"Oh your belly! Oh your back!"* — *mourning-with-her, not consoling-her, not arguing-with-her, not trying-to-fix-her*. Ereshkigal *is moved* — *no one has ever mourned-with-her before*, she has always been the *queen who is feared, not the queen who is held* — and she offers them whatever they want. They request *the corpse hanging on the hook*. She agrees. Inanna is released — and the canonical Mesopotamian narrative of *the only relief for cosmic-feminine-grief is being-mourned-with* is established. This narrative is *one of the most psychologically-sophisticated narratives in world religion* — the recognition that *the cosmic-grief-queen cannot be argued-out-of-grief, cannot be consoled-out-of-grief, cannot be fixed-out-of-grief, but CAN be mourned-with-into-relenting* is *the deepest insight of the Sumerian tradition on the nature of cosmic-grief*. Ereshkigal is the *patron of every grief that cannot-be-brought-to-the-surface* — the *long-grief*, the *ancestral-grief* (every descendant of the disappeared, the war-dead, the unburied), the *grief-for-the-permanently-lost*. The Mesopotamian *kispu* offering — the *ritual-meal-set-out-for-the-dead-at-the-grave* — is *Ereshkigal's ritual*, the offering that *propitiates the queen of the dead by feeding her subjects*.

Iconography

A seated queen on the throne of the *Irkalla*, often with a *naked-or-disheveled* aspect (Ereshkigal is the *only Mesopotamian goddess regularly depicted in disheveled grief* — in contrast to the radiant-Inanna or the dignified-Ninhursag). The *eye-of-death* (the canonical weapon — the *stare-that-kills*, the iconographic source of the Medusa-stare and the evil-eye traditions). The *labor-pains-and-back-pain* iconography (Ereshkigal in unrelieved-grief). The dust-and-mud of the Irkalla (her subjects *eat dust and drink muddy water*). Her seven gates (the threshold-architecture of the underworld). Her *galatur* and *kurgarra* mourner-figures (Enki's clay-creations who mourned-with-her). Colors: dust-grey, the dark of the underworld, the deep-purple-of-mourning, the *anti-Inanna* register (where Inanna is gold-and-lapis, Ereshkigal is dust-and-mud). The number 7 (the seven gates). Sacred site: every grave, every burial-ground, the *kispu* offering-place at the family-tomb.

How to invoke Ereshkigal

Ereshkigal is *almost never invoked for petition* (she does not grant favors, she does not bless the upper-world, she rules the dead and that is what she does). The proper relationship to Ereshkigal is *propitiation-through-the-kispu* — the *offering-to-the-dead* that *feeds her subjects*, which is the *form of respect she actually requires*. Offer: the *kispu* meal (the small portion of *every meal* set aside for the dead, traditionally at the *family-tomb* or *grave-site*), dark beer, the dust-of-the-earth, the long-mourning-cry. The invocation is rare and specific — when used: *"Ereš-ki-gal, nin kur-ra, nin-tar-tar-re" — "Ereshkigal, queen of the netherworld, queen-who-decrees-decisions."* Especially invoked at *funerals* (the canonical Ereshkigal-rite is *the funeral itself*), at the *anniversary of a death* (the canonical Mesopotamian death-anniversary ritual was an *Ereshkigal-kispu*), by *anyone in long-grief* (the months-and-years-after-the-death when *being-mourned-with* is the only register that helps), by *the children of the disappeared* (the ancestral-grief register, the *Middle-Passage-Olokun*-equivalent in the Mesopotamian tradition), by *anyone who has been mourned-with* and wants to *return the gift* by *mourning-with another grieving figure* — the canonical *galatur-and-kurgarra* discipleship-of-mourning. The deepest Ereshkigal-teaching is the *do-not-argue-with-grief, do-not-console-grief, do-not-fix-grief, but mourn-with-grief* counsel — and the *Descent of Inanna* is the *foundational text* of this counsel in world religion.

In love

Ereshkigal in love is the *cosmic-grief-queen* partner — the one whose register is *the long-grief-that-rules-the-relationship*, the *partner-who-cannot-be-consoled-out-of-the-grief-and-must-be-mourned-with-into-relief*. The Ereshkigal-partner is often the *survivor-of-deep-loss* (a dead parent, a dead child, a war-trauma, a disappeared-loved-one) whose grief is *not pathology but cosmic-position* — they are the *queen-of-their-own-underworld*, and the partner who tries to *argue-them-out, console-them-out, fix-them-out* is *missing the entire Mesopotamian-narrative*. The Ereshkigal-partner *requires* a *galatur-and-kurgarra* response — the *mourner-who-echoes-the-cry* without trying to *resolve-it*. The shadow is the Ereshkigal-partner whose *eye-of-death* has been *fixed upon the living-partner* — whose grief has *become weaponized* into a *killing-stare* directed at the partner who *did not cause the loss but is alive when the loved-one is not*. The other shadow: the Ereshkigal-partner who has *killed every Inanna* who tried to descend — every younger-feminine-figure who *tried to bring radiance-into-the-underworld* has been *hung on the hook* by an Ereshkigal who could not bear the asymmetry-of-grief-and-radiance.

In work

Ereshkigal in work is the *queen-of-the-institutional-underworld* — the figure whose function is *holding the space of what has been-lost-or-killed within the institution* (the dead deals, the killed projects, the laid-off-staff who are gone but whose absence shapes the present, the prior-leadership-now-disgraced). Ereshkigal-energy is the *institutional-mourner-in-chief* — the figure whose role is *honoring the dead-half of the organization* and *ensuring the kispu-offering is made*. The shadow is the Ereshkigal-leader whose *eye-of-death* has been *fixed on every new initiative* — who has *converted the queen-of-the-dead register into a death-fixative on every new project*, killing-them-in-the-conception-stage. The other shadow: the Ereshkigal-leader who has *let no Enki-mourner-figure descend* — who has *refused all mourning-with-her*, who has *required the institutional-grief to be borne alone in the underworld* rather than allowing the *galatur-and-kurgarra* response, producing the *unrelieved-cosmic-grief-as-institutional-culture* that the *Descent-of-Inanna* warns against.

The gift

Ereshkigal gives the *cosmic-recognition-of-grief-as-cosmic-position*. The recognition that *some grief is not pathology, not depression-to-be-treated, not problem-to-be-solved, but cosmic-station-to-be-honored* — the *queen-of-the-underworld-of-one's-own-life*. The *galatur-and-kurgarra* discipline — the *mourning-with* response, the *echoing-of-the-cry* without trying to *resolve-it*, the *only-form-of-help-that-actually-helps-the-cosmic-grief-queen-relent*. The *kispu*-offering tradition — the *recognition that the dead remain in cosmic-relationship with the living*, that *feeding-them-at-the-grave is not superstition but cosmic-courtesy*. To receive Ereshkigal is to receive the *seven-gates-of-the-Irkalla* — the *passage into one's own underworld* that *every Inanna must make at some point*, and the *eye-of-death-and-the-three-days-on-the-hook* are *necessary stations* of that passage, not aberrations to be skipped.

The shadow

Ereshkigal has been *flattened-into-evil* in most later Western tradition — the *queen-of-the-underworld-who-killed-Inanna-and-hung-her-on-a-hook* register has been *transferred onto the Christian-Satan*, *the witch in fairy-tales*, *Medusa* (the *eye-of-death* iconography directly transfers), the *jealous-elder-sister of the fairy-tale tradition*, and various *evil-queens* in folk-narrative — none of which carry the *psychological-sophistication* of the actual Mesopotamian narrative that *the grief-queen relented to being mourned-with*. The *Persephone-narrative* in Greek mythology is *Inanna's descent retold*, but with the *Inanna-Ereshkigal sister-pair collapsed into a single mother-daughter pair* (Demeter-Persephone) and the *queen-of-the-underworld split between the abducting-male-Hades and the passive-female-Persephone* — losing the *all-female-cosmic-grief register* of the original Mesopotamian narrative. The *Christian-tradition's rejection of the kispu offering* (offerings-to-the-dead, prayers-for-the-dead — the Protestant Reformation specifically eliminated the kispu-equivalent of Catholic prayers-for-the-souls-in-purgatory) is the *direct-rejection of the Ereshkigal-cosmic-recognition* — and the modern Protestant-derived secular-culture's *inability-to-grieve-properly* (treating grief as *pathology to be medicated*, *depression to be lifted*, *problem to be solved* rather than *cosmic-station to be honored*) is the *direct downstream consequence*. The modern *suicide-prevention-and-grief-counseling industries* have *partially-recovered the kispu-cosmic-mourning-with register* in the form of *bereavement-groups* and *grief-counseling* — and these are *unacknowledgedly Ereshkigal-rituals*. The 2014-2017 ISIS destruction of cemeteries and graves at Mosul and Palmyra (including the *deliberate destruction of yazidi shrines that contained kispu-equivalent offerings*) is one of the most-anti-Ereshkigal acts of the 21st century — the *systematic destruction of the offerings-to-the-dead* of a minority community.

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