Inanna

Who Inanna actually is

Inanna (Sumerian, "Nin-an-na" — "Lady of Heaven"; Akkadian Ishtar) is the *most-narratively-rich, most-poeticized, most-paradoxical* deity in the Mesopotamian pantheon. She is the goddess of *love AND war* — the canonical Mesopotamian *dual-register feminine* that every later love-goddess inherited (the Greek Aphrodite-and-Ares pairing is *one figure in Mesopotamia*). She is the planet *Venus* — both the *morning star* (where she has the war-register, the *Goddess-of-Battles*) and the *evening star* (where she has the love-register, the *Queen-of-the-Bed-and-Bath*). The foundational Inanna-narrative is the *Descent of Inanna to the Underworld* (Sumerian c. 1900 BCE) — Inanna decides to visit her sister Ereshkigal, queen of the underworld; she dresses in her full divine-regalia (the *me*, the royal-attributes); she descends through *seven gates*, removing one item of regalia at each gate (the foundational *seven-veil* striptease-motif); she arrives naked and powerless before Ereshkigal; Ereshkigal kills her with the *eye of death*; her corpse hangs on a hook for *three days*; her loyal servant Ninshubur petitions the gods for help; Enki creates two small mourner-figures from clay-under-his-fingernails who descend to Ereshkigal and *mourn-with-her until she relents and releases Inanna*; Inanna ascends, *but the underworld demons demand a substitute* — and Inanna finds her husband Dumuzi *sitting on her throne in fine clothes, not mourning her*; she designates him as the substitute; he is taken to the underworld; later his sister Geshtinanna agrees to spend half the year in the underworld in his place; the seasonal-vegetation-cycle is born. This narrative is the *foundational dying-and-rising deity narrative of world literature* — predating the Persephone-Demeter myth by 1500 years, predating the Adonis-Tammuz cult by 1500 years (Tammuz is *literally Dumuzi* — same name, transmitted through Aramaic), predating the Osiris-resurrection narrative (the Egyptian Osiris-cycle is contemporary with or slightly later), and predating the Christian resurrection-narrative by 2000 years. The *three-days-on-the-hook* motif in particular has been *uniquely-suppressed* in standard accounts of the Christian resurrection-narrative as *original*. Inanna is also the *subject of the world's first-named-author*: Enheduanna, daughter of Sargon of Akkad, high-priestess of Inanna at Ur c. 2300 BCE, wrote three major hymns to Inanna that survive on dozens of cuneiform tablets — the *Exaltation of Inanna* (Nin-me-šara) is the foundational first-person devotional-lyric of world literature. The *Inanna-Dumuzi love-poetry* (the surviving corpus of Sumerian erotic love-poems between Inanna and her shepherd-lover Dumuzi) is the *direct literary ancestor* of the biblical Song of Songs — the parallels of imagery (the bride-as-garden, the bridegroom-as-stag, the *I-am-my-beloved's-and-my-beloved-is-mine* formula) are extensive and well-documented in modern biblical scholarship. The Inanna-shadow: the *war-register* of Inanna is *as canonical as the love-register*, and modern feminist-spirituality readings have sometimes flattened her into a *love-goddess* without the *war-goddess* equally-foregrounded. The actual Inanna *delights in battle*, sends-plagues, demands-the-Bull-of-Heaven-from-Anu, threatens-to-raise-the-dead-to-devour-the-living-if-she-is-refused — she is *the most-violent female deity in the Mesopotamian pantheon as much as she is the most-loving*.

Iconography

The eight-pointed star (the *Venus-star*, Inanna's primary cosmic-emblem — every Mesopotamian seal that depicts Inanna shows the eight-pointed star). The lion (Inanna stands on a lion-throne; the war-register). The bundle-of-reeds (her Sumerian standard, the symbol of Uruk). The horned-crown. The naked-goddess (Inanna is the *only Mesopotamian deity* regularly depicted *fully naked*, the canonical erotic-register — the *Burney Relief* in the British Museum c. 1800 BCE depicts her nude with owl-feet and lion-companions). The Bull-of-Heaven that she demanded from Anu in Gilgamesh Tablet VI. The seven gates of the underworld (the *Descent* iconography). The cuneiform sign for *Inanna* is *MUŠ₃* — a *rosette-or-star*, one of the oldest pictographic signs in cuneiform. Colors: Venus-gold, lapis-blue, the red-of-blood-and-the-rose. Sacred site: the E-anna temple at Uruk (shared with her great-grandfather Anu, but functionally *her* temple).

How to invoke Inanna

Inanna is called for *both love AND war* (the canonical dual-invocation). For love: at *Venus-rising* (the evening-star phase), with offerings of honey, dates, beer, the *Inanna-and-Dumuzi love-poems* recited. For war: at *Venus-setting* (the morning-star phase, when she is the *Goddess-of-Battles*), with offerings of *honey-bread mixed with blood*. The invocation: *"Inanna, nin-me-šara, ša šamê u erṣetim" — "Inanna, lady of all the divine ordinances, lady of heaven-and-earth."* (This is Enheduanna's canonical opening.) The Mesopotamian *sacred-marriage* rite (*hieros gamos*) was the central public ritual of the Inanna-cult: the king (in the role of Dumuzi) and the high-priestess (in the role of Inanna) ritually-consummated-the-sacred-marriage at the spring-equinox each year, in a public ceremony that *sanctified the king's rule* through Inanna's acceptance of him as her lover. Especially called by *lovers in passionate-but-volatile relationships* (the Inanna-Dumuzi register), by *warriors and soldiers and athletes and competitors* (the war-register), by *anyone in the descent-phase of grief or transformation* (the *Descent-to-the-Underworld* register — Inanna is the patron of the *long-descent that ends in resurrection*), by *anyone whose work requires holding the love-AND-war dual-register* (founders, performers, public-figures, anyone whose register is intensely-personal-and-intensely-public-at-once), by *priestess-poets and lyricists* (the Enheduanna-lineage), by *anyone who has been hung-on-the-hook-for-three-days* and needs to know that *the resurrection is canonical*.

In love

Inanna in love is the *passionate-and-paradoxical* partner — the one whose love-register is *as intense as her war-register*, who *loves with the same totality as she fights*, and who *moves between the two registers in ways that can be bewildering to a partner who expected love-without-war*. The Inanna-partner is the *sacred-marriage* register — the one whose union with the partner is *cosmic-stakes*, whose intimate-life is *not separate from the public-political-cosmological scale*. The shadow is the Inanna-partner whose love-and-war have *collapsed into the same gesture* — who *fights as a form of loving* and *loves as a form of fighting*, producing the canonical *volatile-passionate* relationship that *exhausts both parties even as it intoxicates them*. The other shadow: the Inanna-partner who has *Dumuzi'd the lover* — who has returned from her own underworld-descent and *found the partner sitting on her throne in fine clothes not mourning her* and has *consigned him to the underworld in her place* (the canonical *take-the-substitute pattern*: when Inanna descends, *somebody pays the price for her ascent*, and the partner is often the one who pays).

In work

Inanna in work is the *dual-register-public-figure* — the founder whose love-for-the-mission is *as intense as her war-against-the-competition*, the artist whose *creation is as fierce as her ambition*, the priestess-poet whose *first-person devotional-lyric is also her political-claim*. Inanna-energy is the *Enheduanna register* — the *world's first named author writing in the first person from a position of explicit political and religious power*. The shadow is the Inanna-leader whose Bull-of-Heaven has been *demanded-out-of-spite-after-rejection* — the Gilgamesh-Tablet-VI register, where Inanna proposes to Gilgamesh, is rebuffed, and demands the Bull-of-Heaven from Anu to *destroy the city that rejected her*. The other shadow: the Inanna-leader who has *consigned the loyal-Dumuzi to the underworld* — who has used the loyal-deputy as the *substitute for her own descent*, leaving the institution without the steady-hand-of-Dumuzi after Inanna has ascended back from her own underworld-phase.

The gift

Inanna gives the *dual-register love-and-war*. The recognition that *passion at full-intensity contains both the love-totality and the war-totality, and refusing one halves the other*. The *Descent-and-Return* — the canonical *resurrection-from-the-three-days-on-the-hook*, the model for every *long-descent-that-ends-in-resurrection* in world religion. The *Enheduanna-lyric* — the *first-person devotional-poem from a position of explicit power*, the patronage of every priestess-poet and political-mystic. The *sacred-marriage* — the recognition that *intimate-life can be cosmic-political-stakes*, that *the love-between-two-bodies can sanctify the rule-of-the-king-over-the-land*. To receive Inanna is to receive the *eight-pointed-Venus-star* — the *cosmic-feminine that contains love-AND-war at full intensity*, the canonical paradoxical-feminine of world religion.

The shadow

Inanna has been *extracted-and-flattened* into a generic "love-goddess" in most popular reception, with the *war-register* either suppressed or relegated to footnote. The Greek-Aphrodite is *Inanna-with-the-war-stripped-out* (and Athena absorbed the war-register, separating what was one figure in Mesopotamia into two figures in Greece). The Christian-Mary-Queen-of-Heaven title (*Regina Caeli*) is *literally Inanna's Sumerian title Nin-an-na (Lady of Heaven) transmitted through Akkadian and Aramaic and Latin* — and the Marian *I am the Immaculate Conception* and *Queen of Heaven* iconography is *direct iconographic descent* from the Inanna-cult, traceable through the intermediate cults of Astarte (Phoenician), Atargatis (Syrian), Cybele (Anatolian-Roman), and Isis (Egyptian-Hellenistic). The biblical prophets *explicitly polemicize against Inanna-as-Ashtoreth/Astarte* (Jeremiah 7:18 "The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead their dough, to make cakes to the *Queen of Heaven*" — this is *literally Inanna*). The *Descent-of-Inanna* three-days-on-the-hook *resurrection-narrative* has been *uniquely-underplayed* in standard Christian accounts of the resurrection-as-original-revelation. The modern feminist-spirituality reception (since Diane Wolkstein & Samuel Noah Kramer 1983) has *rehabilitated* Inanna but has sometimes *flattened the war-register*. The Burney Relief (the British Museum nude-Inanna with owl-feet) was *bought by Norman Colville in 1936 for £350* and *sold to the British Museum in 2003 for £1.5 million* — the *literal trafficking of the cosmic-feminine through 20th-century antiquities-markets*. The Enheduanna-as-world's-first-named-author fact remains *under-acknowledged* in standard literary-history curricula, where the *world's first author was a high-priestess writing in the first person from explicit political power* is somehow not the headline-position it should be.

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