Isis

Isis (Egyptian: Aset; Greek: Ἶσις) is the supreme goddess of ancient Egyptian religion — mistress of magic (heka), wife and resurrector of Osiris, mother of Horus, and the archetype of the divine feminine as both nurturing Mother and powerful sorceress. Her cult spread across the entire Greco-Roman world, becoming one of the most popular mystery religions of late antiquity.

The Mysteries of Isis (as described in Apuleius’s The Golden Ass, 2nd century CE) involved a ritual death and rebirth paralleling the Eleusinian_Mysteries, and her attributes were extensively absorbed by the early Christian cult of the Virgin Mary (see Christianity_and_Paganism).

See Also

• Nephthys — Isis’s sister and counterpart
• Mystery_Schools — the Isiac mysteries as a major ancient mystery tradition
• Christianity_and_Paganism — the absorption of Isis’s attributes by the Virgin Mary
• Gnostic_Sophia — Isis as a structural predecessor to the Gnostic divine feminine
• Mother_Archetype — the archetype Isis embodies
• Black Madonna — the dark feminine figure inheriting Isis’s traits
• Eleusinian_Mysteries — the parallel Greek mystery rite
• Comparative_Religion — Isis within cross-traditional study