Theological Matricide in the Ancient Israelite Religion and Commentary on the Book of Lamentations

Abstract

The essay considers the possibility that the Book of Lamentations contains passages lamenting the theological matricide that the ancient religion of Israel and the life of faith and worship have undergone. Despite the fact that archaeological findings, and biblical descriptions, point to the presence of a divine mother figure at the core of the religion and worship of the ancient people of Israel, the violent expulsion of this mother from the people’s life of faith and worship from the outset, as described in the Bible itself, has not been thoroughly investigated in terms of its spiritual-existential implications. This essay argues that what is described in Lamentations 1 may not only originate from the nation’s grief, the sense of chaos, and the destruction of the temple and the city, but also from the existential emotional violent separation from the Mother-Goddess, from the nation’s life of faith and worship, and the disaster that followed this disconnect and separation.