This is one that I forgot about. It was originally published on Planet Waves in November of 2002. Here is the original. The whole concept of a whore is controversial, but if you look up the story of this incredible word in the American Heritage Dictionary — the dictionary with the best information on etymology and Indo-European roots — the word comes derives from: you guessed it: from a mix of love and desire. As Adrienne Rich says, language is a map of our failures. I have switched photos from the original, adding something a little better suited to the cover of Planet Waves: my friend, artistic collaborator and ritual partner Heather Fae, who I have heard a rumor is coming home from California. I look into her face, and well, good goddess, I feel an echo going back 100,000 years. Anyway — here is that article. One of the most interesting things about it is the Bible stuff at the end, clarifying the issue of Mary, from Magdalene.
Prostitution is said to be the oldest profession, so we may guess that there is a bit of confusion about its early history. But there are, at the moment, currents in our culture of something called sacred prostitution, and the fact of the sacred prostitute emerging, or reemerging. Usually a woman, she offers herself as the Way to the Goddess through erotic worship. I am Quaker. This is more fun than Sunday meeting. That is the whole issue.
She may be a tantrika (a practitioner of tantric sex, as taught — not always by that name — by the Taoists, the Tibetans or the Hindus, and their local successors). A tantrika sometimes does sessions with men centered entirely on conscious, mutually respectful erotic pleasure, aimed at increasing one’s spiritual awareness, a concept that is uniquely outrageous to Christian theology. Tantrikas of varying degrees of skill are fairly easy to find on the Internet. She may be a massage therapist who grants what is politely called ‘release’ at the end of a bodywork session. She may be a nurse who, when privately bathing a paralyzed person, includes sexual gratification. She may be a sex writer who tells the truth. She may be a dominatrix, or dom, who provides a forum for what is called power exchange and allows men to be submissive in her presence. She may be a working prostitute who truly cares for and strives to heal the pain of her clients. She may be a social activist who teaches women to masturbate.
She is any woman who can surrender enough of her personal identity into an erotic experience that the Goddess may be experienced directly through her. In a society where God is purported to be a man, this is the issue.