The Hermaphrodite Deity of the Moon

[Fier]

More likely to have been either coincidence, or a result of genetically-based similarities in cycle length - that one's been researched and found to not actually happen, at any rate in situations involving significant numbers of unrelated women/people with plumbing coded female, e.g. college dorms (no time to find you links on the research right now, but let me know if you want 'em and I'll dig 'em up).

Sunflower

 
Where the women in the study on any kind of birth control?

[SunflowerP]

Where the women in the study on any kind of birth control?

 
That's one for which I'd definitely have to dig up the studies to find out.  I'll see if I can get to it later today.

Nitpick:  I imagine you mean "any kind of hormonal birth control", since non-hormonal ones generally wouldn't have a relevant effect.

Sunflower

[Holdasown]

I'm one of those folks who has always felt the moon to have a masculine energy and the sun to have a feminine energy. Maybe this stems from my work with Brighid as a solar/fire goddess and with Manannan as a god of the sea (and thus of the tides) and the mists (and so too the kind of liminal space of the unconscious, which for me also has strong connections to the moon). I haven't seen Manannan connected with the moon in any of the traditional mythology, but as a psychopomp and trickster it makes a lot of sense to me - just UPG.

--Ali

The Norse attributed the sun and moon that way as well.

[Fier]

Nitpick:  I imagine you mean "any kind of hormonal birth control", since non-hormonal ones generally wouldn't have a relevant effect.

Sunflower

 
You are correct. The kind that would alter a lady's cycle.

[Jenett]

That's one for which I'd definitely have to dig up the studies to find out.  I'll see if I can get to it later today.

Nitpick:  I imagine you mean "any kind of hormonal birth control", since non-hormonal ones generally wouldn't have a relevant effect.

 
If it's the same study I vaguely remember seeing, they adjusted for that.

One of the things I vaguely remember seeing somewhere was the idea that to get the women-syncing-up effect, you need to have women sharing not just the same house, but a lot of shared space  over a substantial period of time.

So it doesn't happen much at college (where you share a room with one or two other people, but not very closely - you're not sharing a bed, for example) and there are extended breaks when everyone goes their own ways.

But it might be more likely if you're actually sharing rooms (like old-fashioned boarding schools/convents/etc. worked - or for that matter, Hogwarts) or if you're close enough to interact with each other's hormonal cycles in multiple ways (lots of hugging, close physical contact, etc, as can happen in some families.)

[Tenorbear2]

So, associate the God/Goddess with the Sun and the Earth, and the Moon with a third hermaphroditic deity, possibly the child of the God and Goddess to fit in with the "Made of proto-Earth dust but lit by the sun" thing. This would also be stepping even further outside of the binary gender system by giving gender queer individuals a patron.

I don't know what I'm saying. Just some insane ramblings.

 
I'm brand new to Caldron and your post is the first I've read. One of my reasons for coming here was to discuss this very topic because I'm intersexed - born between sexes with a body that is neither male nor female and sort of both. With God OR Goddess images everywhere I really wanted to find mine. A God figure that isn't either or but is actually AND - a sexual integration. Most people like me are sterile, and all of us end up chosing a side of the room to stand on when they yell, Boys here - Girls there. Our society doesn't have a space for us. We are invisible. I'm most like a male and certainly have always lived as a man among other men but I don't have any more reason to argue that I'm male than female.  We're not rare, people like me are 1 in 2,000. Religion of antiquity had plenty of room for us but with the exception of Horus most of our God/Godess stories are lost. Time to write new ones. I really like your description of the cosmic event that views us as a proto earth dust child lit by sun and moon.  That's great imagery!  Thanks.

Tenorbear2

[Tenorbear2]

I'm one of those folks who has always felt the moon to have a masculine energy and the sun to have a feminine energy. ... but as a psychopomp and trickster it makes a lot of sense to me - just UPG.

--Ali

 
I love it. Throw it all in the gender blender and hit "Frappe!"

Tenorbear2

[Tenorbear2]

I've always felt the same way; I've always been irked by the traditional magical gender binary of feminine = passive, masculine = active. So when my works of fiction and comics required a set of primary celestial deities, I made the sun primarily a female deity, the night sky (the spaces between the starstuff) a primarily masculine deity, and the moon a slightly masculine, but predominantly agendered deity. Personally, this all stems from my menstrual/fertility issues, and androgynous and asexual tendencies. :B

 
My experience as an intersexed person is close to yours. Born between the sexes my body and my life experiences don't match a sexual binary of either/or.  With no fertility, needing to take hormones to have secondary sex characteristics and with genitals in between male/female my brain seems to be there too. Having lived among gay men all my adult life whose personalities are in between masculine/femminine and who dislike being expected to amputate their feminine any more than I want anything amputated off of me it all makes sense. There is a whole lot of power in being both and neither at the same time no matter how that manifests in your being. Only in our variety of traditions is there room and safety to explore and share that openly. Other religious traditions not so much...

Tenorbear2

[Catherine]

One of the things I vaguely remember seeing somewhere was the idea that to get the women-syncing-up effect, you need to have women sharing not just the same house, but a lot of shared space  over a substantial period of time.

It's odd. Even though my cycle is all wonky due to impending menopause, my sister and I are pretty darned synced up. I might not get a period every month, but when I do, she's got her's too! And we only see each other a few times a month, certainly not every day or even every week.

The rational part of my brain tells me this is just a coincidence. I don't really think it's some kind wombyn power thing, but I can understand where that sort of idea comes from. If you're (general you) looking for a connection, it can be pretty easy to find. It can be a comforting idea, feeling like you have some kind of bond. Even if it is a giant load of crap.