Fairies, Dragons and the Virgin Birth ... all myths. Fairies have been really "in" over the last few years, what with everything from little girls demanding fairy parties to the inspired "Squashed Fairy Book", to grown ups playing fairies in a New Age, crystals and incense kinda way. I'm not big on fairies myself. Dragons however, rock hard. I love dragons. I had a very big dragon and unicorn stage in my teens, probably set off by Anne McCaffrey's dragons, at least the early stuff, the Dragonflight and Dragonsinger series, after that she just got too soft-porny and Martha Stewart for my tastes. Anyway I had little pottery dragons, posters of dragons, and produced a massive graphic novel featuring dragons, unicorns, falcons and a small strong outrageously talented heroine ... some of these still survive but are not for public exhibition.
The big difference between mythical creatures / incidents like fairies, dragons and the Virgin Birth is that once past pre-pubescence no one in positions of power and authority enforces the belief that fairies and dragons are real. No one preaches fairies and dragons in public places. No one draws mind-boggling hypocritical discriminatory conclusions based on fairies and dragons.
But the Immaculate Conception? A Virgin Birth?? The Cult of the Virgin Mary? All a dastardly and frankly bizarre plot by the Catholic Church circa 8th Century onwards to wrest power and capital from the bosom of the congregation and turn women into second class citizens.
In the beginning . . . the Old Testament gets off to a great start by blaming everything on Eve, and that because of her 'sin' women would have to endure pain and hardship forever. Like, woo. After that there are lots of begats, bloody wars, environmental disasters, rape and murder and incest, and stories about beautiful women hanging around wells and picking up gorgeous kingly blokes while their plain sisters did all the work.
Then we get the New Testament. Bear in mind that all four books were written long after the event; in the case of the Book of John (which incidentally contains most information about Mary, ie very little) about eighty years or so after the birth of Christ. Just think now; AD 1 - 33 was a time and place where there wasn't a great deal of written language or reportage among the ordinary populace, so what was written in the books of the Gospel, letters and Acts many years later was quite possibly based largely on heresay and perhaps (gasp!) pure conjecture.
In three of the four Books of the Gospel, Mary the mother of Jesus is barely mentioned at all, a paltry four times in Matthew for example, with no reference to a virgin conception and birth, let alone the nativity scene that we all know so well. It is only in the Book of John (written 80 years after the event, remember; were any of the key players even alive?) we are told the story of the Angel Gabriel's visit to Mary and Mary's impregnation via the Holy Ghost. We are also told of Mary's visit to her sister Elizabeth, Joseph's quandary, the journey to Bethlehem, and the nativity (complete with wise men).
Many of these occurrences were prophesised in the Old Testament -- call me cynical but it crossed my mind that John could have been the earliest known spin-doctor eg manipulating facts to meet expectations and constructing a legend.
So call me cynical. Nyah-boo.
All in all, we have a very sketchy picture without any background or frame of reference for that period. For example, it is quite possible that given the custom at the time, Mary and Joseph were engaged but not married; and that the state of 'virgin' was held up until marriage - whether the hymen was intact or not! Though Mary does say, somewhat coyly, that she 'has never known a man' . . Hmmmm. The details embroidered around the nativity story in particular -- the overcrowded inn, the manger, the tired donkey and oxen, the three kings bearing gifts, are pure fabrication, developed through the centuries.
I'm sorry, but anyone who knows about the birds and the bees can see that the whole Immaculate Conception story is improbable at best (although its definitely possible in this day and age, given the marvels of modern science . . . A.I. anybody?). I questioned the story when I was six - was Mary on with this Gabriel fella or what? Anyway, ew ew EW. Procreation without the fun first is supposed to be the ideal? What IS it with that? Uh-uh, no thanks, not for this lil black duck . .
From little things big things grow . . . From a few lines in one book of the New Testament, a huge cult arose; and with it the subjugation and denigration of 51% of the human population.
Worship and prayers to Mary the mother of Jesus spread with Christianity itself; Mary has always been seen to embody tenderness, gentleness, and people prayed to her for these traits and for her mediation and intercession. Madonna figures are found throughout Europe, depicting all kinds of Marian figures, from primitive and propagandist medieval manuscripts to the glorious Black Madonna of Montserrat (I think -- or is it Lucca?). The growth of the Marian Cult is traced mainly through the pictorial; the cult was directed primarily to the uneducated and servile elements of the population.
You see, up until the 8th Century or so, women held a very strong position in the religious community throughout Europe and particularly Britain; Queens and Abbesses were very influential people indeed; women held real power, influence and capital, and could pass this down to their daughters. There wasn't even an Anglo-Saxon word for 'woman'; men and women were both referred to as 'this mann'. As in 'this mann leaves to her daughter Editha ...'. Cool, eh?
Then around the 8th Century, the male clergy got wise to the fact that women DID hold power and capital (well we all know men are a bit slow on the uptake -- until they think someone else might be getting a better deal). Nope, they said, we can't have that ... It was about that time male clergymen were required to be celibate, thus removing the horrid possibility that capital and goods might be directed out of the Church onto the clergy's dependents. Female clergy began to be pushed away from teaching, learning and the sciences into caring and nurturing - read servile, domestic - roles. Those in the proto-medical professions (midwives, herbalists, goodwomen all) were hounded as witches in the 12th and 13th Centuries to take away their power and influence in the community, Medicine and science became intensely chauvinistic and dictatorial professions.
What I said earlier, about the Marian Cult's ideal of procreation without copulation, links with this change-over of responsibility for the healing arts. The womb and its functions became the Big Bad; with the result that women were seen as nasty oozy unpredictable things, pulsing with venomous intent, inspiring fear of the unknown and uncontrollable, lying in wait to drag men into everlasting hell and damnation. The ideal woman was one who did not question or behave in a non-servile manner. By Victorian times, surgeons were ripping out uteruses and slicing off clitorises with er gay abandon as a solution to 'female hysteria'. Sound familiar? We still bear this legacy today, even in the Western World - how many women out there have been remonstrated by a patronising MALE doctor who blames a real medical problem on 'stress' and 'neuroses'? Join the club ladies ...
And because humankind has always known that knowledge is power, women were denied knowledge and learning. The education of women was rare, and generally occurred only in the higher classes if at all. Sure, a female was made professor of physics in Italy in the 15th Century but this was an exception (and she was the daughter of a Duke or something). It wasn't until the 19th Century that the education of female children became widespread; and only in the 20th Century did education become available past pubescence. All those wasted years and lives.
And so we have this legacy, in the 21st Century, of inequity and abuse of power, of the denial of proper medical care and education. All because of a few lines in a fairy story . . . Thanks John honey.
Want to flame me? Go ahead, make my day :) Just don't get me started on Islam . . .