Review — The Goddess Hekate

Sam's review of The Goddess Hekate.

Written for Gnosis in 1993, this is a review of Stephen Ronan's edited volume The Goddess Hekate (Chthonios Books, 1992). Sam opens with the problem the book solves: Hekate is widely invoked and poorly understood. Her ancient cult was vigorous enough that the eleventh-century Church was still condemning offerings left for her at crossroads, yet modern readers know her mainly as a moon goddess and Queen of the Witches. Getting past that has meant hunting out-of-print sources and reading Greek — until Ronan gathered the best English-language classical scholarship into one small volume.

The first half, Sam explains, is reprints, and he walks through what they cover: J. E. Lowe on how Greek magicians saw her, two chapters of Farnell's Cults of the Greek States on cult and iconography, K. F. Smith on Hekate's Suppers and the monthly offerings, and material from Rohde's Psyche on her hosts and the beings who travel with her at night. Fourteen plates are appended, along with a geographical register of Hekate's cult centres that Sam singles out as invaluable for tracing how far the worship spread.

Ronan's own contributions get the higher praise. Four fresh translations of the major hymns — the Orphic Hymns, the Greek Magical Papyri, Proclus, and Sophocles — come with the Greek transliterated for pronunciation. His closing piece on the Chaldean Hekate places her as the Cosmic Soul within the theurgy of late antiquity, the tradition that shaped the Neoplatonists and, through them, Christian doctrine; Sam notes that Golden Dawn practitioners will recognise phrases from their own rituals in the translations. His criticisms are of the physical book — cramped type, thin margins, a prohibitive price — and his warmest note is for Ronan's decision to capitalise Goddess, Gods and Pagans against prevailing custom, on the principle that every religion's names deserve the same courtesy.

Originally published at samwebstermage.com →