The prophet's dictionary guide to the supernatural

gather on her temple steps to wait for passersby. Ishtar cults go way back to ancient Babylonia, where they were founded. The Sumerians inculcated the worship in their society. Since then, it has been passed down under many names and forms, integrated into worship of succeeding generations along the way. When strangers and other males came to the temple to worship, the young women competed to be the one with whom the man chose to have sex. This was a cultural requirement that served as a sort of rite of passage for females seeking to be accepted in their communities. The main purpose was the loss of their virginity. The custom of the day was that a man could not marry a virgin since all virgins automatically belonged to the temple priests. The girls had to serve their time in Ishtar’s temple before being qualified for marriage. The young women who the men kept refusing the ceremonial rite of sex were stigmatized and branded as undesirable. The story of Eli’s sons fornicating with women in Yahweh’s temple was imitative of this profane sacrifice to the fertility goddess. 699. Isis—Egyptian fertility goddess, wife of Osiris. Isis was a counterpart of the Greco-Roman Astarte. 700. Islam—From Arabic meaning “submission to God” comes the name of a world religion founded by the prophet Muhammad in sixth century A.D. It is based on the Bible’s Judeo-Christian faith, from which Muhammad extracted his religion. Both these faiths, plus a multitude of pagan deities, were popular during his time. Although he acknowledged the Bible’s famed Jewish and messianic prophets, Muhammad simply saw them as forerunners of himself, the last prophet to ever speak for the one true god, whom he called Allah. Born in fifth century A.D., Muhammad grew up in Mecca’s polytheistic culture. His fortunate marriage to a wealthy widow catapulted him to wealth and prominence. Nonetheless, Mecca’s religious syncretism motivated him to search for the true god, and so resorting to a cave (see Cave of Incubation), Muhammad went to meet his god. Eventually, he had a supernatural apparition where the angel Gabriel, who prophesied John the Baptist to the Zacharias and Jesus Christ to the virgin Mary, supposedly came and taught him the name Allah, telling him to recite it as the name of the only true god in his new religion. Gabriel gave him a black stone to signify his founding of a new faith, and instructed him on Islam’s five pillars, their “way of life.” From his angel, the prophet received what was to become Islam’s sacred book, the Quran (recitation), whose verses are translated from Arabic as signs.