Sekhmet, Sekhmet, Eye of Re, Great of Flame, Lady Options

sxmt Sekhmet Sachmet Sekhet Nesert (Greek: Sachmis)

Sekhmet, whose name is believed to derive from sekhem meaning powerful, is one of ancient egypt's dangerous goddesses. She is portrayed as a woman with the head of a lion having the solar disk and uraeus as her headdress. She is often shown carrying a papyri staff and ankh.

Sekhmet is seen mainly as a deity of vengeance and pestilence that must be appeased, along with this however she is seen as a deity of protectiveness and healing; the pestilence she brings she can also take away. Sekhmet's priests were most commonly the physicians of ancient egypt. She is also often portrayed as the companion of the pharoah in battle, protecting him and bringing plague and pestilence upon the enemies of egypt.

She is most well known in the myth of the destruction of mankind. In this myth during Re's old age, humanity becames dissatisfied and in the desert rebels started to plot against him. Re was weary of rule and wanted to leave but had to deal with the rebels first. Re gathered a secret council of the gods, explained the situation and asked for their approval in eliminating humanity. The gods agreed that mankind deserved to die, and thus Hathor was transformed into the vengeful eye of Re, Sekhmet. Sekhmet hunted down all the rebels so that the desert ran red with their blood. By this time Re had decided to spare the rest of mankind. Sekhmet however was fond of human blood and was unstoppable since her power was such that not even Re dared confront her directly. To stop the destruction of mankind, Re ordered red orchre to be brought to Heliopolis where it was ground and added to vats of beer to turn it blood red. Re took seven thousand jars of the red beer to the field where Sekhmet was going to attack and flooded it. When Sekhmet came to the field she believed it to be human blood and drank until she got tanked and lost the desire to destroy mankind.

Sekhmet is responsible for the seven guardian demons (Sheseru,Ssr) who are said to embody the seven creative words as well as pestilence and plagues.

More information on sxmt http://www.lionessofthesun.com/Glossary/S/Sekhmet
Ditto http://showcase.netins.net/web/ankh/sekhsigntest.html
Littany to Sekhmet http://www.hwt-hrw.com/Sekhmet.php
Invocation of Sekhmet (French) http://www.esoterika.org/modules.php?name=...article&sid=514
Titled of hathor/Sekhmet http://www.hethert.org/titles.htm
Sekhmet the lion-headed (Neither informative nor particularly relevant, but i like it) http://www.bartleby.com/273/77.html

Sources that I can remember:
Daily Lives of the Egyptian Gods by Dimitri Meeks and Christine Favard-Meeks
Ancient Egypt Magazine December/January 2004/2005 : The Story of the Destruction of Mankind
The Ancient Gods Speak: a Guide to Egyptian Religion by Donald B.
Redford

Sekhmet Netjert (Goddess) of Healing "She Who Is Powerful". was the meaning of Skehmet name. She was the ancient female energy predating ptah by several hundred years. She was a dark Goddess in some of her aspects like the eye of Ra, the story goes she went out to punish the people for laughing at Ra. She began to kill the people and drink their blood. Skehmet is often pictured as a cat Goddess, with the head of a lion. So this blood thirsty behavior was quite in kind for a cat Goddess. But Ra took pity on the people and he tried to get Skehmet to quit killing his people. But she was in a blood thirsty rage and could not be stopped. So he tricked her by making a red beer. She drank the red beer thinking it was blood and fell into a sound sleep. When she awoke she felt remorse for what she had done and so she stopped the killing.
--Courtesy of http://www.gotojassminesitenow.com/goddesses/skehmet.html


Your imagination deceives you. Trust in this, that I have and can hold my own against most any god, especially one with such limited following as Seckhmet. What you see of her is but one face. Much like Shiva/Kali, Seckhmet has a very dark side. I am not judging by any means, for I too have two distinct sides. I merely thought one so dedicated to this goddess should be aware. If my concern was construed as offensive, then you have my apologies.

This post has been edited by Makavelli: Aug 10 2006, 02:37 PM