The little group of three pillars
found at Knossos evidently represents the divinity in her aspect as
a heavenly goddess, for the pillars have doves perching upon their
capitals. Sometimes, as in the case of the Lion Gate at Mycenae, and
other representations, we have the pillar with the two supporting
lions, an anticipation of the anthropomorphic figure of the goddess
on the rock. It is possible that in some cases the figures of the
Double Axes standing between horns of consecration were also looked
upon as embodiments of the divinity. A similar mode of representing
deity occurs in the earlier stages of many religions, and the sacred
pillar set up by Jacob at Bethel may be instanced as an example
of its presence in the beginnings of the Hebrew worship.
In general the Minoan Great Mother appears to have been looked
upon as a being of beneficence, and as the giver of 'every good
and perfect gift'; but her association with the lion and the snake
shows that there was also a more mysterious and awful side to her
character. When the later Greeks came into the island and found
this deity in possession, she became identified, in the various
aspects of her many-sided nature, with various goddesses of the
Hellenic Pantheon. Foremost and specially she became Rhea, the
mother of the gods, who had fled to Crete to bear her son Zeus.
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