History’s Vanquished Goddess
Asherah 
Resource & Reference Update Page   

"Asherah, the Shekinah, consort and beloved of Yahweh. God-the-Mother. Her sacred pillars or poles once stood right beside Yahweh’s altar, embracing it. Moses and Aaron both carried one of these Asherah . . ."

http://www.northernway.org/hgoddess.html
Painting by Jonathon Earl Bowser.

A personification of the goddess Asherah, this drawing was discovered on a 3-foot storage jar at Kuntillet Ajrud.* It depicts nibbling ibexes flanking a stylized, sacred tree,** all positioned above the back of striding lion.

The ancients would have immediately identified this symbolism with the goddess Asherah.The ibexes-flanking-and-nibbling-on-a-sacred-tree is an established Asherah motif throughout ancient Palestinian pottery. It dates back over 1,000 years before Kuntillet Ajrud's drawings.

The stylized sacred tree** is Asherah's sacred Tree of Life/Tree of Knowledge (the Pomegranate Tree^). Throughout antiquity, stylized, sacred trees were called asherahs after the goddess Asherah (reflected also in biblical text).

Epithets of Asherah include "Lion Lady," and "the One of the Lion." The lion was one of Asherah's ancient epiphanies and serves as the foundation of this configuration.
  The numerous references to Asherah presented here, provide a window into the past and a clue to understanding the importance of Asherah worship in a forgotten time long ago.
  
*an Israelite-Judean Sinai way-station with an attached shrine and "religious center." (Although a southern complex under Israelite control, neutron analysis of Ajrud's storage jars reveal they were produced by Judeans around the Jerusalem area, affirming it had a far reaching northern presence also.)

**Fossilized chunks of wood, discovered at Israelite, archaeological sites, were initiallyidentified as "posts" and "tree trunks.” 
Scholars have recently re-identified these remains as "Asherah-images.” 

^As the "Source of All Life," to eat the fruit of the pomegranate tree was to "become one with the goddess" in communion. A tradition continued today by Catholics as they receive the body of Christ in communion. 
-History’s Vanquished Goddess Asherah

 
This informative presentation encapsulates several dimensions of the Asherah-as-YHWH's-wife controversy.

 A Doctor of Theology and a pastor, Andrew Stehlik discusses archaeology, biblical religion, Asherah in Ugarit's religious texts, Khirbet el-Qom, Kuntillet Ajrud, Asherah iconography, Asherah in the Bible, Asherah as Lady Wisdom and biblical divine androgyny.

Through his analysis of this historical data, Stehlik describes the evolution of Asherah and YHWH as a divine couple prior to the rise of monotheism. 

Dr. Stehlik’s analysis can be found at http://andrewstehlik.blogspot.com/2012/03/did-yhwh-have-wife.html