by Terry McCombs
Terry McCombs ran the God/dess of the Month Club (GoM) on soc.religion.paganism from 2003 onward, posting a monthly profile of a deity from a different tradition each month. This profile of Promethea was posted September 1, 2003 — his most unusual entry.
Promethea is not a historical deity. She is the central figure of a 32-issue comic book series (1999–2005) by Alan Moore and artist J.H. Williams III, published through America's Best Comics. Moore — a practicing ceremonial magician and devotee of the serpent god Glycon — conceived the series as a literal magical act: an initiatory journey through the Kabbalistic paths of the Tree of Life, presented as a superhero story. The series begins in Alexandria in 411 CE, when a Pagan magician, knowing he is about to be killed by Christian zealots, sends his daughter into the Immateria — the realm of the imagination at the end of the 32nd path of the Kabalah — where she becomes a living story and begins manifesting through successive avatars in the physical world.
McCombs filed this profile during a difficult month: he had recently moved house after fourteen years and spent time away from technology on vacation. He could either re-run a profile or go light. He went light — and in doing so posed a genuine question: can a fictional character become a goddess? His answer is yes, and his reasoning is consistent: Promethea's synodeities (Biliku the Andanese spider-weaver, Saga the Norse storyteller, the Greek Muses) suggest she is not an invention but a manifestation of a force that already existed. Moore's act of artistic magic gave that force a new name and a new face for the twenty-first century.
Name
Promethea. Named for Prometheus.
Symbols
Caduceus, Third Eye, Tree of Life, symbols associated with Yesod.
Usual Image
Healthy athletic woman with olive skin and stylized "Egyptian" dress, though different avatars vary greatly.
Holy Books
Promethea, Books 1–5, by Alan Moore; artwork by J.H. Williams III and others (America's Best Comics, 1999–2005).
Holy Days
N/A. Though one could say September 25, which is National Comic Book Day in America.
Place of Worship
The Imagination.
Form of Worship
Write, draw, sculpt — exercise one's imagination in some manner or other.
Area of Influence
Goddess of Imagination.
Synodeities
Biliku, Spider Goddess of the Andanese Islands — goddess of storytelling, weaving, fate, and magic. Saga, Norse Goddess of Storytelling. The Muses (Greek). Wonder Woman, Buffy (Pop Culture).
Details
What's the deal McCombs — have you lost it? Placing not only a fictional character among the ranks of Sophia, Horus, Kuan Yin, Durga, and the Greenman, but placing one from a comic book there?
Has all this finally driven you mad? Well, first of all I do more walking than driving, and second of all — yes, I guess it is madness of a sort.
The madness of a major move to a new place of residence after fourteen years of living there. That sort of thing is always stressful and time consuming, and I also spent more than a week away from almost all technology while on vacation this month, so I just did not have the time to do the research I usually do.
And yes, oh my detractors — I actually DO research on each month's God or Goddess, going so far as to not only check books out of the library but even reading them.
With this month's activities I had to decide between either a rerun or going light. I thought I would do the one you see here. However, don't sell Promethea short.
The story of Promethea, a 32-issue series from America's Best Comics (a subsidiary of DC Comics, the home of Superman, Swamp Thing, and Wonder Woman) is written by Alan Moore, a practicing magician who seems to be writing the series as a magical act presented as an initiatory quest into the mysteries of the Imagination, while at the same time acting as a primer to things magical. As such I would guess it is the first such item ever done in such a manner.
Mr. Moore has pointed out in interviews how studies have found that the most effective method of transmitting information seems to be in the form we would call the comic book.
The story of Promethea starts in Alexandria, 411 AD, when a Pagan magician — knowing he is soon to be killed by fanatical adherents of the new religion — contrives that his daughter, named for Prometheus and fated to bring a new kind of fire to mankind, is sent into the desert, where she is rescued by Thoth/Hermes, who saves her by taking her into the Immateria (at the end of the 32nd Path of the Kabbala), where she becomes a living story.
From there she manifests through different avatars in the physical world to fulfill her ultimate fate: to bridge the gap between the material world and the world of imagination.
This is halted for a time in 1097 at the Battle of Antioch, when a Muslim and a Christian Promethea battle one another to the death. She returns in 1751 when a romantic poet causes his housekeeper Anna to channel the first avatar of Promethea in over 700 years.
This does not go well when Anne dies giving birth to a baby that is only half real.
The next incarnation of Promethea takes place through Margaret Taylor Case, when she introduces a character into her newspaper comic strip Little Margie in Mystic Magic Land.
After that introduction into the modern world, Promethea continues to appear in one pop culture media after another, while at the same time appearing physically by transforming either the writer or artist who has envisioned her, or as a loved one of that artist.
After Margaret Case, the other Prometheas are: Grace Brannagh, a 1930s pulp magazine artist; William Woolcott, a comic book artist who draws and becomes her as a superheroine from 1941 to 1970; and Barbara Shelley, the wife of the artist who brings back the character after Woolcott's death.
Promethea almost disappears with the death of Steve Shelley until she manifests for the last time, when college student Sophie Bangs begins a research paper on the odd phenomenon of a character that keeps appearing from writers and artists who know little or nothing about each other's work.
Sophie is to be the ultimate avatar of Promethea, who will bring about the end of the world — not through violence, but by rebuilding it anew when all cross the 32nd path and the world of the flesh and the mind become one.
So no — Promethea is not a goddess like the others that have been on this site. However, I think that Mr. Moore's unique effort is worthy of note for those who might otherwise not take notice of something that might be dismissed by comic fan-boys as too metaphysical, while not even being noticed by the esoteric community due to the medium in which it is presented.
That's why I say: give Promethea a chance. There might be more to her than you imagine.
Colophon
Posted by Terry McCombs to soc.religion.paganism, September 1, 2003. Part of the God/dess of the Month Club series. Original Message-ID: [email protected].
Preserved from the Usenet archive for the Good Work Library by the New Tianmu Anglican Church, 2026.
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