Nuit

Template:Short description Template:Otheruses Template:Technical reasons Template:Template otherTemplate:Wikidata imageTemplate:Compare image with Wikidata Template:Sidebar with collapsible lists Nuit (alternatively Nu, Nut, or Nuith) is a goddess in Thelema, the speaker in the first chapter of The Book of the Law, the sacred text written or received in 1904 by Aleister Crowley. Nuit is based on the Ancient Egyptian sky goddess Nut, who in Egyptian mythology arches over her brother/husband, Geb (Earth god). She is usually depicted as a naked woman who is covered with stars.Template:Sfnp

In The Book of the Law

In Aleister Crowley’s The Book of the Law, the central sacred text of Thelema, Nuit is one part of a triad of deities, along with Hadit (her masculine counterpart), and Ra-Hoor-Khuit, or “the Crowned and Conquering Child”, who Thelemites believe are depicted on the Stele of Revealing. She has several titles, including "Our Lady of the Stars", and "Lady of the Starry Heaven". In The Book of the Law she says of herself: "I am Infinite Space, and the Infinite Stars thereof",Template:Sfnp and in other verses she is called "Queen of Heaven",Template:Sfnp and "Queen of Space".Template:Sfnp Nuit is symbolized by a sphere whose circumference is nowhere and whose center is everywhere.Template:Efn Hadit is the infinitely small point at the center of the sphere of Nuit.Template:Sfnp

In Thelemic theology

Manon Hedenborg-White writes that "[...] Nuit and Hadit are constructed as gendered opposites in ritual and literature, and their divine functions and attributes are linked to their sex."Template:Sfnp She observes that

Claiming that Nuit is female and receptive and Hadit is male and active is thus not a mere description, but a performative utterance that creates these deities as gendered in the minds of those who experience them, and reproduces assumptions about what femininity and masculinity is. By disregarding other physical aspects that might otherwise define the deities and linking their sex to the human sexes of male and female in ritual, gender is established as a crucially important category in relating to the divine.Template:Sfnp

She goes on to note the practitioners of Thelema may subvert this view through polytheism, incorporating deities such as Kali from Hinduism as well as the Greek god Pan to represent different forms of femininity and masculinity.Template:Sfnp She also notes that one of her Thelemic informants questions the gendering of Nuit, calling it "merely a convenient metaphor". Another called the model "overly simplistic" and has devised their own more complex gender formulation. Hedenborg-White goes on to note that "studying contemporary Thelema requires sensitivity to the fact that Thelemites are not passively bound to orthodoxy in their religious practice."Template:Sfnp

See also

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