Yoni

The word yoni is the Sanskrit word for the 'female reproductive organ'. Translated directly into English, it could mean vulva or vagina. It also has a wider meaning in religious and spiritual contexts, where its meaning is 'creativity'. The yoni is also considered to be symbolic of Shakti or other goddesses of a similar nature.

Yoni worship

After the Aryan race intermingled with the indigenous communities of ancient India, a form of idolatory, or idol worship, developed. While the Aryans originally practiced a form of worship that did not use idols, the Dravidian form of worship made prolific use of idols. The new race that was born of their merger tended towards the Dravidian style of worship. In time, certain commonly accepted forms were adopted for the idols of each of the gods. A woman with 10 hands and bearing weapons signified Kali, or power, a woman with heavy ornaments signified Lakshmi, or wealth, and so on.

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People of that time tended to supplicate their deities in the hope of gaining temporal boons. One example of this practice was the veneration of the yoni for the purpose of attempting to ensure the fertility of the land. This form of yoni worship was actually a reverence of the concept of the Divine Passage, rather than the female genitalia. However, in physical form, the yoni idols were statues of women depicted as having enlarged yonis or were simply images of the yoni itself. Foreign invaders tended to express amusement concerning this kind of a worship. The foreigners believed the worship of the yoni was performed with a goal that was somehow related to human sexuality. However, as previously stated, the goal of yoni worship was to increase agricultural yields.

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Over the centuries, couples that experienced difficulties in producing children began to engage in yoni worship with the goal of increasing their chances of conception.

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The usage of the term yoni was spread to other lands by foreigners that had encountered the concept in India. However, their limited understanding of the nuances of the yoni caused these people to represent the usage of the word as solely a reference to female genitalia.

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