VIRGIN GODDESS is a nonhomogeneous, highly problematic concept for scholarly use, for it was partly made up by the religious politics of Greek city-states in order to further their patriarchal aims, and for the other part has been popularized by a certain kind of feminist interest promoted by followers of the contemporary goddess religion. Goddess worshipers in Western postmodern societies promote a biologistic understanding of femaleness that is focused on the procreative capacity of the female body, and therefore venerate one or several goddesses as givers and takers of life. In relating all possible functions of goddesses from all times and religions to sexuality and fertility, the goddess movement(s) reveal an outlook on the essence of femaleness that resembles that of ancient Greek gender ideology, even though it arrives at a different evaluation of it.

History and Critical Reevaluation of the Notion of the Virgin Goddess