Author: Janet Rudolph

Janet Maika’i Rudolph. “IT’S ALL ABOUT THE QUEST.” I have walked the spirit path for over 25 years traveling to sacred sites around the world including Israel to do an Ulpan (Hebrew language studies while working on a Kibbutz), Eleusis and Delphi in Greece, Avebury and Glastonbury in England, Brodgar in Scotland, Machu Picchu in Peru, Teotihuacan in Mexico, and Giza in Egypt. Within these travels, I have participated in numerous shamanic rites and rituals, attended a mystery school based on the ancient Greek model, and studied with shamans around the world. I am twice initiated. The first as a shaman practitioner of a pathway known as Divine Humanity. The second ordination in 2016 was as an Alaka’i (a Hawaiian spiritual guide with Aloha International). I have written four books: When Moses Was a Shaman (now available in Spanish, Cuando Moises era un shaman), When Eve Was a Goddess, (now available in Spanish, Cuando Eva era una Diosa), One Gods. and my recently released autobiography, Desperately Seeking Persephone. Latest book, just released on Feb 17th, 2026, The Music of Creation: Exploring Verse and Vibration in the Bible

Patriarchy, Thy Name is Cruelty by Janet Maika’i Rudolph

Andrew Young famously said that ‘anything is legal if 100 businessmen decide to do it.” I would add a more modern take. Nothing is too low, too immoral, too illegal if 5 or 6 Supreme Court justices decide to allow it.

Their recent decisions could fill a book on how corrupt they are. (I’ve discussed this before. But this post is looking at immigration and the cruelty that this administration is fomenting. We have always been a cruel nation. Patriarchy has honed cruelty as its worked to crush women’s bodies while silencing women. How else would women have agreed to our loss of power? Carol Christ has written eloquently about this. Immigration policy has blown the lid off this pot. Perhaps because it is too new, too shocking. Because ICE is in our faces with agents flooding neighborhoods and engaging in unfettered cruelty.

For example, when ICE raided an apartment building in the Bronx on Feb 24th, they arrested 19 year old Merwil Gutiérrez. When they realized they had the wrong person, their response was “take him anyway.” Read that again, “take him anyway.”

Merwil Gutiérrez was then deported to the notorious prison CECOT in El Salvador. For months, his family couldn’t find him. He was eventually sent to his native Venezuela.

The Erotic as Power, Notes on Audre Lorde by Janet Maika’i Rudolph

I’ve long kept a tract of Audre Lorde’s seminal piece The Uses of the Erotic near my computer. “The Erotic as Power” is her subtitle. If you haven’t read it, please do. It is in her book Sister Outsider. And you can find it as a stand-alone here. It was written in 1978.

Lorde points out how the erotic is the opposite of pornography, in fact pornography is ultimately a denial of the erotic because it emphasizes sensation without feeling. “The erotic is a resource within each of us that lies in a deeply female and spiritual plane . . .” She goes on to note how it is through our bodies that we recognize and access this power. But she goes on, “We have been taught to suspect this resource, vilified, abused and devalued within Western society.” In the hands of patriarchy this amazing and important resource often lies out of reach because it has become a source of shame and a sense of inferiority for women.[1]

I would add to the definition of patriarchy that one of its main goals is to damp down, even destroy, the erotic. We have seen this play out over thousands of years of history. Women are often viewed as either saints or sinners. Saints are denuded of this deep earthy power and sinners are those who flaunt it, or at least in the eyes of patriarchy.

#ShareTheirStories, June updates

Mahmoud Khalil, one of the first people arrested under the administration’s ICE raids. He was targeted because of his outspoken views on Palestinian rights. He is a legal green card holder and was never charged with a crime. Nevertheless the administrations flew him to a holding cell in Louisiana (from NY) in a particularly cruel move that prevented him from being present at the birth of his first child. Even after the baby was born, the government tried to put up roadblocks for his family to visit him and for him to touch his newborn son. He has now been freed by court order but US government is still trying to deport him. He has vowed that he will not be quiet and has already been seen at protests. He is a profile in courage.

Kilmar Albrego Garcia is another case entirely. The eyes of the government have turned his way and now that this has happened, they are doubling down on their cruelty. Just think for a moment of what it is for the government which the power of law enforcement, the powers of detainment to focus their sights on one person. He was originally deported to El Salvador in March. After the government ignored court orders for months he was finally brought back to the US to face federal charges. It is likely this was a face-saving move on the part of the government so they could say, “see he’s a bad guy who deserves this, look at these horrible criminal charges.”

SheSpeaks! Eve by Janet Maika’i Rudolph

Author’s Note: I have begun a project called She Speaks! Women of the Bible Have Their Say. As part of this project, I have done five films with some very dedicated actors (friends of mine) who have dubbed themselves the SheSpeaks!Ensemble. I showed 4 of the films at the recent Yerusha Symposium. Based on the comments and reception, the project is now expanding. I am looking to create longer films that include story arcs. The first one will be of Eve. Below is the script for Eve along with the link to the video.

EVE speaks:

Why hello I don’t get visitors very often! Welcome. Come, come sit under my tree, let’s share some tea. I have the most wonderful and flavorful herbs here in my garden.

Look around at my most marvelous paradise. It is all filled with magical treasure. I’ll tell you a secret, the treasure I care for spans both the heavens and the earth. You see, we are at the place where spirit, breath and matter intersect. Where the living beings of earth and the animating forces of the divine join in harmony.

It is so hard to look at your holy book. I can’t imagine why I keep getting blamed for . . .well . . . just about everything. It’s strange that your world wants to connect me with curses as I am the giver of life. In fact, did you know that my name Eve means life. I don’t understand what has become of you, my children. It is said that I brought a curse to humanity. Do you see life as a curse? Let me tell you a bit about myself. Perhaps then you will see me differently.

#ShareTheirStories, June 2025 Edition

Photo from Amnesty International. For more information and to support his petition click here.

This is a project that FAR has started to share the stories of immigrants who are targeted by the US administration. It is our belief that when people are recognized as human beings, it is harder to dehumanize them and to take away their civil rights. We are facing a devastating situation where in the United States people are being “disappeared” without any recourse to the legal system. The viciousness of what is happening is growing. Some of those arrested have been released but it is a small drop in the bucket of the flood of arrestees, most not even receiving a day in court and some caught in legal mazes that show no sign of ending.

Take Mahmoud Khalil, whom we have already discussed. He was arrested in March due to his outspoken Pro-Palestinian views. In May, U.S. District Judge Michael Farbiarz in New Jersey ruled that Secretary of State Marco Rubio likely violated the Constitution when he stripped Mahmoud Khalil of his green card and ordered him deported. Even so the Judge declined to release him because he has not proven “irreparable harm” caused by his detention. I think an elementary school child can even understand the irreparable harm one suffers by being detained, esp. in Trump prisons that are designed for harshness. And to add to it, Khalil is a new father who only got to hold his son while in prison after a flurry of lawsuits.

The Loving Tree By Janet Maika’i Rudolph

from Egyptian tomb of Pashedu *ca.* 1314-1200 BCE

Once there was a tree who loved two young children, twins, a boy and a girl.

Thay came everyday to play under her canopy.

Gather her leaves and play fairies of the forest.

Climb her trunk and play in her branches

And sleep with their backs against her trunk

They loved the tree and the tree loved them.

Time went by and the twins grew older.

They didn’t come to visit the tree as often.

One day when they did come, the tree asked them to play but they responded they needed money because they wanted to go on dates.

The tree responded, take my apples to sell. But leave enough behind for the squirrels and birds and other animals so they can eat too. Leave enough behind for the seeds.

#SHARE THEIR STORIES by Janet Maika’i Rudolph

I was walking along the street the other day thinking about the comforts I find at home, my favorite tee-shirt, the three or four books I’m reading at a time, photos of loved ones. Around that time, I heard the news that Rümeysa Öztürk, a Turkish PhD student at Tufts who was whisked off the street by ICE agents in Massachusetts. She disappeared into the system until she showed up in detention in Louisiana. This is the facility that has been called “a black hole” by civil rights groups. So many have been swept off the street, how do we keep track? Ozturk had a valid student visa until the State department revoked it without notice nor telling her. She was on her way to break her Ramadan fast with friends. After her arrest she asked for food, not having eaten for 13 hours. She was given snacks. She still hadn’t eaten a meal by the next day and was feeling faint. She was given more snacks.

I began thinking, who are her friends? What was she going to eat? In fact, what are her favorite foods? In other words, who is she as a person. Her name is foreign, she comes from another country so it might be too easy to dismiss her as one of many. But if we know her story, if we humanize her, her story becomes harder to dismiss. The first step in the authoritarian playbook is to dehumanize people for some feature of who they are. When someone is dehumanized, it is far easier to do hateful things.

The antidote is to know their stories, share their stories, speak their stories.

The Flesh and the Fruit by Vanya Leilani, PhD: Book Review by Janet Maika’i Rudolph

Subtitle: Remembering Eve and the Power of Creative Transgression

I have learned that every good story of spirit has many layers of meaning and pathways of understanding. Dr Leilani has found particularly relevant and even beautiful aspects of the biblical story of Eve. She uses Eve’s actions as a template of her own spiritual journey. Her pathway begins in obedience (listening to the voice of authority), travels through transgressive acts (eating of the fruit), and finally results in a self-knowing that had not been possible at the beginning of her journey. In this book we follow along on her quest to learn about herself with Eve as her inspiration.

This is a luscious book. Vanya Leilani’s insights are not only profound but are written with a poetic sensibility. I found myself speaking some of her passages out loud because the vibration of her words are powerful and feel so sensuous on the tongue. I wanted to take them into my body, as well as read them on the page.

We’ve Seen This Playbook Before by Janet Maika’i Rudolph

ICE has been doing mass round-ups of anyone who looks like “the other.” The people cheered. “This is my country,” they shouted to the deportees. “Go back where you came from.” The people are flush with excitement thinking this is what we voted for, meanwhile ignoring that they came from someplace too. We know this is a publicity stunt. How? Dr. Phil tagged along on one of round-ups. Newly minted secretary Kristi Noem also took her role in the spotlight attending one in NYC and saying dehumanizing words I will not repeat here.

We’ve seen this playbook before. Creating chaos, disorientation and suffering for political points, TV or other publicity ratings. It doesn’t end well – EVER!

The NY Times had a report of how deportees were treated in a dehumanizing manner, being held on a broken plane in the Amazonian heat with no AC, people shackled, children were on board. There are always people available to treat other people as less than human. “I was just doing my job.” “I was only following orders.”

We’ve seen this playbook before. It doesn’t end well – EVER!

Broken Human Bonds by Janet Maika’i Rudolph

Author’s Note: I originally wrote this in the fall when Andrea Robin Skinner started going public with her own story. It has taken me a while to contemplate posting it. It feels like this is such a common story that it needs to be shared. We all need to know that we are not alone and that each of us is lovable.

Whenever I hit a personal and/or emotionally raw topic, my first instinct is to turn to Tarot cards to see what lessons I need to learn. I use Rachel Pollack’s Shining Tribe deck (more on that later). I have been finding myself in this situation recently with the revelations of Andrea Robin Skinner, daughter of the renowned Nobel Prize winning writer Alice Munro. Andea waited until her mother died before she revealed publicly that her step-father began sexually abusing her when she was nine years old. When she had told her mother about it, Munro blamed Andrea for damaging her marriage. The stepfather at issue publicly called Skinner even though a child at the time, a “homewrecker.” He did this in a letter which included death threats. Abuse, blame, threats tools of patriarchy all. Skinner’s own mother didn’t seek to protect daughter but chose instead to shield the abuser. A betrayal of the most primal sort!