Eye of Ra Tattoo Meaning

Power, protection, the sun's fury, and the destructive feminine force.

The Eye of Ra is the burning eye of the sun's fury — the fierce feminine power of the sun-god unleashed, sent to punish and to protect, both the destroyer's rage and the nurturer's love bound in one goddess. To carry the Eye of Ra is to carry power, protection, the sun's fury, and the destructive feminine force — the wrathful eye embodied in Sekhmet and Hathor, the divine feminine wrath that protects and can destroy, the fierce power that holds both fury and love.

In Egyptian myth the Eye of Ra is the fierce, feminine, fiery aspect of the sun-god: the wrathful feminine aspect of Ra — a burning solar eye sent to punish humanity, embodied by the goddesses Sekhmet and Hathor. The Eye of Ra was a power Ra could send forth from himself, personified as a goddess — the burning eye of the sun, an extension of the sun-god's might that acted with fierce and independent power. In the great myth, when humanity rebelled against Ra, the aging sun-god sent his Eye against them as Sekhmet, the lioness-goddess of war and destruction, to punish the rebels.

Sekhmet fell upon humanity in a fury of slaughter, so fierce in her bloodlust that she threatened to destroy all of humankind. To stop her, Ra had the land flooded with beer dyed red like blood; Sekhmet, thinking it blood, drank deeply, became intoxicated, and her rage subsided — and she was pacified into the gentle goddess Hathor. The Eye of Ra is thus embodied in these goddesses, Sekhmet and Hathor — the burning solar eye sent as fierce feminine power to punish, the lioness of destruction whose terrible fury could devastate. The Egyptian Eye of Ra is the wrathful feminine aspect of Ra — the burning solar eye sent to punish humanity, embodied by Sekhmet and Hathor. The Egyptian Eye of Ra is the wrathful eye sent to punish — the wrathful feminine aspect of Ra, a burning solar eye sent to punish humanity, embodied by the goddesses Sekhmet and Hathor; a power Ra could send forth from himself, personified as a goddess, the burning eye of the sun acting with fierce independent power — when humanity rebelled, Ra sent his Eye as Sekhmet, the lioness-goddess of destruction, who fell upon them in a fury of slaughter so fierce she threatened to destroy all humankind, until Ra flooded the land with beer dyed red like blood, which she drank thinking it blood, becoming intoxicated and pacified into the gentle Hathor.

The Eye of Ra is distinct from the Eye of Horus. Where Horus's eye represents healing and restoration, Ra's eye represents divine fury. According to myth, Ra sent his Eye (in the form of the lioness goddess Sekhmet) to punish humanity for plotting against him. She became so drunk on blood that Ra had to trick her with beer dyed to look like blood to stop the slaughter. In tattoo symbolism, the Eye of Ra represents fierce protective power — the willingness to burn in defense of what matters.

Eye of Ra across cultures

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