God, is she male or is it female?

[Garbarsardar]

God is our Holy Mother. She is omniscient omnipotent and benevolent. She created the whole Universe and we all aspire to drink from Her breasts, the milk of human kindness.

Can you imagine that at some distant past people were refering to God using male articles and pronouns? Unbelievable but true. They treated God as being a "HE" they were adresing "HIM" instead of Her, and all religious imagery depicted Her as a man. Ridiculous heh?

They even ignored all the passages in their holy books alluding to Her female nature:She is the giver of life who pervades the cosmos like a mother bird hovering over the primordial chaos (Genesis 1:2). She shelters those in difficulty under Her wings (Psalm 17:8) and bears up the enslaved on Her great wings toward freedom (Exodus 19:4). Like a mother, She knits new life together in the womb (Psalm 139:13); like a midwife, She works deftly to bring about the new creation (Psalm. 22:9-10); like a washerwoman, She scrubs away bloody stains of sin (Psalm. 51:7).

It is a hard thing to swallow, but if we look at the opinions of many ancient writers on women we can understand why they denied Her true nature:

a. "St.Jerome said, "As long as woman is for birth and children, she is different from man as body is from soul. But when she wishes to serve Christ more than the world, then she will cease to be a woman and will be called man."

b. Ambrose wrote: "She who does not believe is a woman and should be designated by the name of her sex, whereas she who believes progresses to perfect manhood, to the measure of the adulthood of Christ."

c. Ambrosiaster wrote, "Man is made to the image of God, but not woman."

d. No less a figure than St. Augustine wrote that "only man is the image or glory of God".

e. Tertullian said to women, "Do you not know that you are Eve? You are the devil's gateway... How easily you destroyed man, the image of god. Because of the death which you brought upon us, even the Son of god had to die."

f. Thomas Aquinas, revered as one of the greatest Christian theologians of all time, wrote that woman is "defective as regards her individual nature"; that she is in fact, a "misbegotten male".

Even so-called scientists as Sigmund Freud conceived woman as a man without penis, while now we all know that man is a woman with a defective chromosome.

So I call upon you to preserve those ancient texts with all their misunderstandings because they are a valuable source for the long now extinct patriarchical society, that was but a small interlude in the 20000 years of matriarchical dominion on this planet.

I know that some people still refer to our Holy Mother as a "HE". Don't persecute them; they are harmless fools, not heretics and I'm sure She will forgive them.

[removeduser_487563287433]

PMT would explain some stuff, yeah.

[Justinian]

But the question is, does a being such as God have a sex? If God has a sex, is God a sexual being, or is he asexual? Is God, like Zeus, a perverted old (wo)man? Was Mary the victim of God disguised as a bull, or was Jesus the first lesbian birth in history?

[removeduser_487563287433]

Sexism aside, and I speak only from Greekish mythology since that's my field, mother goddesses are always present, and they are always powerful, and very respected but never dominant. Gaia from Greece, Cybele in Phyrigia, Rhea in Crete, all follow this pattern. Ruling female goddesses never appear in mythology, as far as I know.

[Tom Paine]

Ferrets, think also of Rhea wife of Cronos; that is, mother of Zeus et al. Or the Earth, their mother again. Each survives the fall of their husband.... and disappears. We are a patriarchal society, always have been, probably always will be, and therefore God is a man when anthropomorphised... which we really shouldn't do anyway, so the vwhole mtter is moot, remember God is genderless.

[Justinian]

remember God is genderless.

Where is the evidence for that statement? You're not just coming to a conclusion without any supporting evidence, are you? :wink:

[Tom Paine]

Where is the evidence for that statement? You're not just coming to a conclusion without any supporting evidence, are you? :wink:

Gender is a human concept and God is inhuman, gender limits and God is limitless. So there is logical evidence. Oh, wait, its logic... doesn't apply :laughing:
All right. Gender is the effect of physical products, differences in chromosomes etc. Yet God is not physical as a being and thus this whole affair doesn't and can't apply to God unless God manifests and even then it only applies while manifested; thus God is not, not she, not it, just God.

[Justinian]

All right. Gender is the effect of physical products, differences in chromosomes etc. Yet God is not physical as a being and thus this whole affair doesn't and can't apply to God unless God manifests and even then it only applies while manifested; thus God is not, not she, not it, just God.

So there is no mental aspect to gender?

If gender is purely physical, and God exists and made the universe, then the notion had to exist in God's mind at some point; which means (s)he has to identify with some gender in some way, no?

Furthermore, if humans are made in God's image than God must have an image in the first place.

If god is female does that make Mary a lesbian?

I'm suddenly tempted to write a book about God's feminity and Mary's taboo lesbian relationship with her... :laughing:

[Tom Paine]

So there is no mental aspect to gender?

If gender is purely physical, and God exists and made the universe, then the notion had to exist in God's mind at some point; which means (s)he has to identify with some gender in some way, no?

Not really. There is no mental aspect to gender; gender is purely which physical bits you have, the biological mechanics. As can be demonstrated by butch lesbians, say, or effeminate homosexuals (or just from metrosexuals). And of course God, having created both genders, must be able to identify with both, making God either hermaphrodite or genderless, and which is an interesting question.

Furthermore, if humans are made in God's image than God must have an image in the first place.

Unless the image referse to sentience rather than physical image, or a similar matter.

Ferrets, I didn't know that. Thanks.

[PTL]

So we're speaking of the Christian God yes? Well then, if God was a woman, than why didn't SHE give birth to Christ Jesus with the help of a human male? To accomplish the birth of Christ, SHE had to make it with another woman, Mary. Does that make HER a lesbian? I'm pretty sure lesbians can't impregnant one another. Not that you couldn't just cop-out of that arguement and say, "SHE (God) can do anything SHE wants. And if SHE wanted to impregnant a female, SHE could do it." Any debate on the gender of God is pointless.

[Fenris]

Where is the evidence for that statement? You're not just coming to a conclusion without any supporting evidence, are you? :wink:

Bah... we can say whatever we want about god and put it as a truth, it seems you do not need evidences in this matter...

[removeduser_487563287433]

Ferrets, think also of Rhea wife of Cronos; that is, mother of Zeus et al. Or the Earth, their mother again. Each survives the fall of their husband.... and disappears. We are a patriarchal society, always have been, probably always will be, and therefore God is a man when anthropomorphised... which we really shouldn't do anyway, so the vwhole mtter is moot, remember God is genderless.

This is true, but before her assimilation into Greek myth Rhea was the Cretan mother goddess.

[Hjalmar]

If god is female does that make Mary a lesbian?

[Justinian]

The very fact that a member of one gender identifies with the opposite gender proves that there are mental aspects to genders, or they would not identify themselves with another gender...

[Tom Paine]

The very fact that a member of one gender identifies with the opposite gender proves that there are mental aspects to genders, or they would not identify themselves with another gender...

But how are they identifying with the other gender? The only reason the terms butch, effeminate, etc are used is because of the limitations of language to talk about this sort of thing.

[Justinian]

But how are they identifying with the other gender? The only reason the terms butch, effeminate, etc are used is because of the limitations of language to talk about this sort of thing.

The only reason the words exist is because there is a mental aspect. You can't identify yourself as American or English if there is no mental aspect to being American or English, can you?

[Tom Paine]

The only reason the words exist is because there is a mental aspect. You can't identify yourself as American or English if there is no mental aspect to being American or English, can you?

There isn't a mental aspect to being English or American, other than being told you are, and if that's the mental aspect you're thinking of then it doesn't apply to God who had no-one to tell God that God was male or female or anything else and thus it can't apply.

[Justinian]

There isn't a mental aspect to being English or American, other than being told you are, and if that's the mental aspect you're thinking of then it doesn't apply to God who had no-one to tell God that God was male or female or anything else and thus it can't apply.

So you would be exactly the same if you identified as French or German or Australian? Meaning England isn't any better than anybody else?

[Tom Paine]

Um, right, of course not. God is equally likely to be male or female, ie not at all. And the same for a hybrid, or even beyond it. Applying such things to God just doesn't work, they don't apply. At all.

[Zenith Darksea]

Well, in tradition Christian doctrine, God is Father, Son and Holy Ghost. So I suppose that you'd apply the tag of 'male' to God, but really I don't think that gender is relevant when it comes to divinity.