Gender in the Bible:

Discussion notes:

Two separate and separable Issues:

1. Use of gender words to express ideas about God and Mankind. The “Revelatory” or theological role of gender language.
2. Use of gender in understanding and organizing groups of humans. The “Anthropologic” or social role of gender itself.

Questions:

· Does God have a gender? Is “He” male or female? Why, even, do we say “he” or “she” about God, and not simply “it”?

· What is gender?

· What is the foundation or origin of gender?

· What is the difference between sex and gender?

· Why did God make us, and almost all other animals, dimorphic (having two different normal biological forms)? Did He have to? Why might he have done so? Can you imagine other possible means of reproduction? Three sexes? One?

· Do we see gender or sexuality as having important effects in this world?

· Are men and women the same, generally?

· Is generalization a useful activity? Is it ever OK to generalize? If so, when? If not, how do we say meaningful things about groups of persons or things?

· Is it legitimate to use emotional word associations to communicate?

· Is it legitimate to use poetry and other "associative or symbolic " language forms to communicate?

· Are there generalizable associations with maleness and femaleness in human society?

· What are the male and female characteristics in biology? What determines maleness or femaleness in biology?

· Thought experiment: a new species of animal is discovered, never seen before. It is dimorphic. Which is the male and which female? One makes small, motile cells which have a way of seeking out and going to the other form’s reproductive cells. The other form makes reproductive cells which are larger, contain energy stores used by the new organism during its early cell-divisions and development. There is no doubt which would be called male and which female.

· The fundamental differences in the sexes, throughout biological creation, is based upon these distinctives. The male or his seed, or both, seek out and go to the female or her seed. The seed invades the egg. The male is predominantly female-centered. The female or her seed, or both, accept the male and hence secure offspring. In the higher animals, the female generally accepts or rejects the male. (Counter to popular modern opinion, “rape” is exceedingly rare in the animal world. The male cannot mate without the female’s permission, hence all the preliminary mating rituals.) The female provides the energy…the sustenance…of the young, and is predominantly young-centered.

· Other less fundamental characterizations or stereotypes are less universal and often break down completely. Example: feminine=weak or dependent. Mother lionesses or bears, or mares even, are extremely dangerous and capable of self-defence and self-reliance. In many animal societies, the females do most of the hunting or food-gathering. Often they build the home. Sometimes they dominate and even kill their mates. In insect hives, they do everything EXCEPT fertilize the eggs; the males’ only job is to go to and mate with the young queens.

· The revelatory use of gender draws upon the fundamental differences in the sexes to teach about the relationship between God and Man. God is male, and oddly, man is female. God is the initiator, the One who comes to us to bring us life. He invades our world, and if we allow, will invade our hearts and minds and come into us, “know” us, reproducing himself in us, and through us, in others who are “born” again. The language, the roles, are very sexual. Being sexual beings, this language is understood by us at a deep level, even if we are not strictly aware of its sexual imagery. God is the husband of Israel/the Church, which is his wife (or, when she rejects him and seeks after others, is a harlot, a young (female) donkey in heat (Jeremiah).) The consummation of the ages (again, a sexual term) is portrayed as the “marriage feast” of the Lamb (God, the groom) and the Church (the bride.) Many people see the inclusion of “Song of Solomon” in the canon as appropriate because it is an extended, highly sexual metaphor of the love between God and his people. The ancient sign of being in the covenant people was the bloody uncovering of the male organ, a sign of the Messiah’s being revealed, coming into the world, being wounded and bloodied, bringing life.

· Argument: Ancient culture was different. And more patriarchal. The language was appropriate then but not now.

· Was the culture an accident?

· Did God have any part in developing the Biblical languages?

· What attribute of God are we invoking here?

· so: If God sovereignly chose the language and culture in which to reveal the Bible, why did he choose to use gender language about himself?

· It communicates effectively. We all understand gender.

· Gender invokes personal relationship and role.

What Gender language does God use about himself?

· Father, Son. Holy Spirit with personal pronoun "he ".

· Mother: less common, but occurs.

· The imbalance may derive from a “prioritization” of the message or lesson. We absolutely must understand the gospel, in which God’s role is primarily masculine.

· What Gender language does God use about us?

· Man: Adam Son all male. Abraham and Israel were male, yet Sarah's motherhood was essential.

· Wife, harlot, “betrothed” (fiancée). Feminine

So…is God strictly male?

• If we understand the purpose of sexual imagery, and the ultimate purpose of dimorphism as allowing that imagery, we can see that God is not “actually” male, but is only male with respect to certain aspects of his relationship with us. Namely, the saving, life-giving, coming-into aspect of God and the receiving, accepting, faithfulling cleaving-to aspect of ourselves.
• In Genesis, God says he made adam (the name of the species…”mankind”) male and female, in His image created He them. Hence, the human female is every bit as much God’s image as the male is. Working back, there must be, in God Himself, attributes which He focused in the female.
• Wisdom is a feminine attribute, meaning that it is always portrayed using feminine imagery. Why? (Perhaps because wisdom is nurturing, causes growth, enhances safety and stability)
• Jesus’ reveals the nurturing, protecting aspect of God’s heart and nature in his lament over Jerusalem, in which he expresses his wish to “gather you under my wings”, a distinctly nurturing and protecting impulse.
• Various psalms and other poetry see God as feminine; eg. The psalmist rests in God “as a weaned child rests against its mother.”

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