The Feminine Face of God?
At the Telegraph, an article that has many commenters’ undies in a twist, “Bettany Hughes: who knows whether God is a girl?”
Bettany Hughes, an expert in ancient history, claimed that Christianity “was originally a faith where the female of the species held sway”.
To oppose the ordination of women bishops in the Church of England is to deny the central role women played in the foundations of the faith, said Hughes.
“By suppressing the true story of the connection between women and religion, we etiolate both history and the possibilities of our own world,” she wrote in Radio Times.
The Telegraph piece shoots itself in the foot by including an inflammatory bit at the end about another scholar’s thesis that Jesus was a hermaphrodite.
And while “God as girl” makes a good sound bite, I’d prefer female or woman or feminine or something less childish.
Seriously, though, the tradition of world religions had male war deities paired with female fertility and wisdom deities. Then that changed. Haven’t you ever wondered why?
(Link from The Morning News)