quote:

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I think the impact of gender-inclusive language for God will vary according to the person and specifically their background.

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In my experience, inclusive language was a breath of fresh air in an airless church. My irritation with exclusively male pronouns for God was directly proportional to that which might be experienced by a traditionalist sitting through a service in which every reference to God was feminine.

As to the appeal in the OP regarding father figures, I will say: God made a lot more sense to me when I was shown the richness of other Scriptural images of God. My relationship with my father was not particularly fraught, but neither was it particularly close. The world opened up for me with those other, equally Scripturally faithful, images. I cannot imagine returning to just one: that would be like painting with one colour.

I do not know how the thesis of the OP can be measured, since the discussion will likely boil down to individual experiences and personal piety. If you would like to measure the relationship between introduction of inclusive language and the enrollment of women in seminaries of those denominations, that would seem to indicate that the opposite of the thesis is true. But is that correlation or causation?

Sigh. Measures will vary, the same horses will go round and round.
 

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Posted by Jahlove (# 10290) on :
 
Agree, too, with Leaf - laboured *inclusive* or overly-feminized language is just as irritating and unhelpful. Perhaps we just need better liturgists.

[ 05. June 2012, 00:23: Message edited by: Jahlove ]
 

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Posted by Belle Ringer (# 13379) on :
 
Some of the neutral language efforts are painfully contrived, but I have too many friends who believe the "Father" language and the common referring to God with male pronoun proves that God is male, which too easily becomes males should dominate females (because males are more like God).

The main issue is not that some have/had bad experiences with fathers -- some likewise with mothers! The issue is are we portraying a distorted concept of who God is? Words matter.

I lived thru an era when women were told they could not be a "mailman," "policeman," "fireman"; a discussion-ending explanation was "the word is man, not woman." Obviously women can not be men, "obviously" a woman cannot hold a job the name of which is male. You could argue all you want that "man" is a gender neutral word, but that just got a woman laughed at. "A man is a man and a woman is not a man." That's why the titles of those jobs were changed, to proclaim that the job is not limited to males. As society becomes used to women in all these roles, the word name becomes less important and could eventually revert of "mailman" instead of "mail carrier." But while there are still some arguing that women "can't" any *wording* that suggests women "can't" is important to change because the issue is not the word but the limitation intended - or heard - as conveyed.

Same with any wording suggesting God is more male than female, more Father figure than Mother figure. With so many churches teaching that what matters about Jesus is his maleness, rather than his humanity regardless of gender, (therefore no women clergy, etc), I think it's important to avoid any language that creates the appearance of stating that God is primarily (or wholly) male, but instead proclaim via word choices that God is just as much female as male (take your choice whether than means God is both male and female or neither).

Really too bad English grammar doesn't have a gender-neutral personal pronoun, it would be a big help in communicating a gender-neutral or both-genders God person. I think it would make more clear who is saying God is (primarily) male and who is disagreeing with that. (I have no objection to references to "Fatherhood of God" so long as there are also references to God as feminine.)
 

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Posted by LutheranChik (# 9826) on :
 
In my own role as a lay minister, I consciously try use gender-neutral or gender parallel ("women and men," "he or she," etc.) phraseology when talking about people. When I'm talking about God it gets trickier because people are so emotionally wedded to the male-default language of Scripture, so I tend to leave that alone in the Prayers of the Church; although I try to avoid using a lot of male pronouns referencing God in my sermons if I can do it in a way that doesn't sound forced.

I agree that some of the gender-neutralized language of newer liturgies and hymns can be awfully precious and/or awkward; on the other hand, I find excessive male pronouns used unnecessarily to be grating -- in fact, when we were revising our congregational extra-hymnal songbook, I contacted the editors and expressed my discomfort with a song like "Sons of God" or the lines in "They'll Know We Are Christians By Our Love" about "And we'll guard each man's dignity and save each man's pride"; I didn't have a lot of advice for inclusifying the former song, but I did suggest changing "man" to "one" in the latter song, and they in fact followed my suggestion.
 

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Posted by PaulBC (# 13712) on :
 
Over doing gender inclusive language makes worship hard. Especially if you have a congegation like the 1 I am part of, aging not a lot of youth and thus used to say . i.e "man" meaning all mankind, or refering to "God" as Father. Now I realize and empathize with those people who's experience of life with father has made that title onerous . However when that title is linked to God we need to remember God is not male/female but all in all.
Now I do opposse men saying that God is male thus church leadership needs to all male, BALONEY IMHO. And that cuts the otherway as well where gender neutrality renders things like Scripture & the Creeds just that much more difficult to comprehend or to teach .

 

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Posted by Padre Joshua (# 13100) on :
 
I once was at a meeting where some woman was going on and on about how God isn't male, and that male references to God, particularly as Father, were very unhelpful. She appealed to situations where women had been hurt by men, particularly their fathers, saying that these women could not relate well to God as a father because they had experienced such pain. She sounded very angry, and her tone of voice and her body language was aggressive.

She eventually finished her rant and sat down. Another woman got up to speak. She was very quiet; we all had to strain to hear her.

"I was abused by my father when I was a child. I find it very helpful to think of God as Father, because I know he is good and will never hurt me. He is the best Father I could ever have."

No one else had anything to say about it after that.

Still, I realize that not everyone feels the same way this lady does, and I don't want to upset anyone if I can avoid it.

I feel like there are people who get upset on someone else's behalf, however, and it always seems as though they are simply trying to stir something up just for the sake of stirring. It is as though it is their personal crusade to be offended for someone else. And while I do understand and support the idea of speaking for those who cannot speak for themselves, I also wonder if we take it too far sometimes -- could we be spending too much energy on something that matters less, to the detriment of something that matters more?

I wonder why we have to have so much venom in our discussions about inclusive language. I wonder why we have to have so much anger. I wonder why we cannot listen to each other and try to see another person's point of view before writing them off as either "evil libruls" or "&%$* fundies".

There are times when gender inclusive and gender neutral language works. There are times when it is needed. But there are times when I think we take it too far. I've read things which referred to Jesus during his time on earth in gender neutral language, and it upset me. While he was in human form, he was male. I don't know why, I don't care why, and I'm not going to draw foolish conclusions from that fact. It is what it is, and I don't feel right messing with it.

I question the wisdom of redacting old hymns to the point of contortion just for the sake of inclusive language. One would think that if it's simple then it would be fine, and if it's complicated then we simply would avoid singing it. There are likely as many people who are offended by the changes as there are people who are offended by the original. Should one side or the other be disregarded? Of course not. God is God of all, not just those who think like we do.

I guess what I'm rambling around to get at is this: No one size fits all. God loves all, even those with whom we disagree. And surely we can find a way to dialogue about things we find important in a way that doesn't shortchange or demean those who think differently that we do, and in a way that doesn't allow anger to overcome our words and actions.
 

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Posted by Padre Joshua (# 13100) on :
 
The above is not at all pointed at anyone who has posted on this thread. I see no anger here, and it's refreshing. I'm thinking of several heated arguments I've been forced to sit through at various events.
 

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Posted by OliviaG (# 9881) on :
 
Just to reverse the process, my sister and I always refer to our father as, well, Our Father. OliviaG
 

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Posted by Steve H (# 17102) on :
 
I'm a member, albeit a long-inactive one, of Jubilate hymns, and have had a few of my hymns published in their books (e.g. 'Sing Glory' 94 & 481, if anyone's interested). I avoided gendered language in my later hymns, including those two except for a 'Lord' in 94, when referring to God the Father or the Holy Spirit, or to humanity in general, and later revised some of my earlier ones to gender-neutralise them. Jubilate have a policy of using gender-neutral language in modern hymns published under their auspices, and quite right too, say I. Some examples of gender-neutrality can be painfully clunky ("Parent, Child, and Holy Spirit" - I made that one up, but I've seen some almost as bad), but that it's sometimes done badly is no reason for not doing it at all.
Gender-neutralising old hymns by the likes of Wesley and Watts is another matter. Jubilate do update the language of old hymns in their books, getting rid of 'thee's and 'thou's and other obscure archaisms, and again, I think they are right to do so. Updating the language of Shakespeare or Milton would be a disastrous mistake, but hymns, whatever their literary merit, are not just, or even primarily, literary works; they are worship aids, and as such need to be in language that modern people, most of whom will not be particularly well-educated, can understand. However, Jubilate do it sensitively, and retain the dignity of the language. What they don't do, however, is gender-neutralise them. Whittier's "Dear Lord and Father of Mankind", for example, keeps that first line unchanged, though it is lightly revised, mainly to change "thy" to "your". (Incidentally, I have read that the leading Jubilate people who do the revising of old hymns generally find that 18th-Century hymns need less revising than 19th-Century ones, because they were written in the educated language of the day, whereas many 19th-Century hymnwriters used what was already archaic language.)
 

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Posted by M. (# 3291) on :
 
Padre Joshua, yes. There are times when it works and times when it doesn't. I struggle as I hate to do violence to the words of a hymn (or song, or poem or whatever) but appreciate that hymns, creeds whatever are tools for worship and need to be clear and not cause a problem in themselves.

I usually go the 1662 Prayer Book service and experimented for a while with leaving out the 'men' in the 'for us men and for our salvation' part of the creed, so that it was just 'for us and for our salvation' but really, it was too weird. When it was written, 'men' meant both men and women and I know that. So what's the problem? For me, anyway. I suppose others might not understand (though to be honest, that's unlikely in our 8 am service). It wouldn't be written like that today but then it wasn't written today.

As an aside, I have been a christian for 40 years, most of that time in fairly conservative evangelical churches. I have never ever heard anyone, I don't think, try to tell me that the male imagery of God means that God is actually male. I've heard plenty of other stuff that I've decided was rubbish, but never that.

Neither, growing up in a completely secular environment in the '60's, do I ever recall being told that a woman can't be, say, to use Belle Ringer's thought, a postman, because the word is man. On the contrary, I just assumed that the word is 'postman', irrespective of which sex is pushing the letters through the door.

It is always 'chairman' of any committee, as that is the word, irrespective of sex.

Sorry, that is a bit of a tangent.

M.
 

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Posted by M. (# 3291) on :
 
I've just seen Steve H's post and that does annoy me - I can see absolutely no need whatsoever to change 'thee', 'thy' etc.


M.
 

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Posted by Steve H (# 17102) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by M.:
I've just seen Steve H's post and that does annoy me - I can see absolutely no need whatsoever to change 'thee', 'thy' etc.


M.

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Well, there are plenty of hymnbooks that retain them, if thou wantest them.
 

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Posted by Steve H (# 17102) on :
 
Padre Joshua - so the woman you disagreed with "went on and on", and the one you agreed with "spoke very quietly", eh? Yeah, right. Also, twee anecdotes prove absolutely nothing.
 

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Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :
 
What makes anyone think God is male?

I always use S/he when referring to God - such creative power can't possibly be male!


 

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Posted by Steve H (# 17102) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by M.:
It is always 'chairman' of any committee, as that is the word, irrespective of sex.
M.

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quote:

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quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by M.:
It is always 'chairman' of any committee, as that is the word, irrespective of sex.
M.
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No, it isn't; it's often 'Chair' nowadays - and if you want to object, as someone once did to me, that a chair is a piece of furniture, look up "metonymy" in a good dictionary.

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quote:

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Originally posted by venbede:
There is the goodness of parenthood at the root of creation, which will always be compromised and unsatisfactory with our biological parents.

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Where "man" clearly means "humankind" there was never any intended prejudice.

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Originally posted by Barnabas62:
Where "man" clearly means "humankind" there was never any intended prejudice. Where folks took that "man" and made it "male only", the fault was not in the word, but the prejudice in the mind of the one who applied it that way.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Dafyd:

Basically, whenever man is used to mean both 'humanity / human being' and 'male humanity / male human being' it carries the implication that a male human beings are representative examples of humanity and women and children are special cases.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Evangeline:

quote:

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Where "man" clearly means "humankind" there was never any intended prejudice.

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Not sure about that. Maybe the prejudice wasn't intended but the use of a gendered word to denote humankind betrays a prejudice that maleness is the normative state of humankind and femaleness is an "other" state. Femaleness is a state "other" than maleness but it is not a state other than "humanness" and should not be expressed as such.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Mary LA:
not seeing God primarily as a female or male parent because she says it is problematic for adult women to work with a self-understanding as an infantilized dependent child.

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Originally posted by Custard:
I'm all in favour of using gender-neutral language when it is appropriate. "If any man believes in me" sounds wrong compared to "If anyone believes in me".

But our desire to be fair and balanced should not mean that we ride roughshod over either the Scriptural witness or Trinitarian theology. God is "Father, Son and Holy Spirit", not "Mother, Daughter and Holy Spirit" or even "Parent, Child and Holy Spirit". Descriptions like "Creator, Redeemer and Sustainer" might be true, but mean that God is defined relative to his creation, which is wrong. Such a description is not primary in the way that "Father, Son and Holy Spirit" is primary.

One of the common ways of saying which beliefs are Christian and which are not is by using the yardstick of the Nicene (Constinoplian) Creed. Were someone to refuse to use with it because it uses the terms Father and Son, I would find it difficult to say in what sense their belief was Christian.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:
I raised this issue recently with a certain clergyman, who responded: "The inclusive language is a justice issue and with 75% of our church being women who spent most of their lives being put down by the male world, many have expressed genuine support in the new language."

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quote:

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Originally posted by Enoch:
I'm not that old - or at least I don't regard myself as such. Yet I was over 35 when I first encountered this one.

...I rather hope this one doesn't over time stick. I get the impression the younger generation are less bothered about it than people currently in their forties.

I don't really believe that our mother and grandmothers either were or felt excluded by the older usage. I knew them, and I don't remember them as diminished people.

It's a nuisance. Splattering ones sentences with 'he or she' is clumsy. Modernising hymns is worse. Apart from dealing with points where the offending word is half of a rhyme - a problem that also arises with 'thou' and 'thee' - 'man' has one syllable and both 'people' and 'person' have two. So it throws the scansion as well as the rhyme.

I comply because I don't want to offend people who get worked up about these things, but in my heart I will resent it and regard it as a retrograde step to the end of my days.

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Originally posted by Barnabas62:

Now I think the oppression of women has been a great wrong and I think the part the institutional church has played in that (and continues to play in that) is shameful. I'm just uneasy about the thought that cleaning up the language does much to clean up the prejudice and injustice.

I think a better answer is to recognise the organic and communal nature of language, the portmanteau associations of some words, and wise up on that. Where "man" clearly means "humankind" there was never any intended prejudice. Where folks took that "man" and made it "male only", the fault was not in the word, but the prejudice in the mind of the one who applied it that way.

In a way, I think language clean up can sometimes sweep continuing prejudice under the carpet. We think we've done something.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Barnabas62:

...I think that where the Bible is clearly intentionally sexist in meaning, it needs to be left that way, for honest exegesis. I think the 10th commandment is sexist for example. A wife is property, superior in position to ox, ass and servant, but inferior in position to a house. Nowt to be done about that, I think. It's a record of how folks thought at that time.

But where it is clearly unintentionally sexist, simply because of the portmanteau language patterns of the time, then what's wrong with the change.

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Originally posted by Anglican_Brat:
The only places where I insist on the traditional formula (Father, Son and Holy Spirit):
1) When reciting the creeds
2) When reciting the Lord's Prayer
3) When baptizing a person

For me, all three of these situations are expressions of catholicity. To me, it is appropriate to recite the same words that Christians use throughout history, to express our common apostolic faith.

.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Dafyd:

quote:

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Originally posted by Barnabas62:
Where "man" clearly means "humankind" there was never any intended prejudice. Where folks took that "man" and made it "male only", the fault was not in the word, but the prejudice in the mind of the one who applied it that way.

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William Empson's book The Structure of Complex Words is the best explanation of the problem here. What he tries to tease out is that when we use a word with more than one meaning in a way that more than one meaning could fit we tend to understand a link between the two meanings.

So in sentences like 'in the state of nature the life of man is nasty, brutish and short' (Hobbes) or 'man will reach out to the stars' (Wells) the context doesn't absolutely rule out either 'man' = 'humankind' or 'man' = 'adult males'. What happens is that the language suggests that a good way to understand what humankind is for the present purposes is by attributing to humankind as a whole the qualities typically associated specifically with adult masculine humanity. So for Hobbes humanity is violent and individualistic; for Wells brave and enterprising. In both cases childcare is being considered marginal to what it is to be human.

Basically, whenever man is used to mean both 'humanity / human being' and 'male humanity / male human being' it carries the implication that a male human beings are representative examples of humanity and women and children are special cases.

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quote:

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Originally posted by M.:

I usually go the 1662 Prayer Book service and experimented for a while with leaving out the 'men' in the 'for us men and for our salvation' part of the creed, so that it was just 'for us and for our salvation' but really, it was too weird.

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quote:

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Originally posted by M.:
I've just seen Steve H's post and that does annoy me - I can see absolutely no need whatsoever to change 'thee', 'thy' etc.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Enoch:

It's a nuisance. Splattering ones sentences with 'he or she' is clumsy.

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Originally posted by Evangeline:

I'm not actually a zealot in relation to gender neutral language and am happy enough to refer to God as He and as a father figure but I think it is dishonest to claim that male-centric language eg "man" to refer to humankind is not the result of gender bias.

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Originally posted by ken:
The first regular Communion services I ever attended, back in the 1970s, had "for us men and for our salvation" and I couldn't bring myself to say it. For me, then, that sounded as if it meant males only. So I didn't say it. "For us" is simply a better translation of the Greek original, as well as being true.

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quote:

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(Plenty of them though - Father, Mother, lion, lamb, bread, wine, light, the Son of man (which is a gender-neutral term, just "human" really), Lord, redeemer, waterseller, hen, dove, eagle, storm, fire, smoke, cloud, living waters, mountain, rock, wind, sun, star, husband, teacher, king, fortress, tower, temple, judge, brother, friend, sceptre, soap, tree, vine...)

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Good list, ken!
 

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Posted by Honest Ron Bacardi (# 38) on :
 
and of course not forgetting Lady Wisdom, of whom we would no doubt have heard more had not a lot of the wisdom literature been excluded form our (protestant) bibles. But she's still there in Proverbs.
 

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Posted by Belle Ringer (# 13379) on :
 
Back when the wording was "who for us men and for our salvation..." I would say "who for us women and our salvation" and whatever woman was in the pew next to me would startle and grin. Always a big grin, sometimes a quick little hug or hand clasp.

It felt SO GOOD to be included, after decades of being linguistically excluded. (Even if I had to do the including myself, without the church's help. I wasn't excluding males, I was personally affirming the message was also to me, which the official language did NOT affirm.)

Was there confusion back in the old days of male language? Of course! Men weren't confused, when they saw masculine language they knew they were included. Women had to pause at each instance, sometimes ask questions (and get chided for not knowing), and figure out of they were included or excluded this time. (Well, not a lot of confusion because women knew they were usually excluded.) Masculine language is no problem for men because "you know by the context," and the context ALWAYS included the males but only occasionally included women.

What's the context when the word is "chairman", especially back when newspaper job listings were in separate columns for "male only" or "female only", the whole social assumption was important jobs are reserved for males only, women do support work? In my high school a girl ran for chairman of one of the after school clubs, but the boys said no, the word is chairMAN, and the teacher adviser shrugged & agreed that's the word. So she was barred from being chairman or vice chairman, they did let her run for secretary because it was a gender neutral word and a female task.

As to anger, back in the 80s a man explained to me that gender neutral language, claiming that women and men are of equal importance, is demeaning to men.
 

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Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on :
 
@cliffdweller

Thoughtful as always, thanks.

While reflecting on what you said, I caught up with Honest Ron's post. Illuminating - also as always. The truth may lie in between us.
 

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Posted by Bartolomeo (# 8352) on :
 
I've spent a lot of time comparing hymnals and liturgy settings.

There are four areas where concern about gender-specific language arises. In increasing order of difficulty, they are:

1) References to "mankind," "men," etc. where a broader reference to humanity as a whole is more appropriate. Most of these were cleaned up in the 1980s as a basic matter of equality of men and women.

2) Use of the male pronoun for general references to God or to the trinity. In most cases "God" can be substituted for "Him" and "God's" for "his." Most people don't notice except in liturgy that's recited by the congregation every week.

3) Male references to the parent figure in the trinity, e.g. "Father."

4) The use of the male pronoun for Christ.

As Jahlove has noted upthread, the largest and most immediate problem with these last two is that they pose a barrier to worship for people, especially women, who suffered abuse and neglect as children at the hands of their fathers.

I find ambiguity as to the gender of Christ to be at odds with the gospel. Christ was fully human, and was male.
 

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Posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe (# 5521) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Honest Ron Bacardi:
The church has always asserted credally that Christ became anthropos - which is to say he became human. . . . If using those words is the best way to do it, then we should do so.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:

quote:

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Originally posted by Honest Ron Bacardi:
The church has always asserted credally that Christ became anthropos - which is to say he became human. . . . If using those words is the best way to do it, then we should do so.

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But the pronoun is still problematic, isn't it?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Steve H:
Padre Joshua - so the woman you disagreed with "went on and on", and the one you agreed with "spoke very quietly", eh? Yeah, right. Also, twee anecdotes prove absolutely nothing.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Padre Joshua:
As for the other, I fail to see how I could be more factual. The first woman did speak for what I deemed to be much longer than was needed to make her point. She wasn't saying anything new. She wasn't even rephrasing herself. She spoke for several minutes, and given her angry tone and body language, it struck me as being antagonistic. But I shall give her the benefit of the doubt and simply say that she spoke for several minutes.

As for the second woman, I am simply reporting facts. She did speak very quietly. Everyone had to strain to listen. After the loud, angry-sounding voice of the first woman, the second woman seemed even quieter.

Of course, you could have been at that event and witnessed it differently from me, in which case I would love to hear your version.

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Originally posted by Barnabas62:
... The class prejudice in "All things bright and beautiful" (the rich man in his castle etc) is probably a good contrast. "Omit that verse" - which is what most folks do if they sing that song - strikes me as just sensible, if it is to be salvaged for public worship. ...

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Originally posted by Angloid:
... I would go for 'us humans' except it sounds clumsy. I suppose simply 'us' is OK as long as it is backed up with good teaching. ...

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These particular posts have got me thinking about inclusion and specificity in general, not just sex and gender. ATB&B is a clear case of poetry written in a particular context, when human classes were thought to be divinely ordained. We think differently now - liberation theology is the exact opposite.

It would be an interesting exercise to look at all the collective plurals for humans in particular groups of texts, and see what sort of patterns emerge. Does "us men" mean the males of the congregation, all members of the connexion, all Christians (except those weird Mormons & JWs), all monotheists, polytheists and animists ... Richard Dawkins?

My take on "mankind", BTW, is that it just means things (=people) that are like -- kindred, akin, kind (=type, category) etc. -- man. So one still has to define what "man" means, and decide who all is man enough. OliviaG
 

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Posted by Balaam (# 4543) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Chamois:
In the Eucharistic prayer we used to say:
"... giving him to be born of man.."

Now we say:
"... giving him to be born of a woman..."

The first, previously used formulation could be thought to contradict John 1 ("born, not of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man..."). The second, currently used formulation is clearly a more accurate statement of what the church in fact believes.

But that isn't what we used to say. Which is interesting, don't you think?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Balaam:
It is only in the latter half of the 20th Century that people have started to dispute the gender inclusive use of man.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Balaam:

quote:

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Originally posted by Chamois:
In the Eucharistic prayer we used to say:
"... giving him to be born of man.."

Now we say:
"... giving him to be born of a woman..."

The first, previously used formulation could be thought to contradict John 1 ("born, not of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man..."). The second, currently used formulation is clearly a more accurate statement of what the church in fact believes.

But that isn't what we used to say. Which is interesting, don't you think?

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Only if you think that what you take it to mean now is what it always meant. But words change their meaning.

Take the word man.

In Old English man word meant human-being male or female. The words for male and female human-beings were werman and wifman.

Wifman changed over to years to woman. In the 13th century the prefix wer was dropped and [man] started to be used for male as well as for the original meaning.

When Chaucer wrote, "Ech man for himself," he meant every person, not every adult male.

The two meanings have gone on side by side for centuries. It is only in the latter half of the 20th Century that people have started to dispute the gender inclusive use of man.

"For us men and for our salvation" was gender inclusive when it was written. But as I said above, words change their meaning. If it were written a quarter of the way through the 21st century then it would be gender exclusive. But anyone saying that the use of words from the 17th century excludes them does not understand the history of the words they are complaining about.

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Originally posted by Steve H:
Etymological fallacy.

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Originally posted by Balaam:

quote:

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Originally posted by Steve H:
Etymological fallacy.

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Etimological dictionary.

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Originally posted by Honest Ron Bacardi:

quote:

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Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:
But the pronoun is still problematic, isn't it?

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Can you expand a bit please?

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Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:

quote:

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Originally posted by Honest Ron Bacardi:

quote:

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Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:
But the pronoun is still problematic, isn't it?

---

Can you expand a bit please?

---

I think I may have misunderstood your point. My point was that if you say that the second person of the Trinity became "human" rather than "man" you are still faced with the problem of which pronoun (and, indeed, possessive adjective) to use when referring to Christ.

---

quote:

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Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Honest Ron Bacardi:

quote:

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Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:
But the pronoun is still problematic, isn't it?

---

Can you expand a bit please?

---

I think I may have misunderstood your point. My point was that if you say that the second person of the Trinity became "human" rather than "man" you are still faced with the problem of which pronoun (and, indeed, possessive adjective) to use when referring to Christ.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Bartolomeo:
In increasing order of difficulty, they are:

1) References to "mankind," "men," etc. where a broader reference to humanity as a whole is more appropriate. Most of these were cleaned up in the 1980s as a basic matter of equality of men and women.

2) Use of the male pronoun for general references to God or to the trinity. In most cases "God" can be substituted for "Him" and "God's" for "his." Most people don't notice except in liturgy that's recited by the congregation every week.

3) Male references to the parent figure in the trinity, e.g. "Father."

4) The use of the male pronoun for Christ.

---

quote:

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Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:
I don't deny that women have historically been oppressed. But I fail to see how stripping the Deity of father imagery addresses this. Even the most liberated woman has, or has had, father figures in her life. Why can't the Deity be just another one?

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quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve H:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Balaam:

quote:

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Originally posted by Steve H:
Etymological fallacy.

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Etimological dictionary.

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Very interesting, but the point is that a word means what it means now not what it may have meant in the past. The etymological fallacy is confusing the etymology of a word with its meaning.

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quote:

---

Nowadays, 'man' means a male human only, not a female, whatever it may once have meant.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Steve H:
Nowadays, 'man' means a male human only, not a female, whatever it may once have meant.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Anglican't:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve H:
Nowadays, 'man' means a male human only, not a female, whatever it may once have meant.

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Does it? Since when? Says who?

I'm sure the phrase 'known to man' (such as 'the deadliest disease known to man') is still common currency, at least.

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quote:

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originally posted by RuthW:
Because the Almighty God, Author of the Universe, is not just another father figure.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Anglican't:
I may have missed something, but you've asserted that the definition of 'man' has changed towards a narrower definition, but practice suggests otherwise.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Dafyd:
Do you think the above sentence is stylistically and otherwise correct?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Steve H:
I give up.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Steve H:
You're an idiot.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Anglican't:


I'm sure the phrase 'known to man' (such as 'the deadliest disease known to man') is still common currency, at least.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Boogie:
[Put the boot on the other foot and imagine the common currency was 'known to woman' - then imagine 'woman' used in every other 'mankind' type expression.

Are you saying that wouldn't feel strange an excluding?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Anglican't:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Boogie:
[Put the boot on the other foot and imagine the common currency was 'known to woman' - then imagine 'woman' used in every other 'mankind' type expression.

Are you saying that wouldn't feel strange an excluding?

---

If that was the common currency, then that's what we would have grown up with and consider normal (in the way that phrases such as 'Mother Nature' are commonplace).

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by barrea:
When Jesus was on earth he always called God Father and expected us to do the same, when He gave us The Lord's Prayer.
Surely if we follow Him we do the same as He did.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Alogon:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Bartolomeo:
In increasing order of difficulty, they are:

1) References to "mankind," "men," etc. where a broader reference to humanity as a whole is more appropriate. Most of these were cleaned up in the 1980s as a basic matter of equality of men and women.

2) Use of the male pronoun for general references to God or to the trinity. In most cases "God" can be substituted for "Him" and "God's" for "his." Most people don't notice except in liturgy that's recited by the congregation every week.

3) Male references to the parent figure in the trinity, e.g. "Father."

4) The use of the male pronoun for Christ.

---

And what bothers me is the manipulative way in which the goalposts have been moved over my entire adult life. (1) was mooted in the early 1970s couched in assurances that "God language" was a whole other matter and no one wanted to alter it. This is no longer the case. For forty years, the conservatives have given in and given in and given in, and still the changemongers are not satisfied. Meanwhile the whole premise, that we need to do this because women are particularly oppressed, has become increasingly far-fetched.

My worry is not that this petty social engineering will have any long-term effect on the human mind. It is only that the reputation of the church in the world at large will evaporate in a self-absorbed peroration of solemn silliness.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by barrea:
When Jesus was on earth he always called God Father and expected us to do the same, when He gave us The Lord's Prayer.
Surely if we follow Him we do the same as He did.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Anglican't:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Dafyd:
Do you think the above sentence is stylistically and otherwise correct?

---

I can see your point, but has that sort of sentence ever been written?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Alogon:
And what bothers me is the manipulative way in which the goalposts have been moved over my entire adult life. (1) was mooted in the early 1970s couched in assurances that "God language" was a whole other matter and no one wanted to alter it. This is no longer the case. For forty years, the conservatives have given in and given in and given in, and still the changemongers are not satisfied. Meanwhile the whole premise, that we need to do this because women are particularly oppressed, has become increasingly far-fetched.

My worry is not that this petty social engineering will have any long-term effect on the human mind. It is only that the reputation of the church in the world at large will evaporate in a self-absorbed peroration of solemn silliness.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Choirboy:

Secondly, it always bugs me when people try to "fix" things by referring to the Holy Spirit as "She". God is obviously uncreated and beyond the created realities of sex and gender. Our language is deficient in describing God or the three persons of the Trinity, but we don't have to compound the error by suggesting God has male and female parts.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Alogon:
And what bothers me is the manipulative way in which the goalposts have been moved over my entire adult life.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Anglican't:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Dafyd:
Do you think the above sentence is stylistically and otherwise correct?

---

I can see your point, but has that sort of sentence ever been written?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Charles Read:
The Latin original (I.e. mediaeval rite, from which this text is derived) says IIRR 'dignum et verum est' and there is no gendered pronoun to refer to God.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Mudfrog squares his shoulders ready for the outraged onslaught of those who say that men are always the abusers and that women could never do such a thing!

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Dafyd
As a mammal, man gestates his offspring in his womb and then feeds his offspring with his own milk.

Do you think the above sentence is stylistically and otherwise correct?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Chamois
The vicar (who was leading) had us looking at passages in the Bible where God is visualised as a mother and then we had a discussion as to whether any of us view God as "Mother" rather than "Father". Turned out that quite a lot of group members had had serious problems with their human mothers and found the "Mother" imagery difficult to take.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Mudfrog squares his shoulders ready for the outraged onslaught of those who say that men are always the abusers and that women could never do such a thing!

---

I'm trying very hard - but I can't think of anyone I know on the Ship - let alone posting on this thread who would be stupid enough to make such an assertion. But square away, if that's what you're expecting...

Anyway.

A personal favourite of mine, for an image of God, is the housewife searching for her lost coin. The story comes in the middle of the three Lucan stories he tells about lost things being found; the sheep, the coin and the prodigal son. While we tend to think of Jesus as the shepherd who returns rejoicing with the the lost sheep on his shoulders, generally it's usually God we think of in the parable of the Prodigal Son, as the Father. So maybe that's why I tend to think of God as the housewife - in the middle - sweeping the floor and looking under the sofa for the lost coin!

I don't have nasty associations with the word 'Father' used for God - and I'm very fortunate to have had two wonderful parents. I've always thought, anyway, it was a title meant to draw us closer to God as one who loves us as a good parent, whether or not that was our experience of earthly parents.

But I can understand the need to widen the concept of God as being merely male, which it's hard to do if everything spoken about him is - well, 'him, he, his' etc. However much we may intellectualize about it, our brains are more easily adapted, surely, to making the quick connection of 'him, he, his' etc to being essentially a glorified perfect bloke, with a fuzzy grey margin that might possibly pass for something 'other', so long as it's not actually feminine! After all, who wants an effiminate god, eh? I'm not sure we have the brain equipment to actually conceive of God, that successfully, as neither male nor female but somehow encompassing both and all. And so our minds naturally go to the easiest and most convenient pictures we are mostly capable of.

That's why the language we use is so important.

In terms of hymnology however, I think the words of hymns ought to generally remain the same, or at least as traditionally known - no doubt there are some worthy exceptions, however! I really missed singing 'the eye of sinful man' last Sunday, it having been replaced with 'through the sinful human eye'.
 

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Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Enoch:

Although it reads oddly to us, you might well have said that in the 1950s, and later. It was entirely normal to refer to the species we belong to as 'man' until much more recently. There was a well known television series in the 1970s called "The Ascent of Man". I think it's still available on DVD.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Sorry to suggest this but what about men who have been hurt by women? What about women who have been hurt by their own mothers?

...I think it's right that we refer to 'brothers and sisters' in the faith; I think that where scripture allows it we should say 'people' (but never 'humankind'!)

But where scripture speaks of the Fatherhood of God, where Jesus calls him Father, and God has revealed himself to be the Father, then we need to stick to revelation and not one-sided 'inclusive' language.

People have been hurt by other men and women alike.

Should that mean we don't use ANY gender for God and call God 'it' instead?


Mudfrog squares his shoulders ready for the outraged onslaught of those who say that men are always the abusers and that women could never do such a thing!

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by ken:
True. The natural and correct English usaqe is "they".

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quote:

---

Originally posted by Fr Weber:

quote:

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Originally posted by ken:
True. The natural and correct English usaqe is "they".

---

I know this will brand me as a linguistic tightass, but I hate that. I'll freely admit that it's unreasonable of me, but it just bugs me.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by cliffdweller:
with a bit of thought and effort it's possible to say what you intended in a more natural way where the inclusiveness is seamless and unremarkable.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Mudfrog:
You cannot refer to God as Father without saying he, unless you make your sentences very clumsy and keep using Father or that stupid 'Godself' word.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by cliffdweller:

quote:

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Originally posted by Mudfrog:
But where scripture speaks of the Fatherhood of God, where Jesus calls him Father, and God has revealed himself to be the Father, then we need to stick to revelation and not one-sided 'inclusive' language.

---

As this thread has already demonstrated, the real sticking point is in pronouns for God. As you suggest "he", "she", and "it" are all problematic. Therefore the goal is to avoid using pronouns for God whenever possible.

---

The trouble is that the Christian God is demonstrably male, because that, according to the orthodox Christian, is how things are; if you make God androgynous, then you are creating a different religion with a different understanding of God and the created universe, one which a lot of people happen to think is just plain wrong - there is no way, for example, that I would use a gender-free version of the Lord's Prayer, or to say 'Our Mother, which art in heaven...'.

One way of looking at it is in relative terms, rather than in terms of human gender - God the Father is male with respect to the created universe, and the universe is female with respect to God the Father. Or one can complare it with Pagan pantheons: sky-father (Zeus, Taranis) vs. earth-mother (Ceres, Deae Matronae, etc.). We're not saying that male is 'better' than female; we're saying that they are different, and that they complement each other.

But to change basic theology for what are basically political reasons (AKA 'social justice', or whatever) is just a complete travesty.
 

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Posted by LutheranChik (# 9826) on :
 
The Christian God -- and the Jewish God, for that matter, are not "demonstrably male," unless you're a Mormon.

And as far as the idea of some sort of ontological "maleness" and "femaleness" (which is highly debatable) being complementary -- without a female aspect to the Godhead you've indeed created a male hierarchy where women are ipso facto demoted to second class. There's no amount of patronizing, pat-on-the-head happy talk that makes that not so.
 

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Posted by ToujoursDan (# 10578) on :
 


So the Christian God "demonstrably" has testes, male hormones, thick body and facial hair and a male-wired brain?

Sounds like God has been created in our own image.
 

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Posted by Holy Smoke (# 14866) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by LutheranChik:
The Christian God -- and the Jewish God, for that matter, are not "demonstrably male," unless you're a Mormon.

---

quote:

---

And as far as the idea of some sort of ontological "maleness" and "femaleness" (which is highly debatable) being complementary -- without a female aspect to the Godhead you've indeed created a male hierarchy where women are ipso facto demoted to second class...

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Mudfrog:

People have been hurt by other men and women alike.

---

quote:

---

Should that mean we don't use ANY gender for God and call God 'it' instead?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Holy Smoke:

quote:

---

Originally posted by cliffdweller:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Mudfrog:
But where scripture speaks of the Fatherhood of God, where Jesus calls him Father, and God has revealed himself to be the Father, then we need to stick to revelation and not one-sided 'inclusive' language.

---

As this thread has already demonstrated, the real sticking point is in pronouns for God. As you suggest "he", "she", and "it" are all problematic. Therefore the goal is to avoid using pronouns for God whenever possible.

---

The trouble is that the Christian God is demonstrably male, because that, according to the orthodox Christian, is how things are; if you make God androgynous, then you are creating a different religion with a different understanding of God and the created universe

---

quote:

---

So God created humankind in his image,
in the image of God he created them;
male and female he created them.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Amos:
Holy Smoke--If I understand you correctly, you would also say that men are female in relation to God. (I'm desperately biting back a quotation from 'Team America: World Police' right now)

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Charles Read:
Many Bible (and other) texts too are gender-neutral in the original but English translations import a gender reference into them needlessly.

---

quote:

---

In the CofE's Common Worship eucharistic prayers we changed the ASB's 'born as a man' to the more Biblically accurate 'born of a woman'. One person lobbied the comittee to change it back saying the change was 'a feminist plot to subvert the Church of England'. One committee member (Michael Nazir-Ali actually) responded that it was not a feminist plot - it was a quote from St Paul. The complainant replied 'I don't care who wrote it, it's a feminist plot'

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Enoch:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Dafyd
As a mammal, man gestates his offspring in his womb and then feeds his offspring with his own milk.

Do you think the above sentence is stylistically and otherwise correct?

---

The reason you can't say that now, is because we have been sensitised to the point.

Although it reads oddly to us, you might well have said that in the 1950s, and later. It was entirely normal to refer to the species we belong to as 'man' until much more recently.

---

quote:

---

As an older person, the statement 'Man gives birth to live young and suckles it', doesn't sound odd at all. If I found myself about to say it, I'd have to remind myself that you're not supposed to say that any more.

---

quote:

---

I'd actually though be more uncomfortable about whether one should use 'it' of the live young.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Fr Weber:

quote:

---

Originally posted by ken:
True. The natural and correct English usaqe is "they".

---

I know this will brand me as a linguistic tightass, but I hate that. I'll freely admit that it's unreasonable of me, but it just bugs me.

---

Me too. In my own writing I use "he or she". It may sound a little stilted but at least it's grammatical.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Holy Smoke:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Amos:
Holy Smoke--If I understand you correctly, you would also say that men are female in relation to God. (I'm desperately biting back a quotation from 'Team America: World Police' right now)

---

That would be a corollary - but perhaps in the sense that a human father is more 'male' than a male child. Or that God the Father is male relative to God the Son (or God the Holy Spirit). (Which obviously suggests that there is more to 'maleness' than testes and chest hair). But a 'maleness' expressed in a paternal relationship, rather than in a sexual relationship. At least, that's how I see it.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Holy Smoke:
[The trouble is that the Christian God is demonstrably male, because that, according to the orthodox Christian, is how things are;

---

quote:

---

God the Father is male with respect to the created universe, and the universe is female with respect to God the Father.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Holy Smoke:
hat would be a corollary - but perhaps in the sense that a human father is more 'male' than a male child. Or that God the Father is male relative to God the Son (or God the Holy Spirit). (Which obviously suggests that there is more to 'maleness' than testes and chest hair). But a 'maleness' expressed in a paternal relationship, rather than in a sexual relationship. At least, that's how I see it.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Amos:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Holy Smoke:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Amos:
Holy Smoke--If I understand you correctly, you would also say that men are female in relation to God. (I'm desperately biting back a quotation from 'Team America: World Police' right now)

---

That would be a corollary - but perhaps in the sense that a human father is more 'male' than a male child. Or that God the Father is male relative to God the Son (or God the Holy Spirit). (Which obviously suggests that there is more to 'maleness' than testes and chest hair). But a 'maleness' expressed in a paternal relationship, rather than in a sexual relationship. At least, that's how I see it.

---

In that case, you would appear to be saying that the human male is more perfectly made in the image of God than the human female.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Amos:
In that case, you would appear to be saying that the human male is more perfectly made in the image of God than the human female.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Amos:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Holy Smoke:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Amos:
Holy Smoke--If I understand you correctly, you would also say that men are female in relation to God. (I'm desperately biting back a quotation from 'Team America: World Police' right now)

---

That would be a corollary - but perhaps in the sense that a human father is more 'male' than a male child. Or that God the Father is male relative to God the Son (or God the Holy Spirit). (Which obviously suggests that there is more to 'maleness' than testes and chest hair). But a 'maleness' expressed in a paternal relationship, rather than in a sexual relationship. At least, that's how I see it.

---

In that case, you would appear to be saying that the human male is more perfectly made in the image of God than the human female.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Amos:
ken, I've come across views similar to Holy Smoke's elsewhere in the CofE: Martin Warner, the new bishop of Chichester would say pretty much the same things. I agree with you about them being wildly heterodox and having kompletely krazy implications for any systematic theology.

---

Yep


All a bit icky really. Like those ancient Egyptian myths which had God or a god wanking over the unformed world and his spilled seed turning nto living things. Real Earth Mother stuff, quite literally. Makes for some fun poetry, but its not Christianity.
 

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Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
But again, Holy Smokes has done us a favor by demonstrating precisely why theology matters, precisely why this is important. Several posters here have suggested that inclusive language is a meaningless, unnecessary intrusion-- a solution in search of a problem. Holy Smokes demonstrates that is not the case.
 

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Posted by Amos (# 44) on :
 
My question to Holy Smoke would be: would he (or she, since it is conceivable that HS is female) say that the man on the Clapham omnibus is closer to God in his maleness than the Blessed Virgin Mary is by virtue of being, well, the BVM?

This seems implicit in the argument.(And is why female Anglicans, lay or ordained, living in West Sussex, should be packing their cardboard suitcases as we speak, or else petitioning for Alternative Episcopal Oversight)

[ 06. June 2012, 17:35: Message edited by: Amos ]
 

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Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Holy Smoke:
I'm not at all sure that I would; at least, I wouldn't be using the word 'perfectly'. But I suppose it would suggest that the human male is somehow closer to God - and if that is the case, well, so be it.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Amos:
My question to Holy Smoke would be: would he (or she, since it is conceivable that HS is female) say that the man on the Clapham omnibus is closer to God in his maleness than the Blessed Virgin Mary is by virtue of being, well, the BVM?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Amos:
It looks now as if you (I'm replying to Holy Smoke) are saying, 'Sorry, mate, I'm just simple Mrs Murphy in the pew behind the pillar. Better ask some theologian about that stuff.' It even looks like you're suggesting, 'If only the clergy knew what strange stuff we simple Christians believe!' It would seem that orthodox Christian belief is no longer the benchmark.

---

Well since I am not a trained theologian, I'm not sure what else I can say - I am just saying what I believe, and trying to justify it, when challenged, in terms of other things which I believe. Which is what, I think, you will find most other 'simple Christians' do. And no, it is not likely to come up to the standards of professional theology, or even of theologically trained clergy, and yes, it probably will be heterodox and inconsistent. But hey, we just pay the bills for you lot, so you'd better not piss us off too much.

 

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Posted by Amos (# 44) on :
 
Then, seriously, if you think that what a Christian believes matters, and if you care for such things as orthodox Christian belief, do go get yourself some decent catechesis. If your CofE shack doesn't have it, find your local Dominicans or something. Orthodoxy is my doxy--you really don't want heterodoxy to be yours.
 

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Posted by Choirboy (# 9659) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by cliffdweller:
So you are equally bugged when people refer to the Holy Spirit as "he"?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Enoch:
This review from as recently as 2005 takes it for granted that if one uses 'man' to describe our species, 'man' takes 'he'. It's only the specific context of gestation that makes one ask questions about it. That's really a grammatical question.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Choirboy:

quote:

---

Originally posted by cliffdweller:
So you are equally bugged when people refer to the Holy Spirit as "he"?

---

No. The problem is that all pronouns will be faulty. But dividing God into male and female bits compounds the problem. It's the partitioning of God into "God the (presumably male) Father" while the Holy Spirit is the presumably Female part that is the problem. It sort of institutionalizes the idea that the persons of the Trinity have sex and gender rather than somehow correctly erasing the idea that they have sex and gender.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Dafyd:
And the point is that talking about the Ascent of Man tends to sideline women and activities stereotypically associated with women

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Sorry to suggest this but what about men who have been hurt by women? What about women who have been hurt by their own mothers?

Why is it that the assumption is that only a father can abuse, bully, mistreat, neglect the children?
There are many people whose experience of a mother is that they felt abandoned.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Kwesi:
ISTM that the question of God, Sex, Gender and associated issues depend on context. For me the basic theological position is set out in Genesis 1 verse 27: God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them. On the other hand, to deny that Jesus had sex would be to deny the incarnation, though for me his gonads are no more important that the colour of his hair. It is also undeniable that Jesus referred to God as his father and himself as the son.

What for me is a problem in the father-son business is less the issue of sex than the notion of inter-generational difference, which is particularly marked in the art of Western Christianity: viz. the Sistine Chapel. I wonder to what extent such artistic presentations have influenced our conscious and subjecting thinking about relationships within the trinity.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Mudfrog:

It seems to me that we walk the walk while those churches where women are denied ministry opportunities are just good at talking theology.

---

quote:

---

But I suppose it would suggest that the human male is somehow closer to God - and if that is the case, well, so be it.

---

quote:

---

And that is basically my fundamental point, what matters is how things are...

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Holy Smoke:
[QUOTE]Well since I am not a trained theologian, I'm not sure what else I can say - I am just saying what I believe, and trying to justify it, when challenged, in terms of other things which I believe. Which is what, I think, you will find most other 'simple Christians' do. And no, it is not likely to come up to the standards of professional theology, or even of theologically trained clergy, and yes, it probably will be heterodox and inconsistent. But hey, we just pay the bills for you lot, so you'd better not piss us off too much.

---

quote:

---

am just saying what I believe, and trying to justify it, when challenged, in terms of other things which I believe.

---

quote:

---

Funnily enough, Kwesi, I was wondering that too. In Eastern iconography, God the Father is only very rarely pictured - except occasionally as a hand protruding from a cloud. In Rublev's famous icon of the Old Testament Trinity, the three figures do not seem to be obviously gendered.

---

quote:

---

In other words (as Charles Read sayeth...) - the Father / Son images and language in the trinity are about relationship not gender.

---

quote:

---

Rowan: we do not look at human fathers to see what it means for God to be called Father, we look at God to see what human fatherhood might (aspire to) be.

---

quote:

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Originally posted by Holy Smoke:
Well since I am not a trained theologian, I'm not sure what else I can say - I am just saying what I believe, and trying to justify it, when challenged, in terms of other things which I believe. Which is what, I think, you will find most other 'simple Christians' do. And no, it is not likely to come up to the standards of professional theology, or even of theologically trained clergy, and yes, it probably will be heterodox and inconsistent. But hey, we just pay the bills for you lot, so you'd better not piss us off too much.

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Originally posted by Enoch:

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Originally posted by Dafyd
As a mammal, man gestates his offspring in his womb and then feeds his offspring with his own milk.

Do you think the above sentence is stylistically and otherwise correct?

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The reason you can't say that now, is because we have been sensitised to the point.

Although it reads oddly to us, you might well have said that in the 1950s, and later. It was entirely normal to refer to the species we belong to as 'man' until much more recently…

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… in all Acts Words importing the Masculine Gender shall be deemed and taken to include Females … unless the contrary … is expressly provided

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Originally posted by Fr Weber:
I know this will brand me as a linguistic tightass, but I hate that. I'll freely admit that it's unreasonable of me, but it just bugs me.

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Originally posted by Amos:
Holy Smoke--If I understand you correctly, you would also say that men are female in relation to God. (I'm desperately biting back a quotation from 'Team America: World Police' right now)

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Originally posted by RuthW:

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Originally posted by Choirboy:

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Originally posted by cliffdweller:
So you are equally bugged when people refer to the Holy Spirit as "he"?

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No. The problem is that all pronouns will be faulty. But dividing God into male and female bits compounds the problem. It's the partitioning of God into "God the (presumably male) Father" while the Holy Spirit is the presumably Female part that is the problem. It sort of institutionalizes the idea that the persons of the Trinity have sex and gender rather than somehow correctly erasing the idea that they have sex and gender.

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God the Father has sex and gender, Jesus has sex and gender, so I think we're stuck with this idea no matter how we refer to the Holy Spirit.

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Originally posted by Kwesi:
Charles Read

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Rowan: we do not look at human fathers to see what it means for God to be called Father, we look at God to see what human fatherhood might (aspire to) be.

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........mmmmmmmmmmmm. So how come we conceive of God as father in the first place?

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Originally posted by BroJames:


As far back as 1850, the Interpretation Act of that year felt it necessary to state in terms that:

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… in all Acts Words importing the Masculine Gender shall be deemed and taken to include Females … unless the contrary … is expressly provided

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So 'man' could refer to all humankind, but the presumption was easily overturned even then.

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Originally posted by Alogon:

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Originally posted by Fr Weber:
I know this will brand me as a linguistic tightass, but I hate that. I'll freely admit that it's unreasonable of me, but it just bugs me.

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It's not unreasonable at all. Third-person pronouns need antecedents. If we use a plural pronoun to refer to a singular antecedent, there is a real risk of confusion when there is a plural noun anywhere in the vicinity.

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Originally posted by Charles Read:
Likewise the blessed Rowan saith: we do not look at human fathers to see what it means for God to be called Father, we look at God to see what human fatherhood might (aspire to) be.

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Originally posted by Charles Read:
Likewise the blessed Rowan saith: we do not look at human fathers to see what it means for God to be called Father, we look at God to see what human fatherhood might (aspire to) be.

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Originally posted by Alogon:
Intellectuals or "ceiling people" ...

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"ceiling people"? So what are the rest of the world then? Floor people? Basement peopel? Mud people? Nearly people? Zombies buried under the floor boards?

[ 07. June 2012, 16:32: Message edited by: ken ]
 

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Posted by Amos (# 44) on :
 
Buried under the patio, please ken.
 

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Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 

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Originally posted by ken:

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Originally posted by Charles Read:
Likewise the blessed Rowan saith: we do not look at human fathers to see what it means for God to be called Father, we look at God to see what human fatherhood might (aspire to) be.

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The foolish Powers That Be at our church insist that the Sunday afer next is not the Second Sunday after Trinity, but in fact Father's Day. And insist on appropriate liturgy and sermons, whatver it says in the lectionary. its very hard to know what to say that isn't either sub-Christian twee cliche or else much too personal. (Not mutually xclusive)

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Originally posted by ken:

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Originally posted by RuthW:

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Originally posted by Choirboy:

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Originally posted by cliffdweller:
[qb] So you are equally bugged when people refer to the Holy Spirit as "he"?

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No. The problem is that all pronouns will be faulty. But dividing God into male and female bits compounds the problem. It's the partitioning of God into "God the (presumably male) Father" while the Holy Spirit is the presumably Female part that is the problem. It sort of institutionalizes the idea that the persons of the Trinity have sex and gender rather than somehow correctly erasing the idea that they have sex and gender.

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God the Father has sex and gender, Jesus has sex and gender, so I think we're stuck with this idea no matter how we refer to the Holy Spirit.

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Jesus the man has a sex, but that does not mean the eternal Second Person of the Trinity does. Two different natures, as they said at Chalcedon (and the Egyptians walked out - in fact this very point is one of the reasons why most of the Church regarded monophytism as a heresy)

The phrase "God the Father" has a gender, its a masculine set of words. Which can be unfortunate because it is not meant to to imply that God the Father has a sex at all, that he is male or female or some other as-yet-undiscovered sex they might have on another planet somewhere.

I don't know what it means to say that God has gender. Gender is a property of human thoughts, of words. Its a way we categorise the world. Its not really a property of things in themselves. Nothing is inherently masculine or feminine, those are categories someone assigns them. Bound up with sex, emergent from sex, but not actually the same as sex.

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Originally posted by ken:
The language is what the language is and its straightforwardly the case that phrases like "if someone does this than they..." are normal, standard, correct English. And always have been.

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Not where I come from. Or at best, not all the time.

The issue is essentially clarity rather than grammar. If students submit work containing pronouns with ambiguous antecedents, and a teacher marks them with '?' in red pencil, they are only doing their job.

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"ceiling people"? So what are the rest of the world then? Floor people? Basement peopel? Mud people? Nearly people? Zombies buried under the floor boards?

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Originally posted by Alogon:

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Originally posted by Amos:
Holy Smoke--If I understand you correctly, you would also say that men are female in relation to God. (I'm desperately biting back a quotation from 'Team America: World Police' right now)

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If so, he is taking after C.S. Lewis, who suggested it outright in, as I recall, Perelandra. That's not a bad precedent, and I doubt that Lewis himself was trying to be original with that idea.

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Originally posted by Anselmina:
Your view that 'God is demonstrably male' is clearly dubious, even by most conservative criteria. You're eluding the invitation to justify this extraordinary statement by suddenly becoming 'not a trained theologian'. It would appear by your performance on this thread, that if 'maleness is next to godliness' the world is doomed.

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Originally posted by LutheranChik:

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am just saying what I believe, and trying to justify it, when challenged, in terms of other things which I believe.

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At the risk of offending you by using a big theological word, you appear to be describing the practice of eisegesis -- in other words, trying to shoehorn your own subjective suppositions and prejudices and desired outcomes into biblical texts, instead of trying to understand what the writers actually said and meant.

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Originally posted by Holy Smoke:
I would also quite like to see some evidence of the Church Fathers or Aquinas or Luther or anybody of that stature proposing that God is androgynous or gender-free - perhaps the odd mystic or poet, but not a serious theologian.

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Originally posted by Holy Smoke:
As far as my assertion that God is demonstrably male, that is mostly based on the witness of the New Testament, where Jesus addresses God as 'Father', and is referred to elsewhere as 'Son of God'. I am quite content to do likewise, and I would also quite like to see some evidence (recent feminist theology apart) of the Church Fathers or Aquinas or Luther or anybody of that stature proposing that God is androgynous or gender-free - perhaps the odd mystic or poet, but not a serious theologian.

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Originally posted by RuthW:
Having penises doesn't prevent other men from reading for comprehension, so I feel sure you can do it.

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Originally posted by Alogon:
Third-person pronouns need antecedents. If we use a plural pronoun to refer to a singular antecedent, there is a real risk of confusion when there is a plural noun anywhere in the vicinity.

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Originally posted by Alogon:
This topic reminds me that a former colleague wrote an article some thirty years ago noting a rather striking trend: the appearance of children's books whose heroes and heroines are kids more mature and responsible than their parents. Rather suddenly, these became as common as they had been uncommon before. It's probably a healthy trend not to be so uncritically deferential, at least in quiet moments of reflection. Heaven help us all if such stories are being published because average parents are more immature and incompetent than they used to be.

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Originally posted by RuthW:

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Originally posted by Holy Smoke:
...and I would also quite like to see some evidence (recent feminist theology apart) of the Church Fathers or Aquinas or Luther or anybody of that stature proposing that God is androgynous or gender-free - perhaps the odd mystic or poet, but not a serious theologian.

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Such evidence has already been pointed out on this thread. Having penises doesn't prevent other men from reading for comprehension, so I feel sure you can do it.

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Originally posted by Holy Smoke:

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Originally posted by RuthW:

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Originally posted by Holy Smoke:
...and I would also quite like to see some evidence (recent feminist theology apart) of the Church Fathers or Aquinas or Luther or anybody of that stature proposing that God is androgynous or gender-free - perhaps the odd mystic or poet, but not a serious theologian.

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Such evidence has already been pointed out on this thread. Having penises doesn't prevent other men from reading for comprehension, so I feel sure you can do it.

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Well Ruth it seems that the absence of a penis does little for reading comprehension either: the only theologians mentioned prior to my post, viz. Ruether and Schussler-Fiorenza, are, as far as I'm aware, modern feminist writers.

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Originally posted by Holy Smoke:
As far as my assertion that God is demonstrably male, that is mostly based on the witness of the New Testament, where Jesus addresses God as 'Father', and is referred to elsewhere as 'Son of God'. I am quite content to do likewise, and I would also quite like to see some evidence (recent feminist theology apart) of the Church Fathers or Aquinas or Luther or anybody of that stature proposing that God is androgynous or gender-free - perhaps the odd mystic or poet, but not a serious theologian.

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Originally posted by Holy Smoke:

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Originally posted by Anselmina:
Your view that 'God is demonstrably male' is clearly dubious, even by most conservative criteria. You're eluding the invitation to justify this extraordinary statement by suddenly becoming 'not a trained theologian'. It would appear by your performance on this thread, that if 'maleness is next to godliness' the world is doomed.

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I am conscious of the fact that my theological education is somewhat limited - I was only slightly exaggerating for effect - and I will, if time allows, be attempting to rectify that is some small way, but I think I am not atypical of the average Anglican layman.

As far as my assertion that God is demonstrably male, that is mostly based on the witness of the New Testament, where Jesus addresses God as 'Father', and is referred to elsewhere as 'Son of God'. I am quite content to do likewise, and I would also quite like to see some evidence (recent feminist theology apart) of the Church Fathers or Aquinas or Luther or anybody of that stature proposing that God is androgynous or gender-free - perhaps the odd mystic or poet, but not a serious theologian.

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Originally posted by Lyda*Rose:
As a woman it helps me connect with the Godhead by realizing that I am made in God's image in some fashion including in being female, and that a few bones thrown my way that illustrate this are much appreciated.

I have no trouble with the fact that the Son incarnated as a male human. I also don't have trouble with the fact that Jesus as the son of a human mother, spoke to his father as, well, Father or even Abba/Daddy. But I also like that Jesus compared himself to a mama bird gathering her chicks under her wings. I like looking at icons of the Holy Silence where Jesus is pictured as an androgynous or even rather feminine angel. And I enjoy reading how Dame Julian heard Jesus described as a loving mother. I need to have trust that everything that God intended us to be is somewhere in both of us. If the female is excluded as part of God, the Incarnate Son's sacrifice saves only men because the feminine has nothing to do with it- unless you see the BVM as "co-redemptress" by being his mom.

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Originally posted by Charles Read:
However, singular they is a long-standing correct grammatical usage in England - see e.g. Miller & Swift. Handbook of Nonsexist Writing

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Originally posted by Alogon:

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Originally posted by Charles Read:
However, singular they is a long-standing correct grammatical usage in England - see e.g. Miller & Swift. Handbook of Nonsexist Writing

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If it is indeed long-standing usage, then we should be able to see it defended in a handbook written before nonsexist writing became an obsession-- indeed before anyone had heard of the word "nonsexist". No doubt my example and yours could both be refashioned in a way that would satisfy both of us. But suddenly we have one more hoop to jump through, and evidently we must do so unfailingly. Good writing for comprehension is difficult enough already.

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grammarians' recommendation, during the past two centuries, [which] has been that he (him, himself, his) should be used…

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Popular usage, however, has for at least five centuries favoured the plural pronoun they (them, themselves, their)

This is entirely acceptable in informal speech…
It is by no means uncommon in more formal contexts…

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Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:

Personally, though, I'd like to see the discussion return to my original thesis: that all-inclusive language has nothing to do with the oppression of women by society or the relief thereof.

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Originally posted by cliffdweller:
So we can expect that gender-inclusive language, even gender-inclusive language for God, while currently grating and intrusive, will come to feel natural and less of a distraction.

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that all-inclusive language has nothing to do with the oppression of women by society or the relief thereof.

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Originally posted by Enoch:


1. I agree with Amanda B. Reckondwythe.

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that all-inclusive language has nothing to do with the oppression of women by society or the relief thereof.

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2. If we're talking discrimination/oppression. why shouldn't I claim that it's age discrimination to expect me to fit my speech round changes that didn't happen until I was middle aged?

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Originally posted by Holy Smoke:

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Originally posted by RuthW:

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Originally posted by Holy Smoke:
...and I would also quite like to see some evidence (recent feminist theology apart) of the Church Fathers or Aquinas or Luther or anybody of that stature proposing that God is androgynous or gender-free - perhaps the odd mystic or poet, but not a serious theologian.

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Such evidence has already been pointed out on this thread. Having penises doesn't prevent other men from reading for comprehension, so I feel sure you can do it.

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Well Ruth it seems that the absence of a penis does little for reading comprehension either: the only theologians mentioned prior to my post, viz. Ruether and Schussler-Fiorenza, are, as far as I'm aware, modern feminist writers.

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1. Of Faith in the Holy Trinity.
There is but one living and true God, everlasting, without body, parts or passions; of infinite power, wisdom and goodness; the Maker, and Preserver of all things both visible and invisible. And in unity of this Godhead there be three Persons, of one substance, power, and eternity; the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.

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2. Of the Word or Son of God, which was made very Man.
The Son, which is the Word of the Father, begotten from everlasting of the Father, the very and eternal God, and of one substance with the Father, took Man's nature in the womb of the blessed Virgin, of her substance: so that two whole and perfect Natures, that is to say, the Godhead and Manhood, were joined together in one Person, never to be divided, whereof is one Christ, very God, and very Man; who truly suffered, was crucified, dead and buried, to reconcile his Father to us, and to be a sacrifice, not only for original guilt, but also for all actual sins of men.

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Originally posted by Enoch:
If we're talking discrimination/oppression. why shouldn't I claim that it's age discrimination to expect me to fit my speech round changes that didn't happen until I was middle aged?

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If the change you are talking about is the word "Man" dropping out of normal speech as a word for all of our species, that would make you well over two centuries old. If out of formal academic speech, somewhere between 90 and 120 - which you might well be of course. It was already old-fashioned and stilted when Bronowski used it in the 1960s.

Though if you meant the singular they you would have to be fifteen centuries old. (actually that's a bit unfair as Old English had full set of neuter pronouns as well as gendered ones so singular they doesn't really become a possibility until Middle English - which is when our ancestors started using it. So you'd only have to be a bit less than a thousand years old )
 

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Posted by RuthW (# 13) on :
 

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Originally posted by ken:

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Originally posted by Holy Smoke:

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Originally posted by RuthW:

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Originally posted by Holy Smoke:
...and I would also quite like to see some evidence (recent feminist theology apart) of the Church Fathers or Aquinas or Luther or anybody of that stature proposing that God is androgynous or gender-free - perhaps the odd mystic or poet, but not a serious theologian.

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Such evidence has already been pointed out on this thread. Having penises doesn't prevent other men from reading for comprehension, so I feel sure you can do it.

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Well Ruth it seems that the absence of a penis does little for reading comprehension either: the only theologians mentioned prior to my post, viz. Ruether and Schussler-Fiorenza, are, as far as I'm aware, modern feminist writers.

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The Council of Chalcedon

Thomas Aquinas

Quoting them, The Westminster Confession of Faith, and also Articles One and Two of the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of England, which say:

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1. Of Faith in the Holy Trinity.
There is but one living and true God, everlasting, without body, parts or passions; of infinite power, wisdom and goodness; the Maker, and Preserver of all things both visible and invisible. And in unity of this Godhead there be three Persons, of one substance, power, and eternity; the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.

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2. Of the Word or Son of God, which was made very Man.
The Son, which is the Word of the Father, begotten from everlasting of the Father, the very and eternal God, and of one substance with the Father, took Man's nature in the womb of the blessed Virgin, of her substance: so that two whole and perfect Natures, that is to say, the Godhead and Manhood, were joined together in one Person, never to be divided, whereof is one Christ, very God, and very Man; who truly suffered, was crucified, dead and buried, to reconcile his Father to us, and to be a sacrifice, not only for original guilt, but also for all actual sins of men.

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Originally posted by OliviaG:
God encompasses all genders and sexes, yin and yang, and beyond. OliviaG

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Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:
Personally, though, I'd like to see the discussion return to my original thesis: that all-inclusive language has nothing to do with the oppression of women by society or the relief thereof.

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Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:

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Originally posted by OliviaG:
God encompasses all genders and sexes, yin and yang, and beyond. OliviaG

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So, then, should we accept the trend toward using gender-neutral language when addressing or describing the Deity? If so, it would seem to me that the task would be to do it as elegantly as possible, avoiding those awkward expressions and substitutions that rankle us so at the moment.

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Originally posted by RuthW:
OK, go for it. Write or re-write something yourself. It would be really nice if folks like you would take on this work instead of leaving it to folks like me.

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Originally posted by OliviaG:
If I'm reading #2 correctly, Jesus' human male nature came from Mary, a woman. Combining this with the Adam/Eve myth suggests reciprocity and interconnection between the masculine and feminine. Like a magnet, there can't be just one pole. God encompasses all genders and sexes, yin and yang, and beyond. OliviaG

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Originally posted by Amos:
I'm not sure that we are, Kwesi. I don't think that's what Genesis 1 is saying at all--or else no single person could be made in the image of God. You're going all Platonic when you say otherwise.

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Originally posted by Penny S:

Two, I watched the last part of LOTR, in which Eowyn, only there by virtue of an assumed masculinity, proclaims that she can kill the Nazgul King because she is not a man, and he has been told he cannot be killed by a man. Tolkein as a philologist should have known about the early use of 'man' as equivalent to 'homo' rather than 'vir', or 'anthropos' rather than 'andros', as inclusive.

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Originally posted by bib:
I'm not sure why it seems to be mostly men who feel the need need to change the language to gender inclusive as a token towards we women(at least that is my impression).

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Originally posted by bib:
I and most of my women friends feel the issue is a non issue and that there are more important thing to occupy our time and thoughts. If one's faith is so weak that God has to be seen as a man or a woman then I fear for the future of our Christian faith.

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Originally posted by OliviaG:
If I'm reading #2 correctly, Jesus' human male nature came from Mary, a woman.

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Combining this with the Adam/Eve myth suggests reciprocity and interconnection between the masculine and feminine. Like a magnet, there can't be just one pole. God encompasses all genders and sexes, yin and yang, and beyond.

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Originally posted by Kwesi:
Are we to conclude from Genesis 1 that God is best expressed and understood through the union of male and female, whether in sexual congress or in fellowship? Is it the starting point for an exploration of his/her nature?

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Originally posted by ken:

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[QUOTE]Originally posted by Kwesi:
Are we to conclude from Genesis 1 that God is best expressed and understood through the union of male and female, whether in sexual congress or in fellowship? Is it the starting point for an exploration of his/her nature?

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No, because God is the eternal origin of all created things. God is not the union of male and female at all. Males and females are among the many things God created and creates. God is not the union of anything earthly. Would you say that God is the union of insects and molluscs? Or of iron and sulphur? Or of wind and rain? Or of planets and nebulae? Why pick on males and females?

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Originally posted by cliffdweller:
No, God is the union of Father, Son, and Spirit. God exists in Trinity-- in intimate, loving, mutual relationship. Hence the image of God-- the likeness of God-- is found in intimate, loving, mutual relationships.

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Originally posted by Horseman Bree:
Just to further muddy the waters, I'll offer "Biblical Proofs in Scripture for the Feminine Face of God" tidily summarised by Rachel Held Evans.

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Nice list. Helpful. Doesn't muddy the waters at all (other than my introducing that deuterocanonical Mr Ben Sirach ) But I don't think anyone here is denying that the Bible uses lots of symbols for God, and that some are female and some male (rather more male than female).

If there is dispute going on here about the nature of God there are two questions - can we say God is of one sex or the other, and can we say that God is of one gender or the other?

For the first question, does God have a sex? is God male or female?, I think the Christian and Biblical answer is clearly and indisputably "no".

The first question, does God have a gender? is God masculine or feminine?, is a bit more troublesome because, to be honest, I don't know for sure what it is meant to mean. It looks like handwaving vagueness to me, talking about gender as a polite alternative to talking about sex, when they are in fact different things (though not of course unconnected)
 

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Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 

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Originally posted by ken:

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Originally posted by cliffdweller:
No, God is the union of Father, Son, and Spirit. God exists in Trinity-- in intimate, loving, mutual relationship. Hence the image of God-- the likeness of God-- is found in intimate, loving, mutual relationships.

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Of course. But the Holy Trinity is not made of three earthly things, but three eternal persons, and even if we can talk about distinctions between the persons of the Trinity we can't do so in sexual terms. Even by analogy - for a start there are three of them. The words "Father" and "Son" when used about eternal God have to be understood as not implying male sex.

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I'm not sure why it seems to be mostly men who feel the need need to change the language to gender inclusive as a token towards we women(at least that is my impression). I and most of my women friends feel the issue is a non issue and that there are more important thing to occupy our time and thoughts.

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Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:

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Originally posted by RuthW:
OK, go for it. Write or re-write something yourself. It would be really nice if folks like you would take on this work instead of leaving it to folks like me.

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I can try my best in my own writing, but I am neither a liturgist nor a composer or arranger of hymns. Were I, I would certainly try my best there.

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God doesn't give advice or things. God gives us himself.

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God doesn't give advice or things. God gives us herself.

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Originally posted by Boogie:
God doesn't give advice or things. God gives us himself [or] God gives us herself.

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Originally posted by bib:
I'm not sure why it seems to be mostly men who feel the need need to change the language to gender inclusive as a token towards we women(at least that is my impression). I and most of my women friends feel the issue is a non issue and that there are more important thing to occupy our time and thoughts. If one's faith is so weak that God has to be seen as a man or a woman then I fear for the future of our Christian faith.

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I would go further, and say that - as a female - the gender inclusive language often jars dreadfully (especially in hymns and other well-known phrases where the word change is very obvious). And when, out of frustration, I speak out about how I feel, my views apparently don't count (that would be because I'm a woman, then? ) So, for my own satisfaction, I continue to say or sing the old words - very quietly of course - and pretend they haven't been changed. I'd hate to think that men thought they had to change them because of people like me.
 

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Posted by Enoch (# 14322) on :
 
The argument from Tolkien is missing the point. Tolkien knew well the long mythological tradition of prophecies that are fulfilled by their ambiguity. It is a currency that is even familiar to ordinary people like me. The Delphic Oracle said to one supplicant that if he went to war, a great empire would fall. It did. His own. Macduff famously was from his mother's womb "untimely ripped", and so could slay Macbeth. A spirit conjured by the witches had told him "none of woman born shall harm Macbeth".

So the Tolkien extract only works if one assumes 'man' was still ambiguous when he wrote Lord of the Rings.


On pronouns for God, we have to choose one. There's no way of writing sensibly about God without one. As a statement of the 'bleeding obvious', English has four third person ones, three singular and one plural. There is no singular pronoun for a person without gender. Historically one has used 'he' or 'they', usage of each depending on both context and ones nationality

Jesus has to be 'he'. There's no option about that. I would say the Father likewise has. We can't say 'it' for either. That implies they are not persons, but merely things. That's wrong, derogatory and probably blasphemous.

When we speak of the Holy Spirit, there is some precedent for 'it'. Because that implies the Holy Spirit is not a person, IMHO that is considerably more damaging to peoples' spiritual understanding than saying 'he' or 'she'.

There's widespread confusion when people say 'God' as to whether we really mean the Father or God in Trinity. It might be better if we tried to be more accurate about this, but both confusion and ambiguity on this goes back to scripture. There could perhaps be a case for referring to God in Trinity as 'they', except that we don't. The OT word 'elohim' is plural. However, I believe it normally takes a singular verb.

The convention is that we use 'he' both for God and for the Holy Spirit. While it may be that this is a survival of a grammatical usage that some now deprecate, referring to either as 'she' is making a statement, drawing attention to itself, in a way that says 'look; I am being controversial; I am making a statement', probably 'I am being clever-clever'. It jars. It is saying that making this statement, which is one of linguistic usage, is more important than anything else I might be saying about either of them.
 

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Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 

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Originally posted by Chorister:

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Originally posted by bib:
I'm not sure why it seems to be mostly men who feel the need need to change the language to gender inclusive as a token towards we women(at least that is my impression). I and most of my women friends feel the issue is a non issue and that there are more important thing to occupy our time and thoughts. If one's faith is so weak that God has to be seen as a man or a woman then I fear for the future of our Christian faith.

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I would go further, and say that - as a female - the gender inclusive language often jars dreadfully (especially in hymns and other well-known phrases where the word change is very obvious). And when, out of frustration, I speak out about how I feel, my views apparently don't count (that would be because I'm a woman, then? ) So, for my own satisfaction, I continue to say or sing the old words - very quietly of course - and pretend they haven't been changed. I'd hate to think that men thought they had to change them because of people like me.

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Originally posted by Chorister:
And when, out of frustration, I speak out about how I feel, my views apparently don't count (that would be because I'm a woman, then?

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Originally posted by ken:

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Originally posted by Enoch:

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Originally posted by Dafyd
As a mammal, man gestates his offspring in his womb and then feeds his offspring with his own milk.

Do you think the above sentence is stylistically and otherwise correct?

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The reason you can't say that now, is because we have been sensitised to the point.

Although it reads oddly to us, you might well have said that in the 1950s, and later. It was entirely normal to refer to the species we belong to as 'man' until much more recently.

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No you really wouldn't have said things like that. They would always have struck people as odd

Yes, you got books and others things like "The Ascent of Man" or "An Introcuction to the Study of Man", but that was a rather pompouse frormal sort of textbook language and not used much in normal speech, and even then people would have avoided sentences like Dafyd's example. And they have been doing for centuuries, that is NOT a recent thing. (As can be quite easily demonstrated by redong a few old books)

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Originally posted by Eliab:

My only problem with inclusive language is that it is sometimes too impersonal, because the ordinary English word for personal relationships often are gendered. Last year I preached on the passage "If your brother sins against you..." which the NRSV (I think) renders "If a member of the church sins against you...".

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Here "If your sister or brother sins against you..." would work.

I find inclusive language for God can be too impersonal. Shame we don't have a gender neutral word for 'himself' or 'herself'


 

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Posted by Enoch (# 14322) on :
 

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Originally posted by Eliab
A biology textbook I used at school (late 80s) had a lot of electron microscope views of tissue sections, one of which was captioned something like "Lining of uterus (pregnant) (man)". We understood it,of course, but we thought that it was ridiculous.

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Ditto
My only problem with inclusive language is that it is sometimes too impersonal, because the ordinary English word for personal relationships often are gendered. Last year I preached on the passage "If your brother sins against you..." which the NRSV (I think) renders "If a member of the church sins against you...".

Reading the passage with "brother" makes a difference - the impression it gives is of the urgency and importance of restoring a damaged relationship with someone you love and are inescapably committed to. "Member of the church" makes the thing read like a company's grievance procedure. "Brother" is better.

Of course, if there were an everyday English word which captured the personal impact of "brother" without implying only one gender, that would be better still. The trouble is, there isn't a good one. "Sibling" is an impersonal term, "brother or sister" (probably the best option) is rather clumsy, "friend" suggests a voluntary relationship rather than one you are stuck with. ...

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"What is man, that you should be mindful of him; ¨
the son of man, that you should seek him out?"

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"What are mortals, that you should be mindful of them; ¨
mere human beings, that you should seek them out?"

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'Blessed are those' weakens the personal force of Psalm 1, lets us off the hook of individual moral responsibility. If 'man' is too much of a problem, 'Blessed is the one' works, but merely postpones by a verse the challenge as to how one translates or avoids singular pronouns for the rest of the psalm.

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Originally posted by Boogie:
I try to use gender neutral language for God and appreciate it when anyone else does. Some sentences need a gender 'tho. I have just used one on here (The Ship).

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God doesn't give advice or things. God gives us himself.

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The convention is that we use 'he' both for God and for the Holy Spirit. While it may be that this is a survival of a grammatical usage that some now deprecate, referring to either as 'she' is making a statement, drawing attention to itself, in a way that says 'look; I am being controversial; I am making a statement', probably 'I am being clever-clever'. It jars. It is saying that making this statement, which is one of linguistic usage, is more important than anything else I might be saying about either of them.

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Originally posted by Eliab:

A biology textbook I used at school (late 80s) had a lot of electron microscope views of tissue sections, one of which was captioned something like "Lining of uterus (pregnant) (man)". We understood it,of course, but we thought that it was ridiculous.

The word "man" can still be used to mean humanity generally, or an individual human being, and those meanings will be understood, but what is impossible is to use it in that way and expect that the connotation of maleness will be ignored. "For us men" and the like can mean, intelligibly "human beings" but now requires, as it might not have done in the past, a conscious translation from the normal use of the word "men" (adult males) to the specialist meaning that it has in that phrase (people).

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Originally posted by Enoch:

The one which perhaps causes the most difficulty to those who must be modern at all costs is Psalm 8. The CW psalter actually gives you the option of two versions. The difficult verse, of course, is 5, but your choice affects how you understand the next four, whether it is his or their sovereignty. The options are

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"What is man, that you should be mindful of him; ¨
the son of man, that you should seek him out?"

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followed by singular pronouns, all 'he', or

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"What are mortals, that you should be mindful of them; ¨
mere human beings, that you should seek them out?"

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followed by plural pronouns.

Now, I know, 'Son of Man', has resonances for us that it did not have when the psalms were written. However, once you gloss that out of the psalm, you change what it has meant for Christians since the New Testament.

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