If we are going to be true to the Bible, then God the Creator should take they/them pronouns
The Creator and Sustainer of the cosmos bears male, female, and nonbinary qualities.According to both the Hebrew prophet Hosea as well as Jesus the Christ, YHWH the Father God (Abba), the Creator and Sustainer of the cosmos, is compassionate.
In the Hebrew Bible, compassion is something you feel in your womb (rechem or beten). Scholars translate the Hebrew words rechem and beten as womb, bowels, or heart when referring to the body, and as mercy or compassion when referring to a feeling.
Both rechem and beten provide maternal imagery for God. When Babylon conquered Israel and took its leading citizens from Jerusalem into exile, many Jews felt forgotten by their God. But the prophet Isaiah (or his followers in the Isaiah school), writing in the voice of God, assures them: Can a woman forget her nursing child or show no compassion [rechem] for the child of her womb [beten]? Even these might forget, yet I will not forget you (Isaiah 49:15 NRSV). And, sensitive to the yearning of the exiled for home, Isaiah also writes, again in the voice of God: As a mother comforts her child, so I will comfort you (Isaiah 66:13).
Sometimes, the Hebrews maternal imagery for God is explicit birth imagery. Frustrated that Israel so quickly rushes to other gods, Deuteronomy accuses: You deserted the Rock who gave you life; you forgot the God who bore you (Deuteronomy 32:18). Later in the Hebrew scriptures, God declares to Job, Has the rain a father, or who has fathered the drops of dew? From whose womb did the ice come forth, and who has given birth to the hoarfrost of heaven? (Job 38:2829 NRSV). And there is substantial evidence to justify translating El Shaddai, traditionally the Almighty, as the Breasted One.
Such passages deny YHWH the Creator, whom Jesus called Abba, any single gender with which to identify. Instead, they implicitly declare YHWH/Abba to be omnigendered or nonbinary.
Jesus also asserts Abbas transcendence of all gender categories.
Jesus continues this Jewish tradition, revealing the intimacy of Abba through the imagery of father and mother. Jesus had innumerable Hebrew images for Abba to choose from, male, female, and neuter: Creator (Genesis 1:1), King (Psalm 99:1), Lawgiver (Exodus 20:217), Judge (Psalm 7:811), Lord (Exodus 4:10), Jealous (Exodus 34:14; Jealous is capitalized as a proper name), Fire (1 Kings 18:38; Exodus 13:21), Warrior (Exodus 15:3), Potter (Isaiah 24:8), Rock (Psalm 31:18), Shepherd (Psalm 23:1), etc. But in his own teaching, Jesus chose imagery of warmth and care: God as Father (Luke 11:22; following Mal 2:10) and God as Mother (Luke 15:810; following Deut 32:18).
In contemporary English, persons who identify with both genders, or are nonbinary, use the pronouns they/them. Their decision to use these pronouns follows the English language tradition of substituting they for he or she when the gender of someone is indeterminate. For example, if you see an individual person far away and cant tell if theyre male or female, then you might ask, What are they doing? They here serves as a stand-in for indeterminate gender. Today, we use they to refer to persons who identify as neither male nor female, or as both male and female.
In keeping with this practice of language, for the remainder of this book (The Great Open Dance), we shall assign they/them pronouns to Abba, our Creator and Sustainer.
AbbaGod the Creator and Sustainershould be referred to with they/them pronouns.
We do so for several reasons. Historically, the church has always recognized that God the Creator is beyond all gender categories. The Catechism of the Catholic Church summarizes this long tradition: We ought therefore to recall that God transcends the human distinction between the sexes. He is neither man nor woman: he is God.
Problematically, historical language for God has been exclusively male: God the Creator is a he, God the Christ is a he, God the Spirit is a he, and God the Trinity, those three persons as one God, is a he. Exclusively male language for a gender transcendent God misrepresents the divine nature; hence, it is theologically inaccurate. Moreover, exclusively male language for God misrepresents males as more divine than females and nonbinary persons, distorting our thought and, inevitably, our societies.
Everyone is made in the image of God, no matter their gender identity. Therefore, our language for God should allow everyone to see themselves in God. Referring to Abba, God the Creator, as they corrects the tradition, allowing nonbinary persons, so often excluded both socially and theologically, to understand themselves as manifestations of divinity. (Later in the book, we will introduce the Holy Spirit as Sophia, who is metaphorically female, thereby providing a gender-inclusive image of God the Trinity.)
We should refer to God the Creator as Jesus taught us, as Abba.
For the rest of this book our primary term for God the Creator and Sustainer will be Abba rather than the customary terms such as Creator, Sustainer, God, or Father. As noted above, Abba is the Aramaic term of endearment for Father, although (as noted above) it conveys more affection and closeness than its English counterpart. Jesus spoke Aramaic and used the term explicitly in his prayer life: when pleading to be freed from the pain of crucifixion, Jesus prays to Abba, Father (Mark 14:36).
This usage continued in the early church. The apostle Paul promises that, because Christ refers to the Creator as Abba, Christians can do so as well: Those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. . . . Through the Spirit, God has adopted you as children, and by that Spirit we cry out, Abba! (Romans 8:15b16a). Today, many Jewish children in families familiar with Hebrew will call their father Abba, which is more readily translated as Dad, Daddy, or Papa.
Not only is the term Abba entirely biblical and appropriately intimate, it offers several additional advantages. Relative to the word God, Abba suggests the warmth of a person to whom we can relate rather than an abstraction that we ponder. Relative to the word Father, Abba suggests less formality and greater familiarity. And relative to the words Creator or Sustainer, Abba refers to the whole person rather than a function thereof.
Regarding gender, the Aramaic word Abba is clearly a masculine noun. Fortunately, for our purposes, it has the advantage of ending in the letter a, which provides it with a feminine tone in many European languages: for example, Maria and Antonia are feminine; Mario and Antonio are masculine. This fortuitous ambiguity in the word provides us with some flexibility as we try to develop a gender-inclusive concept of God.
Finally, since we will call God the Creator Abba, for the rest of this book the term God itself will refer primarily to God the Trinity, the community of personsCreator, Christ, and Spiritunited through love into one living divinity.
Theological language should be dynamic and flexible.
These references will not be perfectly consistent. Theological language should be sufficiently precise so as not to confuse, but sufficiently elastic so as not to obstruct the divine plenitude. When writing about faith, there is always a tension between precision and transparency, logic and metaphor, reason and imagination.
Moreover, the perfect cooperation of the three triune persons deeply involves them in one anothers work; even though they have distinct responsibilities, they fulfill their distinct responsibilities alongside one another. This co-involvement consolidates their activity, rendering it distinguishable but inseparable. From the perspective of theological language, God the Sustainer, God the Christ, and God the Spirit together form God the Trinity, granting the word God an indefiniteness appropriate to divinitys overflowing nature. (adapted from Jon Paul Sydnor, The Great Open Dance: A Progressive Christian Theology, pages 66-68)
*****
For further reading, please see:
Biale, David. "The God with Breasts: El Shaddai in the Bible. History of Religions 21, no. 3 (February 1982) 24056. DOI: 10.1086/462899.
Bacon, Hannah. Thinking the Trinity as Resource for Feminist Theology Today? CrossCurrents 62, no. 4 (2012) 44264. http://www.jstor.org/stable/24462298.
Loughlin, Gerard. What Is Queer? Theology after Identity. Theology & Sexuality 14, no. 2 (January 2008) 14352. DOI: 10.1177/1355835807087376.
United States Catholic Conference. Catechism of the Catholic Church. Merrimack, NH: Thomas More College Press, 1994.
multigraincracker
(34,533 posts)Jesus Interrupted by Bart D. Ehrman
professor Ehrman was a scholar who set out to prove the Bible to be literally true. First he graduated from Moody Bible School. Then he went to Harvard to study the three ancient languages used in writing the Bible. He ended up find too many errors and inconsistency to be true.
He points out all of the errors and mistakes made every time it was copied. Until the printing press was invented every copy was different than the one copied. He has found more errors in todays Bible than there are words.
After setting out to prove the inerrancy, he did the opposite. Now he is a nonbeliever after his research.
I suggest you read some of his works.
I was a Secular Humanist long before I read his books. I put Humans before Gods and find most religions very too authoritarian for me to buy into. Im more into a free and independent search for the truth.
The Great Open Dance
(73 posts)Yes, I am familiar with Bart Ehrman's work. He is a recovering fundamentalist and working hard to slough off some bad theology that he was raised in. My faith, like that of Jesus, is also free, loving, uncontrolling, experimental, and humanistic. Progressive, if you will. I think that God is a humanist, personally. Respectfully submitted.
multigraincracker
(34,533 posts)the most interesting.
The Great Open Dance
(73 posts)because they're actually trying to be Chrislike, and not just call themselves Christian!