Interesting opinion piece in the New York Times:
"Is God Transgender?" in the NYT
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More like this
- "I prayed to God to make me a girl"
- From the NYT: "All Twisted Up by Gender Bending"
- The Protector of Angels- Washington DC Team- Slothrop's "I Can See For Miles"
- Autumn is the Season of Doom-Chihuahua, Mexico Team- Slothtrop's "I Can See For Miles"
- The Dead Kid Returns- Chapter 7: "I think I'm a girl."
Comments
I believe
the god name Elohim is actually a mixture of male and female.
Angharad
Yahveh and his Asherah
There are strong hints of Judaism going through a dualistic phase with male - Yahweh, and female - Asherah, deities. A hubby and wifey team.
The NYT article is poorly researched shit. Hatshepsut did not put on a beard to become a "gender fluid" person but to pretend to be a male, as females "did not do" Pharaoh.
The text of the Hebrew Bible should be compared with that of the Septuagint and the Dead Sea scrolls, both of which are earlier compilations of the text.
It was opinion.
However, it was opinion written by an actual Hebrew Jewish Rabbi. Do you purport to know more about the original text than someone who's been studying it from birth?
As for the comparison of Hatshepsut to a gender fluid person, I think you're misunderstanding that paragraph. The author did not say explicitly anything about Hatshepsut's specific history or possible reasons for what she did, only that the Hebrew history seems to be one where her actions became revered and treated as holy and became a part of a gender fluid cultural meme. That's not the same thing as saying she did it to BE gender fluid. Only that it ended up REMEMBERED as being gender fluid and holy. For a while, at least.
Abigail Drew.
There is a slight problem with language...
There is Yiddish and Hebrew. Most of the Jews, for example in 1930, had no idea that there is Jewish language apart of Yiddish. So people who designed Hebrew could have made mistakes when designing holy texts for Jews.
BTW, I had s few Jewish friends. And quite a few of them knew some of the Yiddish because of grandmothers... But almost all of them had to _learn_ Hebrew at some point...
Sigh...
Actually, the Jewish canon is entirely originated in Hebrew or Aramaic, both ancient languages that existed concurrently. There is today only a modern Hebrew, Aramaic has descendant languages but has itself gone extinct other than as a scholarly and priesthood language, much like Latin has, though Latin came later.
Yiddish is a language used by modern Jews of European descent long after diaspora. Most Yiddish Jews have little if any Hebrew ancestry. The author was noted after the opinion article to have specifically been a HEBREW Jewish Rabbi. He would have been selected to become a rabbi at birth and been studying the original languages and the scriptures as well as histories and laws etc from birth. I would be far quicker to trust his judgements on his peoples history than I would any other Jew, let alone a Christian or someone who purports to be a religious scholar but only started to study a broad spectrum of religions from a late age.
Hebrew is the ancient and still living language of the Hebrews. They are a people who may or may not be Jewish, Judaism is a faith, not a people. Therefore, quite simply, a Hebrew Jewish Rabbi is a much better authority on Hebrew and therefore Jewish history than any other profession since Judaism started as a Hebrew faith.
And what I find interesting, is, no matter which sect they follow, ALL current HEBREW Jewish Rabbi's seem to be saying the same thing as this one. At this point, anyone questioning this are the ones to be asked to back that up, and, not surprisingly, they always fail to put forth a convincing argument, pushing for later translations or sectarian non-canonical works to be considered proof positive of their argument.
Canonical Hebrew and Aramaic texts for the Bible are still extant, they've been preserved despite all the things the Hebrews as a people have been through. Also still extant, preserved through all their history, have been a large chunk of their historical records, including their laws. As a HEBREW Rabbi, the man who wrote this opinion piece has been studying these records, in their original language, all his life. That's his JOB. I'll readily consider him more authoritative than some other random person who only just started studying this stuff recently in translated form.
There's still a lot of opinion here, of course. The same words that he interpreted to mean that the Abrahamic God is gender fluid COULD also be interpreted to mean that the Godhead includes more personages than one, and at least one of those personages is female... there's really no way to know what was meant, and he's interpreting it just as much as we are. The fact that he's interpreting it from the original, though, and with far more context than we non-Hebrews have, lends quite a bit more credence to his theorizing and opinions than most though. Especially since every Hebrew Jewish Rabbi are saying the same or at least extremely similar things.
Abigail Drew.
The Boiling Cauldron
Just making conversation here, so no barking at me. After spending some 42 years as a member of one religion or another, I've come to the conclusion that none of us have a very firm idea of the identity of God, G_d, Yaweh, or Allah SWT. We try to mysticize God when I am pretty sure that he would be more comfortable in a Science Fiction tale and perhaps Isaac Asimov got closer in his original "Foundation Trilogy" than most.
Certain aspects of belief make no sense. One issue that I have always had is that "I am that I am" talked to ancient people on a fairly regular basis, starting with Abraham, and according to Christians, suddenly stopped with the death of Jesus Christ. Muslims believe he spoke through an angel to Muhammad PBUH around 600 AD, and according to Muslims Muhammad PBUH was the last prophet, giving them the holy Quran, and now it has been some 1400 years since.
To those who believe the story, Joseph Smith was another prophet that lived in the early 1800's and gave them the Book of Mormon. Mormons believe that there are now prophets that run their church.
Having a very broad background in religion, that is not particularly deep, I am waiting for something new to happen, whether that is a giant spaceship showing up or the Messiah himself to come riding out of the clouds, followed by a heavenly host. There is a lot about religion that lacks credibility and I am not sure where I am with the whole boiling cauldron.
Yiddish vs. Hebrew
I have no idea where you got the idea the most Jews in 1930 "had no idea that there is Jewish language apart of Yiddish." Yiddish was the common language in daily use of Ashkenazi Jews, largely based on German with the addition of many Hebrew and Slavic words, and written with the Hebrew alphabet. It was never the language of the Jewish religion, which is Hebrew. Prior to modern times, only men could participate in the religious services, and to do so they had to be able to read Hebrew. Even today, the bar mitzvah ritual, after which a young man (typically 13 years old) becomes religiously an adult and responsible for following the law and can help form a minyan, usually includes the young man (or today a young woman bat mitzvah) reading from the Torah, which is written in Hebrew and, some parts, in Aramaic.
Since in prior times women were not included in the minyan and did not lead prayers, they usually did not learn Hebrew. This, by the way, was the basis for the movie Yentl with Barbra Streisand. Hebrew thus was reserved for religious use prior to the establishment of Israel, and Yiddish was used in daily life. Jews who were not Ashkenazim would have a different vernacular based on the common language of their area, such as Ladino for those descended from Sephardic Jews of Spain. If you're really interested, a good discussion can be found at http://elalliance.org/languages/jewish/.
The Dead Sea Scrolls
are quite a bit later and thought to come from the Essene sect.
Angharad
Strangely...
...after surviving for couple millenia under rock in the desert with temperature variations from below freezing at night to almost boiling point midday... After placement into special storage with reduced oxygen, stabilized temperature and stabilized optimal humidity... Those scrolls sterted to deteriorate rapidly...
Not really
Until the 1990s very few of the scrolls and scroll fragments had any consistent protection from deterioration. The period before 1991 is when most of the damage was done by poor handling, poor storage and outright theft. Squabbling between governments, museums and private collectors made it very difficult to control or even keep track of the material.
Some of the damage done introduced things like solvents, metals and mold that continued causing deterioration even with adequate storage.
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
Dead Sea Scrolls
No, these predate the fixing of the canon by Jews. The Masoretic Text aka Hebrew Bible was compiled one thousand years later.
ADDED LATER: Compiled around 200 AD but the text was not "fixed" until 9-10th century AD. Hence scope for lots of errors and typos there.
Gender?
Gender, IMHO is probably one of the least important traits in nature. Though I can't list it now, there are animals which change gender, and actually, in homo sapiens actual male and female only represent the opposite ends of the scale. And one day we will know that most people are not straight up XX, or XY with no endocrinological irregularities, or androgen issues. Perhaps then we will see that pants or skirts are simply covering to suit a situation.
It's sad that a bunch of ancient telling stories around the camp fire eventually became religious dogma.
Gwen
Maybe
I asked a Catholic priest once if God was male or female and he answered unequivocally, "Both." I can make a good case that Adam was created intersex. Consider Genesis 1:27 "So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them." (Speaking of Adam only.) This was chronologically before Genesis 2 where spread over verses 21, 22 and 23, it says, "But for Adam no suitable helper was found. 21 So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs and then closed up the place with flesh. 22 Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man."
This would also make the case that God is also intersex, since in the first chapter it said that man was created in God's image, and then in the second chapter He, God, takes the female out of Adam and creates Eve with it.
Now this leads to my personal theology regarding transgender. As observed by Leopold Hartley Grindon in his essay, "Sexuality of Nature" 1868, "Every man has something feminine in him woman something masculine in her," it also appears that there is both masculine and feminine in God since he created Adam "male and female" and in His own image.
It's my personal belief that there remains in each of us remains the residue of what God separated when. It would seem that that residue is felt stronger in some of us than others.
Hugs
Patricia
Happiness is being all dressed up and HAVING some place to go.
Semper in femineo gerunt
Ich bin eine Mann
God is I Am
Why do we want to define God in our own limited human definitions and ability? It boggles the mind all the limitations we mortals place on God when He is All that is, All that was, All that will be. Some fear Him, some worship Him, some deny He exists, some blame Him for all their problems, some...,
If I may give some truisms as the least among you. God loves each and everyone of His creations. It doesn't mean He won't take to task those who wandered. We are allowed choice to do with our life whatever we want within certain restraints of money, society, etc. Blaming God if our life isn't what we wanted is a non starter. Maybe one doesn't believe in God so who do they blame for all their problems?
This next one is going to be rough for some to take. God didn't make religion. Being a good Protestant or Catholic isn't a ticket to Heaven. Man made religion to control the masses. God only gave us one rule. "Have Faith". With that one rule all the rest falls into place without any wiggle room for error or bad judgement.
Want to know what God looks like? Look in the mirror, look at your parents, your brother, sister, your neighbors..., Look at everything on this old earth. Look at the stars. I understand it is impossible for most to wrap their mind around God is all. We foolish humans want Him to be in our own image. Well, He-She is but not in the way most think.
A preacher asked me, "Can God make something so heavy He can't pick it up?"
I said, "Yes. But then He can pick it up." It isn't a contradiction but our human limits in thinking.
Believe, don't believe is a choice we all make. I couldn't stop believing if I tried. I was given a choice to stay or return. Everyone is having to put up with my decision. God is my best buddy, Lord, Master, Father, Mother.
Have FAITH!
always,
Barb
Oklahoma born and raised cowgirl
What does it mean?
What does it mean for God to be male or female? Especially if there's only one God? What would make God male or female? It would seem that calling God male (or female, or even both) would be like calling a particular stone male or female. "Transgender" has the same problem: What would that even mean?
-- Daphne Xu
Translation problems
I grew up in the British non-conformist tradition, and it was understood that God transcended gender.
The problem occurs when translating between languages. As Angharad has already stated Elohim represents both male and female, in the past when translating this to English with no suitable gender neutral (or should that be inclusive?) pronouns, male pronouns would have been used as, at the time, it would have been understood that they could also represent both genders.
In recent decades, beginning with the rise of feminist movements, there has been a need for the language to change to become more inclusive. When that happens and is widely accepted then the next generation of bible translations will be much richer.
Does Not Apply.
I think we are trying to apply labels that do not apply. I would say Both & Neither at the same time. This just a case of humans trying to put God into one of their little boxes. God likely has aspects of both, plus many other aspects we would never understand. However if it helps a person relate to God, then the label may of help for some.
Do I believe in God? Yes. I faith? Yes. I can not conceive of the possibility that, "All that is around us is just the meaningless collision of atoms and energy". There has to be more, but I do NOT Understand the more, though I do think we may glimpse parts of it.
My over all view on "Religion" is summed up by the poem "The Blind Men and the Elephant"*
Partial quote: "... Though each was partly in the right And all were in the wrong."
We must remember, we will all always be Blind Men in our attempts in this life to view God. I respect all religious views, except for the parts where they disrespect alternate views, and condemn or worse those who hold them.
God(whoever he or she etc. may be) Bless you all,
~Hypatia >i< ..:::
.
* note: I am aware of the historical background of this parable/story/poem/folk-tail, and that there are older variations. I am also aware that, several religions(it has been borrowed a lot) have included variations of this in their philosophy, and yet even those seem to sometimes ignore it's implications and lesson in the everyday real world. More links: [With some commentary], [WikipediA]
Meh
Religious beliefs are subject to politics as well as bullying as much as anything else.
Early religions were goddess based until male gods starting to get inroads due to, you guessed it, the idea of male domination being legitimized because men are so much stronger and better. Of course there is that whole awkward thing of males not being able to have babies (despite the myth of them implanting their 'seed' into a womens wombs so that a woman is merely the 'field' that gets plowed.) The latter of course why the Goddess was the first creatrix until all male-centric religions came in and hijacked that with their own creation myths.
I tend to take a pretty dim view of the whole Judeo-Christian mythos.
So, in a sense, the deity is transgender as we have made it that way.