Do you think God is a "He" or "She"?

Great response! Thanks for your opinion. Most people personally refer to God as he or she. I wanted to know if they had ever thought about it. For example, even if I don't really believe that God has a gender, I refer to God as He. I think it is a force of habit, nothing more! Cheers and happy mylotting.

I notice you are new to Mylot. Warm welcome and wish you a happy time here.

Most people, I believe, think of the Deity (if they consider it as a single personage) as male. There is really no logical reason for this except that human society currently tends to think of males as being the 'providers' and 'activators' whereas females tend to be (traditionally) 'receptive' and 'pacifiers'. Society's current perception is notoriously behind the times, of course, and always has been. Religious thinking, however, especially in the writings of mystics and ascetics, has often been ahead of the time and has frequently questioned the conventional perception of God as 'male and human-like'. It is a common (and entirely natural) thing to envisage 'God' as in some way super-human and to distribute attributes between many 'gods' or 'saints'. I don't see any harm in this, provided that the individual concerned is humbly engaged on a real journey of the discovery of reality.

'He' or 'she' ... it doesn't matter (as you have intimated elsewhere, RazPenny). If your perception is more of a loving, caring, fecund female than of a procreative and organising male, it is not important. He/She/It/They encompasses all of that and more. What is vital is that we attempt to relate to this being, our Creator, in whatever way is most meaningful and conducive to love as possible.

Hi, I can't make out which version of creation this is? Is it the Jewish version?

Cheers

Genesis 1:27-28

The problem is the English translations translate Adam as man, which is not very accurate. Adam, when not used as the name, means humanity or humankind or just plain human. It all depends on the context of which it was used. Eesh is the word of man or male, which conversely does get used for husband and eeshah (woman or female) for wife in some cases. Adam, pronounced Ahdahm, is not used to mean male and refers to humans. Which is a good thing to note when looking through the creation account since until Chava is formed from his rib, he is referred to as ha-adam, ha is the prefix for 'the', and then as ha-eesh and her as ha-eeshah. It is likely that Adam might not have even been male before Chava is formed...which really makes you think about being created in Shaddai's image.

Thanks, RazPenny, this is really informative. So, Shaddai means "God" in Hebrew? I did not know that. Neither did I know all the things you had explained. We were definitely taught in Sunday school that Adam was 100 percent male and that Eve was originally his rib. This makes God 100 percent male, and not a Neuter with both feminine and masculine qualities. That makes the religion that preaches such a thing typically male centric, something that I don't like. Thanks again for all this information.:)

No, Elohiym is the word translated into G-d. Shaddai is the name by which he introduced himself to Avraham.

As far as what was taught in Sunday School, I grew up in a Catholic family so I feel your pain. Christian theology to me is one of the most sexist religions I think I have ever encountered. Hell, under Jewish law women had more rights than women did at the turn of the 20th century; and we are talking about a society which was dominated by Christian theology so go figure.

RazPenny, I think we appear to be disputing here about names and epithets that humans have chosen to use about something which many cultures have considered 'un-nameable' ('God' is just another such).

I am sure that you are just as aware as the creators of the Creation Myth that all mammals (including humans) are, by necessity and design, male and female. If you like, it concurs with the creation of humans 'in God's image' that we are male and female (like our animal ancestors) yet have an asexual part of us that we call 'soul' which appears to combine something of what we consider the 'higher' or 'better' attributes of what we see in both men and women. This quite common approach is like trying to determine what a potter is like from seeing his/her fingerprints on the clay and the shape that he/she gives to his/her pots.

Corr.: "What is simpler than that 'God' IS?"

I couldn't agree with you more!

I have always felt that animals are far more superior to human beings. They haven't made a mess of the world as we have. And I always felt that they knew more about God, instinctively, than we do. And that's why they are so peaceful and so good. Have you ever seen a cat meditating or sitting on the wall and observing nature? I somehow feel that this is how they communicate with the divine.

Cheers and thanks for your lovely response.

I am an agnostic, but sometimes, I feel I am no agnostic; deep within me I feel the presence of that surging energy, and I think I am a pagan at heart. I believe in the God within everything -- very difficult to explain it.:)

Cheers!!

I think I can very well relate to you my friend, I believe in some things that are hard to explain but I am not bounded by the teachings they gave us in Sunday schools.