MFRANCL@CC.BRYNMAWR.EDU (02/13/90)
Despite my impish crack about peacemakers being "children of God" as
opposed to "sons", I don't really believe in messing with scripture to
make it inclusive - you shouldn't alter the scripture, you risk
clouding revelation that way. However...some questions for any and all...
How do you feel about inclusive language in prayer? I.e. do invocations
addressed to "brothers" and prayers that we all become "sons of the living
God" bother you. Does your tradition make use of inclusive language?
What about using a neuter gender for God? or at least for the Spirit?
MichelleXVDHMAK@VCUVM1 (Michael Kline) (02/14/90)
*** Reply to note of 02/13/90 02:20
I would need more on the "inclusive language". As far as scripture goes, many
of the "sons, and men" speak of mankind, generally addressed as masculine.
On the gender of God, I once said that since God chose to represent Himself to
us as male(same goes for the Trinity), then that is how I address Him. The
scriptures tell us that there is no sex or marriage in Heaven, so we assume
that God has no sex, but like I said, He has shown Himself to us as male.
I'm not sure if the Spirit has been shown as male or not, but I think "it"
would be wrong because the Spirit is indeed a person. There are scriptures
that tell us "The Spirit told me..." and on Annias, "You have not liked to the
Spirit but to God."
All comments welcome.
In His Love,
Michael A. Kline, Sr. SSE
VDH, Technical Support
(804)786-1559
XVDHMAK at VCUVM1
Richmond, VirginiaJIM@AUVM (Jim McIntosh) (02/14/90)
In article <DC8D02D2ECDF00496B@cc.brynmawr.edu>, MFRANCL@CC.BRYNMAWR.EDU says: > >Despite my impish crack about peacemakers being "children of God" as >opposed to "sons", I don't really believe in messing with scripture to >make it inclusive - you shouldn't alter the scripture, you risk >clouding revelation that way. However...some questions for any and all... There's "messing" with the scriptures (ie, the original texts), and there's "messing" with translations. Many translations were written at a time when there was less concern with exclusive language -- at a time when "men" was an acceptable term for "people". In some cases the original texts contain clearly exclusive terms. Since these texts are historical documents, the terms should be retained when the texts are translated into modern languages. In other cases the terms are ambiguious, or mean a group which includes both sexes. In these case inclusive terms should be used, since these terms are becoming the norm in our culture. >How do you feel about inclusive language in prayer? I.e. do invocations >addressed to "brothers" and prayers that we all become "sons of the living >God" bother you. Does your tradition make use of inclusive language? It didn't used to bother me -- but then I am male. I slowly became aware that a number of women in my church were bothered by exclusive language, and that this "irritant" was coming between them and God. This included only using male terms for groups which included both sexes, and only using male terms for God when God clearly has to include elements of both male and female. When only male terms are used for groups which include both sexes, women can feel excluded. When we say "Christ came for all men" it can subtly cause women to feel that they are not included in Christ's saving mission. When we say "peace on earth to men of goodwill" if could be misunderstood that we are saying that women are not included in this message of peace. Since God created both male and female in God's image, both these images must exist in God. When we only refer to God in male terms, we are implying that male is better. This can cause women to doubt the equal validity of their sex. >What about using a neuter gender for God? or at least for the Spirit? Now, this is the difficult question. The German theologian Dororthy Zolle, in reaction to the constant refering to God with male pronouns, only refers to God with female pronouns. To my mind this is no solution. Just as refering to God only as "He" is wrong, so is always refering to God as "She". Both for the reasons stated above (God does have elements of "male") but also because this can startle someone, perhaps interupting their prayer or thoughts. My personal response is to omit all sexual pronouns. If you examine any of my postings to CHRISTIA, you'll notice that I've never refered to God as "He". This is not an ideal solution, though, because it can lead to some strange sentenances like "God so loved the world that God sent God's only Son." Clearly, this could be said better, but I'm still struggling with how. When I was less sensitive to the the needs of some of the women in my community, these questions didn't bother me. Now that I have come to understand the problems that exclusive langauage can create -- how it can come between someone and God -- I have tried to address the problem. The solutions we have so far are unacceptable, I think, but then so is maintaining the status quo. In time, I am confident we will arrive at some acceptable conclusion. ------- Jim McIntosh (JIM@AUVM) The American University Washington DC 20016 USA