Godde - God's Gender & Our Language

Does God have a gender?


Gender is a thing of this world — identified by natural distinctions of sex and associated with various mental & emotional attributes.


Surely, God's character encompasses all of the attributes we see in humans since we are 'made in the image of God'. God doesn't have a physical body with which we can associate these attributes.


God transcends gender.


In our society we're accustomed to referring to God in masculine terms and envisaging God with a male physical body. It sounds so foreign to say "Mother God, Praise Her. She is good to Her children." Hearing God spoken of with feminine terminology brings to mind ignorant stereotypes of new-age-earth-loving-spirituality. 

I think its a problem that it sounds weird or 'wrong' to speak of God with feminine words, especially when we claim to know that God transcends gender.

I've heard many Christians defend their use of masculine language because Jesus was a male. They argue that Jesus is how God has presented 'himself' to the world and therefore that is how God would want us to think/speak about 'him.'

Photo Credit: http://www.god.com.bz/articles.html

When becoming incarnate God doesn't seem to have much choice. It was 50/50 whether 'he' was going to show up as male or female. Some people say God chose to be male when 'he' came as Jesus because in that culture only males had the respect/power/ability to do what God wanted to do while visiting us. Not a bad argument if you ask me.


The fact that God came to earth in the form of a man says less about God and more about the culture he came into.


Why does it matter what language (masculine/feminine) we use when we speak of God?

“Turning the historical particularity of Jesus’ maleness into an ontological and Christological principle, the church not only emphasized the conceptualization of God as male but also denied that women were fully human, the image of the divine, and thus representative of the Christ.”[2]

There is a strong relationship between the words we speak and images/beliefs we hold in our minds. Every Christian I've spoken with says that although they speak about God using masculine terms, they know in their head that God doesn't actually have a gender. Even if you know something that does not necessarily make it a reality for you. You can know/believe that God exists but that doesn't guarantee that you'll know God's and feel God's presence in your life. Even though we know God transcends gender, its pretty difficult to not imagine God up in heaven as a guy.

Photo Credit: http://mattstone.blogs.com/photos/female_crucifixion_art/female-jesus-image.html

However, I think the bigger problem is not that we refer to God as a male but that we completely fail to refer to God as a female! It is a reflection of a patriarchal society that silences women. I think that language ought to evolve in order to keep up to date with the evolving ideas of an ever changing society.

“When that manhood is deconstructed, and replaced by crucified womanhood, this radical paradigm shift reveals, at the very least, how embedded male imagery is within traditional Christianity, and how far it needs to go to be comfortable with a truly inclusive symbol of redemption.”[1]

I experimented with thinking of God as a woman, as a mother, as a girl-friend. I was surprised to find that I actually felt differently towards God as a result of this. When thinking about God as father I felt a sense of God's power over us tiny creatures, but when thinking about God as mother I felt more supported as if God was by my side with an arm around me rather than above me hollering down helpful advice. When praying to God as male everything felt pretty standard but when praying to God as female I felt a new sense of openness and again a support that I feel with my girl-friends. Surely, God's 'femininity' should be encouraged if it helps believers drawer closer to 'him.'


Now, this is all very nice but why does it matter, especially for men who would rather be buddies with a male God than hang around with a God who is going to mommy them?


3 Reasons why I think we should make an effort to speak of God in both male & female language and evoke both male and female images when thinking of God:


1) We'll be understanding & representing God more accurately
2) Backs up the modern understanding of gender-equality, putting it into action
3) Helps us tap into different 'sides' of God and our relationship with 'him' that are useful at different times


In some cultures there are multiple gods that do have genders and because of this there are two separate words used to refer to them. The male gods are called 'gods' and the female gods are called 'goddesses'. Neither of these terms accurately represents the god of the Christians. But since the term 'it' would hardly be appropriate for God why not compromise by conjoining the two gendered terms?

Photo Credit: neglizt

The word 'Godde' is half way in between 'god' and 'goddess.' God may not be half-male half-female but it is certainly getting closer to the idea that God encompasses the qualities of both and neither should be favoured.


I've heard the argument that we should not change the spelling of 'God' because that is how it is spelled in the Bible. In response to that, 'God' is an English word. We have already changed the 'spelling' of the word in question by translating it into many different languages. Nothing sacred is being compromised by changing the English spelling. If we were petitioning to change the Hebrew spelling, that would be a different matter.


And what about all of the pronouns? That's a bit trickier. I think its good to alternate between male and female pronouns. Sometimes one gender feels more appropriate than the other at a certain time. Another option is to write both, for example... 's/he.'


Your thoughts? 

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[1]Sawyer, Debora F. The Blackwell companion to the Bible and culture. Edited by Sawyer, John F.A. Wiley-Blackwell, 2006. Pg. 473. Google Books. 

[2] Kramarae, Cheris and Spender Dale. ‘Christianity: Feminist Chriostology.’ Routledge international encyclopedia of women: global women's issues and knowledge. Volume 1. PublisherRoutledge, 2000. Pg. 172 Google Books.