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Well, you could say that in a sense they were intended to be generic—but by men who believed the "generic" or normative human, or human essence, was necessarily masculine, and who subsequently built this belief into their systems. This was surely the case with Aristotle and the early church fathers, and even though most of us no longer hold this explicitly—i.e. we now "know better"—the underlying presuppositions have persisted unchallenged.

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Le Femme Fetale
I’m sure I’ll wind up shooting my masculine self in the foot more than once each time I respond, but what the heck! I’ve never ventured into Aristotle’s idea of human essence and am surprised to know he was such a jerk. There. But I’m wondering about the “human essence” of which you speak. I’d like to know exactly what this is, and whether or not it objectively exists apart from our being either female or male (See? I put “female” first!). Does my question make sense? What I’m wondering is, is there such a thing as a “genderless human essence”? Or is gender part of what we are down to the core, part of what we “essentially” are? Is it even legitimate to suppose that there is a way to “be human” that is not either male or female? I don’t think so. I guess this might mean we’re “different” at our core. Happy thought indeed! This, I suspect, all feminists are loath to admit.

Note, I am NOT saying one is better, worth more, or more genuinely “human” than the other. On the contrary, I’ve NEVER thought the image of God was reflected primarily in men. I’ve always thought man and woman TOGETHER reflected the image of God. And I agree that the Church has done a stinking rotten job of understanding and articulating this (and for the reasons you explain). But at the same time I’m wondering if your search for an objectively “genderless” human essence that defines who we REALLY are (as if “male” is not who and what I REALLY am and “female” is not who and what you REALLY are) is misguided. I’m inclined to believe that there simply is no such human essence that is ME that is not also “male” or that is YOU that is not also “female.” This is not to deny that men historically saw their being “males” as a more genuine expression of what it means to “be human.” This is wrong. But I don’t think the answer lies in positing an objective “genderless human essence” that fundamentally defines who we are, in which our gender is viewed as essentially a temporary manifestation or “shell” in which our “genderless essence” resides. I AM all for asking, How do we address the inequality that historically has marred the male/female relationship? And how do we relate in ways that more accurately reflect our biblical interdependence as men and women equal before God? These are very important questions to me.

Pia, please tell me if I’m on the mark here in framing the two immediately preceding questions. I want to ask the right questions FIRST. If my questions are right so far, then the remaining issue is simple: Certainly language is ONE way (the most important way!) men and women relate to one another and it ought to reflect the biblical view of man and woman. I am WAY in agreement with you here. You have challenged me to ask myself whether my language reflects the biblical view that men and woman TOGETHER bear the image of God. Ouch! What I’m NOT convinced of yet is that this biblical truth is necessarily incapable of being expressed in language which uses “he/him” generically provided people don’t assume, or want to assume for political reasons, that it has to mean anything more than that. And the one significant piece of evidence of this may be the Bible itself. Modes thinks generic language in the Bible was a wrong and a bad thing (or so I understood), or at best was a concession on God’s part to our warped views. I’m not so sure. Perhaps this is where we may differ. Seems to me you want to insist that the generic “he” must today mean for all those who use it what Aristotle meant by it and that those who use it do so for the same philosophical reasons Aristotle did. If this is the case, then I don’t see how you can avoid including the biblical authors in this and accuse them of having a fundamentally unbiblical view of men and women.

Secondly, I don’t know how you can objectively demonstrate that even though most of us no longer believe the male gender is more genuinely human than the female, this underlying presupposition still persists in those who explicitly believe otherwise. For me, the generic “he/him” was always ONLY a linguistic issue. It’s never gone any deeper than that, and I’ve resented the feminist claim that by using such language I must necessarily be a latent chauvinist and have copies of Aristotle’s works hidden under my Barbeque or a bust of Aristotle hidden in my office. (If you haven’t noticed yet, this is typical male exaggeration to make a point, or so my wife tells me! )

Why “he/him” was chosen to represent the generic, I never knew or cared. Big deal I thought. I think this is the case for a lot, maybe most, of men AND women. And it’s hardly fair to ask every speaker of English to know the precise history of the philosophical forces at work in shaping the language, or worse yet to attribute to every modern speaker of generic English those same philosophical presuppositions. Hence, my hunch that folks who make their career in academia sometime live in a totally different world than your average mom or dad. (That’s gonna get me in troooouble!) Not that academians [sp?] are not normal moms and dads, just that in certain respects they’re MORE than average moms and dads. (This is another post, so let me get off it!) Anyhow, part of my beef with feminists is that they tend to project their feelings onto women generally and insist that women who have never been offended by generic English become offended by it. Should they be offended by Aristotle (once they find out about him) and by chauvinistic attitudes? Absolutely. Thanks to you I DO know care about the historical inequality now and am exploring it. But MUST our offense at such wrong attitudes be reflected in a language change across the board? In some cases, yes; but universally? I’m not so sure.

I still feel a little lost on this whole issue, Pia. I’m trying to find out just what it is theological feminists are saying and what it is they want.

My personal history
Thanks for sharing your own personal experience about how you viewed God growing up. It was, like you said, perfectly manipulative! Just kidding. I see your point perfectly, Pia. And if THIS is what theological feminism is addressing, then I’m a feminist too. But once they start destroying biblical metaphors, tossing out this and that, or attributing to the authors of Scripture unbridled chauvinism, my response tends to be, “Get a life.” I’ve spent time behind the pulpit right here in the Middle East confronting men in the pews about their views of women. And this has landed me in hot (though not boiling) water at times, so I’m not insensitive to it.

Here’s a bit of my own history. (Mephi, listen up.) I’m of the class of ’78 and from the South. When I started high school, integration was the hot issue. I lived in a white neighbourhood and was bussed out of town to attend a predominantly black high school. But as a 14 year old, the whole issue about race and integration went over my head. I never got it. I just enjoyed school, led kids to Christ, got involved in extracurricular clubs and whatnot, and naturally made close friendships with black, white, and Hispanic students. It didn’t matter to me. In a lot of ways integration turned out to be a good experience for me.

Aaaaannyhow…because of this, it always bothers me to hear white folks tell of having “met someone” in a store or mall. If they met another white person, they’ll say, “Oh, hey, I met this guy in Sears. We got to talking and….” But if they met a black person they’ll say, “I met this black guy in Sears. We got to talking and….” That reeeeally bothers me. So what if the person you met was black. What’s that got to do with it? It’s like meeting a white guy is “normative” experience and meeting a black guy is strange and needs to be reported on. Color then becomes important to the story when it SHOULDN’T BE. White folks never say, “I met this white girl at the register at Sears, she said….” See?

Pia, is this similar to what you’re saying about gender? If it is, then I have something I can connect to. Let me know. But, and this is important, my father-in-law, for example, a deeply godly man who’s more like Christ than anybody I’ve ever known, speaks like this constantly about people he meets. But he’s NOT a racist. What’s to account for it? “Linguistic barnacles” I call such ways of speaking. Things we pick up from our language and environment unintentionally. Because of MY experience I don’t speak that way and I don’t like to hear it, but I don’t get all over people who DO speak this way unless it’s an obvious manifestation of racism. I think language ought to be interpreted in the context of our RELATIONSHIP with the one who’s speaking and NOT the other way around. If you don’t know the person speaking (or writing), then the Christian thing to do is always assume the best about the person. I think this may be a weakness in feminism. Seems to me feminists tend to assume the worst about a person using generic language. I’d be happy to be wrong on this point, but it doesn’t change what I think is the case regarding relationship.

I have more to say but will let it rest for now.

Western White Male Smart-bottom signing off

PS Mephi? Do you see where I’m coming from?

PSS If there are those of you offended by my use of “white” and “black,” I’m sorry. I know whites and blacks and as far as I can tell both groups use “white” and “black” respectively to describe themselves.

Edited by - TGB on 08/16/2001 10:34:01 AM

Edited by - TGB on 08/16/2001 11:01:23 AM

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All brief portions from Evdokimov (pp.177-184) , a Russian emegre' to France during Soviet "liberation":

...the theology of the last decades (repeating comments heard after Vatican II) has lost the sense of mystery, it is built upon speculation about God, and has thereby ceased to be a dynamic thinking in God.

...In scholastic theology one sees the fossilization of divinity and eternity dangling over the future as a secure nook, beyond time. (remind any one of EDF?) . . . The graciousness, the freedom of salvation, this marvelous mystery of God's love that the Reformation saw so clearly in the Bible (this is an Orthodox theologian talking, mind you!) and in the Fathers, once posed in terms of causality (OV/EDF debate?) and then conceptualization, became the terrible doctrine of double predestination. If in our time one tried to correct this, speaking of the salvation of all and showing that only one is culpable, namely God himself, then one would see how this doctrine cannot in any way serve humanity.

...Such regressive religion forgets the Trinity, God's sacrificial fatherhood which does not dominate by gives birth to freedom.

...replaced in history by the hierarchical institutions of the Church...

...The reality and relevance of the Christian message can only be revealed through the Church's engagement as an ESCHATOLOGICAL (my caps) partner revealing through the Church's engagement as an eschatological partner in the world and within the experience of humanity today. Historical life is never a means for the age of the future. If the world is finalized by the Kingdom, it is because the Kingdom is already "among men."

...The deus ex machina, a compensation to human weakness, and inadequacy, is therefore quite dead. But he is very much present as the creative source when we are the masters of ourselves. God clings to us when we are string and forceful, and this is why the Gospel should be present in all the decisions and risks of the human condition.

...The Church need not take charge of the many specific tasks of the human city, but a Christian consciousness is called to be fully at work even in the most technological situations. Politics, economics, development, there are spheres common to both believers and nonbelievers alike. The immense task of bringing the world to completion in the qualitative "catholicity" of all is planted in culture by the light which enlightens the hearts of men and which illuminates the whole world." A survey recently in Russia (in the 1960s) quotes a young believer: "Christianity is everywhere. It is the very heart of existence, in the holiness of motherhood, in the events of everyday life, in the fondness of love and friendship."

...The Church of the last times will offer to the one who is hungry not the "ideological stones" of systems, neither the "theological stones" of catechism but the bread of angels," and "the heart of the human brother offered as pure food," in Origins beautiful words.

...Classical positive theology is not devalued but placed within its own limits. It cannot apply anything other than revealed attributes, manifestations of God in the world. This theology translates them into an intelligible mode of expression but they remain cipher, symbols, for the reality of God is absolutely original, transcendent, and irreducible to any system of thought. Around the deep abyss of God, the flaming sword of the cherubim drew an impenetrable circle of silence.

(pp. 213)

...Christ sends his Church into history to make it, at different moments, the place of his presence, so that all can live the "today" of God in the today of humanity. God is not further removed from our time than from any other age. His presence is even more particularly sensible in every encounter between people, for this is how we are human and joined again to the Church.

...The presence of Christ is universal. However the Church is the Body of Christ and Christ calls her to transform the symbolic forms into the explosive reality of the Gospel, to before all this shining doxology borne by the liberating dynamism of the Holy Spirit of which the Book of Revelation speaks and which none will be able to ignore.

...In its essence, culture is the search for the one thing necessary (Mary and Martha) which leads us beyond the immanent boundaries in which we find ourselves. By means of this world, culture lifts up the sign of the Kingdom, a shining spire pointed toward the one who is to come. With the Bride and the Spirit, culture says "Come, Lord!" As St. John the Baptist, her star fades into the brilliant light of the Parousia's noontime. As each human being, created in the image of God is a living icon, so earthly culture is the icon of the Kingdom of heaven. At the moment of the great passage, the Holy Spirit, the "finger of God," will touch this icon and something in it will remain forever.

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The Didascolion, or Teaching of the Twelve Apostles, ontologically links the feminine to the mystery of the Holy Spirit. "The deacon has the place of Christ and you must love him. You should honor the deaconesses as having the place of the Holy Spirit." This is why in the symbolism of the liturgical assembly the woman is called the "altar" and represents prayer. The image of the soul in adoration, woman is the human being who has become prayer. In the well-known fresco of the basilica of St. Callistus, man extends his hand over the bread of offering and it is the one who offers sacrifice, the bishop who does this, who presides at the Liturgy. Behind him we see the praying one, the woman in prayer, a pure and total self-offering. In her charism of protection she raises all of life, the world, all people up to God. She does this in the sign of the Spirit who "broods over" or covers all creation as the Hebrew word in the creation narrative of the book of Genesis suggests, the sign of the Paraclete, the Advocate and Councilor." (Evdokimof, p.237, In the World, Of the Church)

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Girl power
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Women greatly outnumbered men among early converts. However, in the empire as a whole, men vastly outnumbered women. There were an estimated 131 men for every 100 women in Rome. The disparity was even greater elsewhere and greater still among the elite.

Widespread female infanticide had reduced the number of women in society. "If you are delivered of a child," wrote a man named Hilarion to his pregnant wife, "if it is a boy, keep it, if it is a girl discard it." Frequent abortions "entailing great risk" (in the words of Celsus) killed many women and left even more barren.

The Christian community, however, practiced neither abortion nor infanticide and thus drew to itself women.

More importantly, within the Christian community women enjoyed higher status and security than they did among their pagan neighbors. Pagan women typically were married at a young age (often before puberty) to much older men. But Christian women were older when they married and had more choice in whom, and even if, they would marry.

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hmmmm...

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Pia -- Are you going to get it?

PotOnWheel

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