It Is Not Just Someone Who Is A Rude Bore. This Sort Of Character Understands Norms And Manners Very

Some guy: “I love falin and marcille, but what about falin and sh…”

Me: EXECUTION

Very cool.

Feminine language for God in Christian history: a brief timeline

People have been employing words and images for the Divine that move beyond the masculine from the very start. I thought I’d compile some examples chronologically. 

Links in any of the points lead fuller explanations or excerpts. Feel free to add on to this timeline!

First Century: 

Paul himself, right there in the canonical Bible, implies that God is pregnant with all that exists! And he’s not pulling that image out of nowhere, but from his own Jewish scriptures.

100s:

“In his ineffable essence he is father; in his compassion to us he became mother. The father by loving becomes feminine.” - St. Clement of Alexandria .

There’s a long complicated history around Sophia being identified sometimes as the Spirit and sometimes as Jesus in Christian history, about which @fierysword has many posts, but Theophilus of Antioch is one of the early figures to describe the Trinity as being God, the Word (logos), and Wisdom (sophia), so that the Holy Spirit is described in feminine language because sophia is feminine. Meanwhile, see here for information about Jesus being identified with Woman WIsdom.

200s/300s:

“Come, secret Mother; Come, You who (fem.) are manifest in your deeds; You who (fem.) give joy and rest to those who are united to You (fem.)” - The Acts of Thomas .

”She is the kind and heavenly mother…” - Symeon of Mesopotamia (speaking of the Holy Spirit) .

St. Barbara envisions both God and those who follow God as Saints as being beyond the human gender binary

300s-400s:

the earliest Syriac Christians frequently employed feminine language to all three members of the Trinity, including Mother language for God and sometimes using She pronouns for the Holy Spirit .

“He who has promised us heavenly food has nourished us on milk, having recourse to a mother’s tenderness. For just as a mother, suckling her infant, transfers from her flesh the very same food which otherwise would be unsuited to a babe…so our Lord, in order to convert His wisdom into milk for our benefit came to us clothed in flesh.” - St. Augustine of Hippo 

1000s-1100s:

“And you, Jesus, are you not also a mother? Are you not the mother who, like a hen, gathers her chickens under her wings? …. And you, my soul, dead in yourself, run under the wings of Jesus your mother and lament your griefs under feathers. Ask that your wounds may be healed and that, comforted, you may live again.” - St. Anselm of Canterbury  .

“In Hildegard’s day there were other traditionally feminine theological ideas: for instance, the Cistercians feminized the language for God by replacing ‘God’ with ‘God is love’, and, because love (caritas) was a feminine noun, God could be denoted as ‘she’.” - Andrea Janelle Dickens For more on Hildegard’s feminine conception of God as Caritas, see here. .

“Our good mother Charity loves us all and shows herself differently to each one of us, cherishing the weak, scolding the restive, exhorting the advanced. But when she scolds she is meek, when she consoles she is sincere…” - Burgundian Abbot Bernard of Clairvaux

1200s:

“What does God do all day long? God gives birth. From the beginning of eternity, God lies on a maternity bed giving birth to all.”  - Meister Eckhart, German theologian (c. 1260 – c. 1328) .

St. Francis of Assisi envisioned the Trinity as a group of three women (who give him a feminine title!): “Three poor women appeared by the road as Saint Francis was passing. They were so similar in stature, age, and face that you would think they were a three-part piece of matter, modeled by one form. As Saint Francis approached, they reverently bowed their heads, and hailed him with a new greeting, saying: ‘Welcome, Lady Poverty!’” .

Poet and mystic Hadewijch wrote in Middle Dutch about God as Minne, or Lady Love (and it gets pretty gay; see this excerpt) .

“Even if you gave me everything that you possess in Heaven and on earth, I would not consider myself satiated until I had you, because you are the life of my soul, I do not have a father and mother outside of you.” - Marguerite d'Oingt

1300s:

“As we know, our own mother bore us only into pain and dying. But our true mother Jesus, who is all love, bears us into joy and endless living.” - Julian of Norwich  .

In various places in medieval Europe starting around 1320, Jesus’s side wound was frequently depicted as a vulva. Scholars have suggested various reasons for this depiction, including: making Christ androgynous as androgyny was seen as more holy than belonging to an earthly (binary) gender; and helping women see themselves in their Lord (birthing girdles were even made bearing Christ’s wounds so that one could imagine their labor pains in parallel to Jesus’s pain on the cross) - See my #androgynous Christ tag for more info + scholarly sources

1400s-1500s

Madre Juana de la Cruz in Spain imagines the Trinity as working together to weave divinity and humanity into one being (Jesus), just as a seamstress sews a shirt. She also envisions God the Father as having a womb, and, speaking in the voice of Jesus, said: “And all those who seek in me a father, will find in me a father. And those who seek in me a mother, will find in me a mother. And those who seek in me a husband, will find in me a husband. And those who seek in me a bride, will find in me a bride. And those who seek in me a brother, or a friend, or a neighbor, or a companion, likewise will find in me everything they desire…” .

A convent in Belgium commissioned a painting of Jesus in which he has breasts  .

God cares for us with an everlasting maternal heart and feeling.” - Martin Luther, who also pictured scripture as God’s womb.

1800s:

1800s: “My Father, my Mother, it is in You that I sleep, it is in You that I breathe. Awaken!” - Saint Mariam Baouardy (1846 – 1878)

I recommend Lynn Japinga’s article “Language about God” for information on how and why to expand what gendered language one uses for the Divine. I share excerpts from the article in this post, as well as a link to the full thing.

I'm honestly just fascinated with having an elf-like lifespan. But I think even a 100 year life extension would be good for the human race. I feel like people make so many rash decisions because 70-80 years is a short time.

It seems like people only become wise when they are 60+, by which time you have only 10-20 years left. Imagine if you were wise and still had most of your life ahead of you.

Thoughts on Life Extension

I think the human race needs an additional 100 years of (healthy) lifespan. I honestly think it'd solve some of our problems and probably make us chill out in general.

The pressure to have children by 20 to 30 in most places would no longer exist. That is something you don't have to worry about until you're 50 or 60, by the time you are more wise to the ways of the world and you can avoid being trapped in a terrible relationship for the sake of the children.

The young would be much more reluctant to take part in wars, as there is far more life ahead of them. Artists and writers would have more time to create closer to their true potential. There'd be less reason to have a midlife crisis and the mad drive to accumulate enough savings for retirement would not be as pressing.

The memory of historical failures would stay around for far longer. Those who lived through the horrors of industrialisation, slavery and totalitarian movements would not let the young make the same mistakes. People would be harder to fool. Imagine if a politician tried to slag off unions in front of voters who were child labourers in 1900. Politicians will take long-term threats more seriously, because there's a good chance they'll be seeing the consequences.

At the same time, accidental death would be more frightening. We'd probably be a more cautious species - the effects of this would flow into many areas. Technological progress would slow from a furious boil to a reasonable simmer as society would have more time to think about the New Things critically and test them with greater rigour. Think of how many lives have been lost over the decades because we were blazé about Asbestos.

At the same time, there might be greater hierachy related to age. The young might have less of a say in society, as they are encouraged to gain more knowledge and experience first. Those who are close to the end of their lifespan might be treated worse, because this is a more distant prospect to most people. Though it might not necessarily turn out that way; since people live longer they are more likely to become disabled by accidents, so society puts more resources toward ensuring the disabled and eldrely can live full lives.

Yeah, I love going places with my flash suit and pants which cost me a grand total of twenty five dollars. I quite often get compliments. I once walked into a gallery and someone asked if I owned the place. How easily people are fooled.

OP: when your fashion doesn't match your life (cr 千千Sherry)

pig,,

God, I hate this. Though this also applies to the way the books themselves are advertised, which are festooned with quotes from reviewers which tell me nothing, which all read like

"A stunning menagerie of life, this book is thumpingly alive."

What happened to the teaser on the back cover?

I was gifted a book in which the cover, the first two pages and the back cover was just uninformative praise from prominent critics. Like, great, now I know the cultural gatekeepers of the Wank Street Journal love it. What an endorsement.

I have noticed also that authors from South Asia, Africa, Latin America tend to have the words "kaleidoscopic" and "magical realism: applied to their work, as well as "emerging voice". I mean, wow, they sure do have a different culture.

y’all really recommend books like: title, there are gay characters, enemies to lovers, young adult, written by poc

not once do i ever see a summary

Like that smelly, ungracious, clumsy gremlin who keeps crashing the "networking events", and doesn't play ball, but somehow keeps getting invited, even though they drive the guests away and discuss inappropriate topics.

I am a strong advocate of bringing back that guy who messes people's lives up just a little bit, especially if they have their priorities in the wrong order.

Yep. All of them.

All my mutuals are hot. Reblog to tell your mutuals they are hot.

nothing hurts as much as the day i found out this character was a man and not a beautiful lesbian

Huh.