Introducing Feminist Images of God

Introductions in Feminist Theology #7

by Mary Grey

Encouraging a range of inclusive, pluralist expressions in which women experience the Divine power, often in the figure of Sophia, the divine Wisdom. This book is an introduction to recent thinking on, and experience of the Divine, reflecting the work of women from diverse contexts. Early attemps to move beyond the restriction of God-language to 'Father' language and to open up the possibilities of a more inclusive way of praying have led to a richness and variety of experiences of God and the world of the sacred. God experienced in the struggle for justice is one such area. While similarities and connections are shown between, for example, Jewish, womanist, and Latin American women, their distinctiveness and diversity is respected. Women's experience of God does not flinch from ambiguity and tragedy; so long as the figure of Sophia, Wisdom, integrates new dimensions of experience the infinite depths of the Divine Mystery are still to be plumbed.

Genres: Theology, Religion

137 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2001

Reviews

[Elizabeth]

Twice in less than a week I was put in a position to recommend feminist [Christian] theology texts, but I had never actually read any feminist theology books (I just sort of absorbed by osmosis and jumped ahead to queer theology, [queer and non-] Jewish commentary, etc.), so I started to read the feminist theology books I had adopted from Jeff+Julie when they moved out of the country.

Published in 2001, this book feels a bit outdated (cough, gender essentialism) and also has a moment where I would have thrown the book across the room/quit reading except I was committed to finishing the book for the purposes of this project -- in the chapter on embodiment, the author is clearly uncomfortable with sexuality and hospitality as models for God because of the ways they have been used to exploit women, which are valid concerns, and it's unfair for me to ask people to be at the same stage of comfort/reclamation as I am, but in talking about eros, Grey says, "As holy it stands in direct opposition and rejection of distorted forces such as sadomasochism and pornography. They are to be opposed as wrong relation" (p. 80, emphasis in original). While I think Grey is wrong, I understand why she thinks this. However, on the next page she says, "Pornography in its truest sense is not eros (or even sex) but violence" (p. 81, emphasis in original). Maybe define your terms before making such claims?

Okay, backing out from my specific critiques to my broader concerns about the book...

The book feels surface (it talks at length about God as "our passion for justice" and yet barely talks about process theology... it talks about eros and never mentions Audre Lorde's "The Uses of the Erotic"...) and I'm just not that compelled.

I realized, in talking to Ari, both that I came into this book wanting feminINE images of God, and that I don't care about a lot of its arguments. Its purpose seems to be to present ways to conceive of God that aren't oppressive like the traditional patriarchal models have been, and (a) these aren't issues I personally feel a need to work through at this point in my life, (b) answers such as goddess or "our passion for justice" don't resonate for me.

The final chapter, on Sophia, seems to be positing that Sophia is the optimal feminist imagery of God -- but doesn't really explain what Sophia means. I felt a little like Sophia combines and improves upon all the things the author has already talked about and found lacking, though in actually returning to the text I don't think that's technically wholly true.

The Table of Contents of the book is:
1. Struggling to Move 'Beyond God the Father'
2. Encountering Gods as 'She'
3. Images of God in Jewish Feminism
4. God--Our Passion for Justice
5. The God who Liberates and who does not Liberate: The Challenge of Womanist Theology
6. An Embodied God
7. Tragedy in God
8. The Re-emergence of Sophia
Epilogue: The Journey is Home

In the Sophia chapter, Grey lays out 6 threads ("What I try now do to here is to sketch a kind of cartography for Sophia, Lady Wisdom, weaving in and out of the many inspirational strands in which she is sought and savoured, without ignoring the negative reactions and backlash she has evoked and the theological issues raised" -.p. 102-3):
1. the Wisdom literature of the Hebrew Bible
2. "the mythological strand and the role of Sophia in other ancient Near Eastern cultures. For Sophia is also a goddess figure appearing in the religions and cosmos of many lands." (p. 104)
3. "the way that Sophia as goddess functions as an empowering figure in women's spiritual journeys" (p. 106)
4. Sophia in Christian feminist liturgies
5. "Sophia is also present in the Russian Orthodox theological tradition" (p. 107)
6. "the steadily insistent way that feminist theology has been working on the integrating of scriptural Sophia themes within Christian doctrine and systematic theology" (p. 108)

[E. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Grey's book, published in 2001, gives a good, quick survey of feminist images of God from the late-seventies and the publication of Mary Daly's Beyond God the Father. Little time is spent on the initial round of feminist theological work and the deconstruction of patriarchal images or debates over gender-inclusive language. Her main focus is the creative and imaginative approaches taken by a variety of feminist theologians.

Her work is nicely inclusive of Jewish, African, Womanist, Latina, Asian, and other theologians, as part of the creative work of this period was breaking out of the limits of white, upper-class Euro-American feminism.

Some of my favourites, such as Sallie McFague and Wendy Farley, come in for nice treatment. Grey argues that McFague's Body of God (which I read in the early 90's, altering my theological thinking) is one of the important sources for this period, going beyond her earlier book Models of God, which Grey simply assumes as part of the methodologies of this period but doesn't discuss in detail.

Read on my blog how my reading of this book corresponded with one of our Advent worship services exploring ancient names of Jesus: http://escottjones.typepad.com/myques...

I appreciated learning more about Carter Heyward, Carol Christ, and others. I really enjoyed some of the wonderful quotes, many of which will find their way into sermons, prayers, and other ministerial functions.

Toward the end, even after her presentations on goddess spirituality and the imagery of Sophia, she argues for a reclaiming of a non-patriarchal father image as important for men to have good images of the divine, and also proclaims:

". . . in a strange way, without seeking for it, one could be astounded by the way the Trinity turns out to be at the heart of feminist theological thinking."

Grey concludes that "in the end, God will be God, and the world will find its true homecoming into God."

If you want a nice, quick survey of late-20th century feminist thought or a book that excites your own imagination about the depth and breadth of the divine, then I highly recommend this book.