A Monstrous Regiment of Women (Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes #2)

by Laurie R. King

Finding your way through the English Bible, you’re entirely under the tyranny of the translators.” “Oh, for subtle distinctions perhaps. . . .” “And blatant mistranslations, and deliberate obliteration of the original meaning.”

‘You have forgotten the Rock that begot you; you have forgotten the God who writhed in the effort of giving birth to you.’ The purpose of the verse is to remind the people of the intimacy of God’s parenthood, using both the male and the female forms.”

“That means that an entire vocabulary of imagery relating to the maternal side of God has been deliberately obscured.” I watched her try to sort it out, and then I put it into a phrase I would definitely not use in the presentation in Oxford: “God the Mother, hidden for centuries.”

“Is there more of this kind of thing?” “Considerably more.”

“You must show me this ‘God the Mother.’ Why don’t I know about this?” Before I could answer, she went on. “It makes all the difference. There is more, you said?” “It’s no fluke. Once you’re looking for it, it’s everywhere. Job thirty-eight, Psalm twenty-two, Isaiah sixty-six, Hosea eleven, Isaiah forty-two. And, of course, the Genesis passages you cited tonight.”

Man for the field and woman for the hearth: Man for the sword and for the needle she: Man with the head and woman with the heart: Man to command and woman to obey; All else confusion. —ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON

A woman’s guess is much more accurate than a man’s certainty. —RUDYARD KIPLING (1865–1936)

I, Fire, the Acceptor of sacrifices, ravishing away from them their darkness, give the light. —SAINT CATHERINE OF SIENA (c. 1347–1380)