If God invented man surely 'It' is not a man itself. You cannot invent yourself. Or invent something that already exists.
Doesn't the fact that 'God' is said to be male just reflect the attitudes of those that wrote the bible. Ie 'men have power and control'?
I don't mean to offend anyone I'm just curious. I will delete my question if it causes upset to too many people.
2007-08-01 04:20:35 · 23 answers · asked by Anonymous in Society & Culture ➔ Religion & Spirituality
Why would people say 'he' and the cartoons show him male if society didn't think of him as male.
People say God is female as a joke too.
2007-08-01 04:33:37 · update #1
I don't think what ever God is supposed to be exists either. I just wondered why it would have a gender.
2007-08-01 04:35:43 · update #2
God is a made up concept that reflects the views of those that made him up.
2007-08-01 04:25:18 · answer #1 · answered by discombobulated 5 · 3⤊ 0⤋
All our gods are more or less children of our brains.
The Abrahamic god was originally thought up to be male and female at the same time, alone by that being a god above all other gods, thus supplanting the male/female deities Baal and Astarte that used to be the chief gods. It was not a Jewish invention either, the Sumerians had Marduk who was supposed to have male/female attributes already. The deity was referred to in the plural form "elohim", rather than as a single male being.
But as women became second class humans the "female" qualities were denigrated as weaknesses, and the god became exclusively male. (That must have had a lot to do with the conquest of neighbouring tribes, where it was the "divine" decree that all males be killed and only the unmarried women kept as slaves and concubines. ) It was a process that played, as you might say, in heaven and on earth, both levels influencing and reinforcing one another. I'm absolutely certain that the god being male has an awful lot to do with only (some) men having the leisure to think and write about theology, while the women were too busy with the unimportant task to bring forth and care for the next generations. Besides, in such a society only very few women were educated and able to read and write, since that was a man thing. A woman offering her thoughts on the subject would just have been laughed at, at best.
Funnily enough, right in Genesis, and overlooked by most people, there are two versions of the creation of humans, the first one being the terse statement " And he created humans in his own image. As man and woman he created them."
It would be a mystery why a divine being should have the shape of a large hairless ape, unless you assume that the brains of that species were the origin of the deity in the first place.
2007-08-01 11:48:11 · answer #2 · answered by haggesitze 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋
I always assumed that the reference to God as male was a reflection of male dominance in society. If women were considered second class citizens at best, it wouldn't have gone well with a female deity.
2007-08-01 11:24:53 · answer #3 · answered by mist_dark 3 · 1⤊ 0⤋
The Creator is both Male and Female. The Goddess and the God. All things in balance.
2007-08-01 11:29:24 · answer #4 · answered by hedgewitch18 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Man wrote the bible and therefore very likely came up with the idea that god is man.
Why do you think that the catholic church was in an uproar about the movie Dogma? One of reasons why they were was god was portrayed as a female not male.
2007-08-01 11:25:27 · answer #5 · answered by independant_009 6 · 4⤊ 0⤋
The creator is nothing like the created. No one knows the attributes of God. It really does reflect the attitude of the time the message was supposedly interpreted.
2007-08-01 11:24:44 · answer #6 · answered by Loco 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Your question is a good one, and you shouldn't remove it if some people are upset by it.
This is one of many reasons that the Biblical depiction of God is clearly MAN made.
2007-08-01 11:30:17 · answer #7 · answered by Jim L 5 · 2⤊ 0⤋
Women are important to religion and race.
Men who are given any power in society fail to show graditude towards the sex who made his life possible.
When the few men do, most hate him and his wife/mate.
I do not get it.
So maybe the man upstairs is really the woman.
2007-08-01 11:28:32 · answer #8 · answered by Nurse Winchester 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋
according to jewish thought (and remember, our bible was around long before the christians') god is neither male or female. rather god is both male and female. god encompasses all genders and all human traits.
when we refer to god as a "he" in the bible and in our prayers, it is not because we are anthropomorphizing god into a male, but rather because we're describing and appealing to specifically what we consider "male" attributes of god.
these concepts are explored more deeply in kabbalah.
2007-08-01 11:35:11 · answer #9 · answered by mobius1ski 2 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Obviously because God is a 'Man Made' idea. Had a woman thought it up, no doubt it would have been a female.
2007-08-01 11:24:51 · answer #10 · answered by Anonymous · 4⤊ 0⤋