Why Must God and His Prophet Be Male?

This is one thing I've never understood about the holy books. Why is it that the Almighty just happens to be male? Same with his prophets? Jesus and Mohammad and all the major figures in the holy books. Versus female or even non-gendered in the case of God himself?

The skeptical part of me says its just the result of the male-dominated society of the time who invented them. But maybe there's more going on than meet's the eye?

I'd appreciate people's opinions on this matter.

Thank you.

The gender assumptions about The Messiah and The Prophet were based on the fact that, by virtually all accounts, they were male in their earthly incarnations.

At least as I understand it.

Mind you, we don't even know for sure if the latter two DID exist.

We do not know if god exists

And who is the Prophet you speak of??

For what it's worth to you, by The Prophet, I meant Muhammad. My assumption is that that is who the OP was referring to by using the term(which is usually only capitalized and singular when referring to Muhammad, at least in my awareness).

You and I aren't actually having a disagreement here, just so you know.

I thought that is what you meant, I was just making sure.

I believe that Muhammad did have at least one wife and the one I am thinking of was a property holder. So in that regard Islam is more progressive than the christian churches.

What I find funny is that the christian right is always complaining on how everyone is attacking the traditional family. Whereas the god that they believe in does not have any females in any part of their family. Yes, Mary did give birth, but she was not part god's family. She was part of man's family. So does the right only believe in families made up of men??

the third part of the trinity was sometimes thought of as female... "Sophia" - wisdom - the Holy Spirit... And in the Roman C. tradition, the position of Mary is quite important and highlighted. Of course, it's often her submissiveness that's celebrated.

But yes, the absence of a strong female figure is off-putting - but just a reflection of the men who dominated the religion(s). They saw it, and formed the faiths, from their own very biased perspectives. Women weren't important.

And God "He vould have an enormous Shwanstooker!"

but them apparently the high testosterone crowd got the upper hand and our goddesses were regulated to history and they became male. And then males became superior to women and then men became the only people who could own property including their women. Women went from being revered for the fact that they could bear children to being brood mares for the next generation. And they wonder why women are feminists.

who had "equal time" in Greek and Roman mythologies. You took Hera (Power), Athena (Wisdom), Aphrodite (Love), and Demeter (Crops) VERY seriously.

Eisler presents a pretty compelling narrative of this process of replacing female and gender-balanced deity systems with the male-dominant paradigm we have today.

I think that religious structures mirror the social situation. Something about the development of agriculture (possibly the strength required to use a ox-drawn plow) gave men social dominance, and religion changed/was changed to reflect that. Once a religious system is in place it is always used by the hierarchy to reinforce their position, resulting in the social control feedback loop we're all familiar with.

So a male hierarchy worshiping a male deity in a male-dominated society becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy :evilgrin:

Here's a few more sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/When_God_Was_a_Woman">When God Was a Woman

http://free-ebook-download.org/When-God-Was-a-Woman.html">When God Was A Woman -- FREE PDF eBook downloads

My god is not gender based.

...feature two large balls, and there are those "noodly appendages" as well, but I can't rule out the FSM being hermaphroditic.

Who says they have to be internal?:evilgrin:

Genesis 1:27
If you figure "man" is plural, as in 'mankind,' you have the Abrahamic god creating both men and women in it's image. The reason for referring to this god as a 'him' can then be attributed to patriarchal tradition.

Maybe saying "sky daddy" is incorrect, and should instead be "sky hermaphrodite." Not as catchy, but probably more theologically accurate. Maybe our resident theologian could chime in, though I don't expect that he will, other than to say that everyone's wrong and leave.

I do know from my own Jewish upbringing, that the sky hermaphrodite is supposed to have both male and female forms. There's a part of the weekly Shabbat service that involves welcoming in the (invisible) Sabbath bride/queen (depending on the sect/temple/rabbi) who's a feminine form of the Abrahamic god.

The Jewish concept is neither male or female. It has no gender. "Creating" male and female in his/her/its likeness has nothing to do with physical attributes in Judaism. I think it is a way to give humans a special status like humans having the intellect to aid in deision making (for good or bad) and be "godlike," whatever that means.

Shabbat queen/bride has nothing to do with god or other supernatural beings either. It is just a Jewish tradition anthropomorphizing the arrival of shabbat since all sorts of special preparations are done to welcome the sabbath. You know, people prepare their houses and their tables for shabbat as if they were waiting for a queen/bride.

There are different names of God used in Jewish texts and tradition in the masculine form. But there is "Shekhinah" which is a feminine name for God. Regardless, it does not define the gender for a Jewish God. Jewish tradition rejects any definition of attributes for God.

I'm not sure there's a whole lot of difference between God being envisaged as having no gender or both genders... either way, it makes it more difficult for humans to quickly categorize and limit the divine.

Or I think so, anyway.

I think this got squashed out during the formation of Christianity, during times in which women were pushed aside, and certainly not given much voice in religious or political arenas. The early church mothers were all put papered over, and it was all about men. That includes the way God was talked about and imaged.

there are some women who figure in religious texts and scriptures.

But that said, I think the answer is as simple as this: the guys wrote the books. In their view, men were all that mattered, and women were fortunate if they were viewed as anything more than chattel. The scriptures of our major religions have most certainly been formed on the worldview and biases of the men who wrote, edited and translated them over the years. So yes, as you say, male-dominated society creates scriptures that reflect their view.

Likewise with the perception that God is a "he". There's plenty of "father" thrown around, but really, no basis to assign a gender to God. God is. God is both/neither genders. But human beings - men - look at male as the gender default. And someone as powerful as God must of course be male in their view.

I think we'll eventually grow beyond that perception, but I'm often surprised at how strongly held it still is. I had a bit of a back and forth a couple of months ago on the topic at adult ed at my church. One very nice man was quite honestly shocked when I said that God was not a he or a she. But, but, but, he sputtered, the bible says "father" and "He"! His idea of God was very strongly and literally formed from the way he read the bible. Even the idea that God didn't conform to his expectations was hard for him to handle. The women there had no difficulty at all with the idea, however!

...very much like being invisible and pink at the same time.

There were goddesses. Greek, Roman, Norse, Hindu, Wiccan, and a few others.. Make it one god and its easy for them to eliminate the female side.

If I recall correctly there was Deborah in the book of judges.
There was a woman in the times of the later kings that authenticated the words of Moses and brought revival to the nation of Judah (don’t remember her name but I think it started with an H)
There was Anna who greeted the Baby Jesus in the Temple
And Paul, mentioned a few Dorcas? And there was the wife in a husband/wife duo that worked side by side with Paul (Saphira?) It was thought that the book of Hebrews was written by the H/W team
Women didn’t get books named for them but they were there.


(just looked it up it was Priscilla not Saphira) but the Book of the Hebrews still might have been written by Priscilla and Aquilla no one knows for sure)

that there were plenty of monotheistic religions where the one that taught the people how to live were hermaphrodites. Since just one gender was too much of a confinement for a god.

The reverence for Mary in the Christian West, and continuing to the present day in Latin America, was extraordinary. She is venerated by Eastern Christians, but no as strongly and not in the same way as in Western Christianity. Interestingly, this extreme level of the veneration of Mary started not too long before the explosion of troubadour love songs and tales of courtly love. Then there was the powerful, respected nuns like Hildegard von Bingam, who often took the Pope to task.

there seems to be a Feminist strain in Western Civilization that goes very far back, perhaps to the Celts and Ancient Germanic peoples. Compared to them and to the Medieval west the Ancient Greeks were like the Taliban when it came to women.

Romans could chose at will whether God was male or female, by signing up with Isis or Mithras or whomever. It just looked more profitable to the powers that be that their subjects sign up with Jesus. After that high- level decision, and the subsequent banning of the opposition, a little slaughter did the trick. It's in the book.

edit: 3rd and 4th century.

Hinduism, and some forms of Buddhism do have Goddesses. and visualize god(if they ever do..as many different schools have different philosophies....and some hindu schools dont have a god at all) as both male and female...or as something that transcends such human-centric limitations.

in fact...if i remember correctly, the largest Hindu temple in India is that of the "Fish eyed (green) goddess" , Meenakshi.
Its been there for nearly 2500 years and was even mentioned in the travelogues of the Greek and Roman merchants who visited that place.

http://www.travelintelligence.com/travel-writing/court-fish-eyed-goddess-queen



http://www.view360.in/virtualtour/madurai/