Thank you, Mark, for your voice of reason - for shining the light of truth into this latest debate which aims to promote 'inclusion' but threatens distressing controversy and further division. You are right, God has made His gender pronoun preference well known.
Doesnt both the Hebrew and Greek language use masculine and feminine words, in English we hardly have any..ship being the most obvious (female..she ..never he) So in Both God is Elohim and Theos which are masculine words yet spirit is Ruach and pneuma which are feminine words. God devised the languages so has purpose in their construct. In German and Spanish the words key and bridge are masculine in one language and female in the other and vice versa, yet ask the relevant country to describe a key, and to one it is metallic and sharp edged and functional yet to the other it is sleek and subtle and has a good shape. This shaping of thought (sadly mostly lost to the British) surely is the most important aspect of gender, God uses both to enhace our understanding of Him
Thank you for the added depth....and I guess in describing them as a (masculine) hostile ship would attract descriptions like "threatening" "dangerous" even "lethal" whereas a feminine friendly ship would be described as "a support vessel" "providing protection etc etc" Which makes the male and female descriptions incompatible with each other and therefore lends strength to both genderisations (sorry!) of words.
Thank you, Mark, for your voice of reason - for shining the light of truth into this latest debate which aims to promote 'inclusion' but threatens distressing controversy and further division. You are right, God has made His gender pronoun preference well known.
A nicely articulated reflection on and defense of the orthodox Christian view.
Doesnt both the Hebrew and Greek language use masculine and feminine words, in English we hardly have any..ship being the most obvious (female..she ..never he) So in Both God is Elohim and Theos which are masculine words yet spirit is Ruach and pneuma which are feminine words. God devised the languages so has purpose in their construct. In German and Spanish the words key and bridge are masculine in one language and female in the other and vice versa, yet ask the relevant country to describe a key, and to one it is metallic and sharp edged and functional yet to the other it is sleek and subtle and has a good shape. This shaping of thought (sadly mostly lost to the British) surely is the most important aspect of gender, God uses both to enhace our understanding of Him
Hi Ian,
I'm not sure that grammatical gender does imply semantic characteristics in languages like Hebrew and Greek.
NB
Hebrew ruach 'wind, spirit' is feminine grammatical gender
Greek pneuma 'wind, spirit' is neuter grammatical gender, not feminine
thanks for the correction...something I had heard rather than checked it out for myself
A ship is "she" if friendly. and "he" if hostile. This is a naval custom to help prevent shooting at a friendly ship.
That's fascinating.
Thank you for the added depth....and I guess in describing them as a (masculine) hostile ship would attract descriptions like "threatening" "dangerous" even "lethal" whereas a feminine friendly ship would be described as "a support vessel" "providing protection etc etc" Which makes the male and female descriptions incompatible with each other and therefore lends strength to both genderisations (sorry!) of words.