Amanda:
One of the reasons I embraced Islam is that I have a strong,
personal dislike of the anthropomorphic versions of God found in many other
religions. That being said, I feel that trying to grasp The
Divine without using ANY 'personhood' references is next to impossible.
We are physical beings in a physical world and, as hard as I try, I can't
avoid using personal pronouns when referring to God or using human
ideas and emotions to describe God's being. For example, when I say things like "God hates this," I don't think God really hates in the way that we do, but trying to discuss
God without using any of this kind of language can make the discussion
cumbersome and esoteric. So it doesn't offend me to read or hear
God being referred to in this way. I think we're all trying to
understand The Divine and we're using whatever faculties we have to do
so. Perhaps, the closer we get to
understanding God, the less we need to rely on anthropomorphic representations—whether mental or physical—of God.
Amanda originally wrote her response in the comments section of Tziporah's post. Grace responded last week with a Christian perspective. Please share your thoughts in the comments section this week.
Grace:
The outstretched arm of
God is a powerful image in Christianity, too. Witness Michelangelo’s beautiful
“Creation of Adam” painting on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel! Unlike our Jewish and Muslim cousins,
Christians are comfortable imaging/imagining God, yet without worshiping the
image itself or losing sight of the reality that God cannot ever be imaged/imagined in all God’s fullness and
glory. We believe that God has
created every human being in God’s image, and that, in the person of Jesus
Christ, we can see that divine image fully revealed. For this reason, we seek
to conform our lives to the life of Christ—not just to the prophetic teaching
of Jesus, but to the very being of
Christ—by loving wholly, unconditionally and limitlessly. The term “Son of God” is not understood by
Christians as a reference to Joseph’s or Mary’s son; like other monotheists we
believe that God is One and undivided. “Son of God” is simply a way for our
finite brains to conceive an eternal relationship through which God gave and
gives to us God’s very self to be with us in our joys and in our suffering, and
to offer us the redemptive Grace of an ever-deepening awareness and experience
of God. That is why the historical Jesus, a Jewish man situated in time and place, can be understood as the eternal Christ—of one being with God—who can
be seen and embodied in every person. Depictions of Jesus Christ, the Icon of
God, can thus be windows for us through which God’s presence, and God’s
forever outstretched arm, may be revealed.
This is a response to Tziporah's post of March 20th. Please share your thoughts about using anthropomorphic terms to talk about God in the comments section.
