We were talking about the woman in Proverbs 8 who helps God create the world. Â
Julio over at our GoddessChristians forum contributed the following:
ja_translations / Julio Salomon 20 Feb 2009
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WOMEN WERE “ALSO” CREATED IN THE IMAGE OF GOD.
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God is part woman, women were also created in the image of God, contrary to the false teaching of the old male dominated religious political system. Women are not some spiritually inferior being, made to be a shadow and servant to man, but an equal. Of equal importance, equal beauty and equally representative of the God head that created us for love.
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In Genesis chapter 1, verses 26 & 27 it says: “And God said, Let “us” make man (mankind) in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of  the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth.
So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him: “male and female” created he them”. “Who” was God the Father talking to when he said let “us” make mankind in “our” image?
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According to the late great American comedian “Lenny Bruce”: “If God made woman for man, he must have one of his own for himself.” Sounds sensible.
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So, then, we could safely assume that the Holy Trinity, the Godhead of 3 Gods in one:
Father, Son & Holy Ghost, is not a male dominated political circle, but the perfect picture of the heavenly family of which we are a representation, having been made in their image and likeness: The Father, The Son and “HOLY SPIRIT”: the ever present wife of the Heavenly Father & Mother of the Son. Also known as the spirit of wisdom, compassion, mercy, love,  gentle like a dove, like a woman, not stern, judging or harsh as the Father.
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When they talk about the “Trinity” 3 Gods in one, it means that they are ONE in unity, in love, even as “we” should be. Like Jesus prayed to his Father in John chapter 17: “I pray that they be one, even as we are one and the love that we have for each other, let it also be in them.” (read the whole chapter) So women are ALSO made in the image of God. This sounds a lot more fair and equal. Some feminist groups suggest that God is a woman, maybe they are “half” right, because the third person in the trinity: The Holy Ghost “is” a woman.
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No wonder Jesus was such a defender of women in a hypocritical society were men were tolerated to commit certain sins, that if a woman committed them she would be immediately stoned to death. Women were viewed as mere possessions, second class citizens, before God and before man, they did not have equal rights. God did not make a woman from Adam’s feet so he could walk all over her (nor did he make her from his head so she could dominate him), but he made her from his ribs, near his heart, so she could be his sweetheart.
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Possibly, the male dominated religious system of the past, even influenced the Bible translations to maintain superiority over poor women who were burnt at the stake as “witches” if they dared to demonstrate any spiritual gifts and who even in the epistles of the New Testament were told to be ashamed, take a lower seat, subservient to man because of  the “curse” of the garden of Eden and are not allowed to speak in the church.
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Furthermore, the Apostle Paul, seemed to be opposite to Jesus Christ. Jesus said “eat and drink with sinners”, Paul said to disassociate with them. Jesus told a thief that tomorrow he would be with him in paradise, Paul said thieves cannot inherit the kingdom of God.
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And on the subject of women, Paul said that a woman should bow her head in shame in the house of God and not be allowed to make any comments. But Jesus in his defense of an adulterous woman said: “he that is without sin, let him be the first to cast a stone at her” and then he told her: “I condemn thee not”. How beautiful.
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Jesus did not need anyone to compliment him, not the Apostle Paul, not anyone, nor did he have any twin brothers, he stands on his own, representing himself. Thank God for that.
That part of the bible even contradicts Jesus, who came to free us us completely from all curses. He even liberated us from the curse of death: “He that believes on me HAS eternal life”, right now and without any other conditions. Amen. John chapter 6, verse 47.
 –Julio
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I often contemplate this “let us make man in our image, male and female made he them”.  “Man” in those days meant “humanity”. And the “god” doing the talking has a compound name (Elohim) which means literally “God and Goddess” or as some translate it, “the gods”.
If you find yourself wondering about all of the above, you might enjoy my online slide presentation, which covers this fascinating creation conversation and the woman-god Sophia of Proverbs 8.  We show other appearances of Sophia in the Hebrew scriptures, too. See God Has a Wife! starting here (this starts you on slide #28)
–Katia
Translation problems from Hebrew I think.
ADM [ neither male nor female] seems to have been made in the image of God, the ALHYM [ Eloheem]. The Adam was split into Man and Woman – AYSh and AShH – ayeesh and eesha].
ChVH [ Hevah – Eve] = a projection of YHVH translated as “Lord’.
Eve was also NOT the female with apple, that was Eesha.
CARLO SUARES goes into the text, though he feels that the translated bible has led to a vast amount of insanity on this planet.
There are NO people int he garden of Eden, or in fact the whole of Genesis, they = archetypes with which we ALL relate.
Eve = Jesus
cheers
If women were also created in the image of the one God, does that make God genderless, or does that mean men are also the image of the goddess?
Oh good question, Matt. Hee hee or should I say, good Zen puzzle. It’s one of those ponderings that goes round and round and yet is profound.
Personally, being monotheistic, I see God as genderless, at least when being compared to Pagan god/desses.
But I just wanted to invite polytheists such as yourself to consider, if women were created in the image of god then I would thing you also have to say men were created in the image of goddess if you’re going to retain theological balance. The alternative would be to say women are no more created in the image of god than men are created in the image of goddess but that doesn’t seem to be the direction of you thought.
Matt
Thank You. This has helped me. I had problems with returning to Christianty concering the male dominated results. But you have helped me relize that God has created men and women equally in his own image even if we were made from Adam we were still made in his own image. To me, God is Female and Male at the Same Time. Not saying Im right, Im just placing what i think. I think God is God and he can be Male or Female, White or black at any chosen time he likes to. I guess God is Just God in relaity if you think about it…. Anyways just some of my thoughts.
God bless.
I have never considered the word “image” to be a literal meaning. Consider the image of the soul/moral/love verus the images we see in a mirror because we all look very different and while God is great i don’t think he looks like me or my brother my cousin.
The image in the mirror is not as “real” as the person standing there. So hmmm. I can’t quite get abstract enough to think of the soul/moral/love as what’s meant by “image” in Genesis. The wording is something like God made humans, “male and female, made he them, after his own image.” The image of his soul, his love, you say? So vague…
Women are made in the image of the fallen Venus “Queen of the Night” Lilth. Part Holy High God, more of the devil.