If you would like a review copy of the print version of my new book: Tim Bulkeley, Not Only a Father: Talk of God as Mother in the Bible & Christian Tradition (Signs) Auckland: Archer Press, 2011 ISBN: 978-1468091373 Please contact me, please say both where you expect to publish the review (blogs are quite [...]
Browsing Posts in God as mother
Psalm 90 makes a fine reading for a new year. Through the psalm, time (and especially the haunting disparity between short brutish human time and the timeless divine reality) is a strong theme. The psalm is peppered with time words: dor generation in v.1 (x2) b’terem before in v.2 shanah year in vv.4, 5, 9, [...]
See also: Jesus and talk of God as father (part one) When thinking about Jesus’ talk of God as father it is useful to examine how, in fact, he pictured God the Father. What did he mean by calling God ‘father’? To set this question in context it is helpful to consider the cultural stereotypes [...]
On Facebook yesterday I was prompted to reflect on the oddities that our herd mentality imposes on humans. We often signal words that name these “herds” linguistically (rightly or wrongly)1 by giving nouns that name human herds capital letters. Thus I am catholic but not Catholic in my tastes.2 Capitalisation to indicate herd membership is [...]
I have just posted another short section to my online discussable book on motherly talk of God Not Only a Father which addresses the question of how The Nature of Christ as a Man interacts with my ideas of the (non)gendering of God. Not Only a Father is an attempt at a new way of [...]
The God of the Bible is aniconic,1 meaning never to be painted, sculpted or drawn. The second commandment forbids all idols, even images of the true God. In a world of gods and goddesses, both sculpted and drawn, the Bible pictures God with words alone. Yet God is person, not an abstract philosophical concept. The [...]
Previous post in this series: Not Only a Father: 1. Talking Pictures: a. Introduction Not Only a Father: 1. Talking Pictures: b. Why Change the Habit of Centuries? In view of this pastoral need (see previous post), we may ask why we evangelicals do not talk of God as motherly. Does some clear and strong [...]
Previous post in this series: Not Only a Father: 1. Talking Pictures: a. Introduction In order to avoid some extremes of politically correct Christianity, and because they lack understanding of the historic and biblical background for a theologically sound talk of God as mother, many evangelicals speak of God as male. Yet there are pastoral, [...]
The central task of theology, talking about God and discussing the nature of true talk about God, is difficult. How can one express the ineffable? One cannot hold the infinite within human language. Theologians and Pastors have used a number of approaches to their impossible task. One approach, the Via Negativa, proceeds by saying what [...]
Last night we launched: Reconsidering Gender: Evangelical Perspectives Edited by Myk Habets, Beulah Wood and two other books edited by my colleague Myk. The man is a book production machine! I have a chapter in the Gender book: “The Image of the Invisible God: (An)iconic Knowing, God, and Gender” The publisher describes the book thus: [...]
