Does God have a gender? If so, what is it? This week we reexamined three familiar texts with an eye towards what God was doing, how we would describe God in those situations, and whether those actions and descriptions seem more masculine, more feminine, or both/neither. The texts we used for this process were from the leaving Egypt story—when God spoke to Moshe from the burning bush (Exodus 3:1-14) and when Bnei Yisrael (the Jewish people) crossed the sea (Exodus 14:23-30)—and from the Yosef story—when Yaakov prayed for El Shaddai (God) to protect his sons (Genesis 43:14).
Here’s a chart of some words we brainstormed to describe God and the gendered associations we have with those descriptors:
Based on the text, what gender do you think the author believes God has?
- Both/neither, because God does some things that we think boys do and some things that we think girls do.
- Masculine, because my initial instinct is to imagine men doing these things even if I want to push that away and imagine women doing them too.
- Either way, not mostly feminine.
- God is a boy because that’s what everyone says.
- But God has so many names—God could be anyone!
Do you think this text about El Shaddai, where God is kind, gentle, and protective, depicts God more like a man/dad or a woman/mom?
- Mom because usually moms are the ones who save you.
- Both because all parents want to protect their kids.
- Both because both love you and protect you.
- I think both because I ask my dad and also my mom to save and protect me.
The conclusion we came to is that depending on which parts of Torah you read and exactly how you’re reading them, God can come across as more masculine, more feminine, or something that’s both/neither/confusing. Or, as one of our Boker students put it, “Most of Torah is just both/neither/confusing.”