WEAVING THE CONNECTIONS
The Newsletter of the Center forWomen, the Earth, the Divine
Volume 8 Spring 2003 Number 4
Divine Wisdom
Her Significance for Today
Eleanor Rae
Part Two: Wisdom as the Feminine Divine
The issue of the divine as feminine is one that has been at least touched on by all the major religions, but none have a fully developed theology. For example, Hinduism, with its many goddesses, is still in the process of developing an adequate theology on the Feminine Divine (see the forthcoming book on the Hindu goddesses by Lina Gupta for enlightenment on this issue). In Buddhism, Prajnaparamita is acknowledged as the mother of all Buddhas, but this role is simply overlooked in that tradition. The three Abrahamic traditions (Hebrew, Christian and Islamic) are uniquely hampered in their ability to deal with the divine as feminine because of their adherence to monotheism. A closer look, however, reveals ambivalence within each. For example, compare the claim of Hokmah (Wisdom) in Proverbs 8 as the giver of the foremost divine blessing, life itself, with the Hebrew tradition’s role for Yahweh. Or with the view of the 12th-13th century Islamic theologian Ibn al-Arabi who understood the creative breath of Mercy as a feminine component of the Godhead itself. In Christianity, some of the very early church fathers (such as Theophilus of Antioch, Irenaeus and the author of the Clementine Homilies) regarded Wisdom in the Old Testament as prefiguring the Holy Spirit, as did the second century apologist, Justin Martyr (but he equated the divine intelligence both with the Holy Spirit and the Son). The imaging of Wisdom as the Son (rather than the Holy Spirit) was the basic path followed by the later church fathers, including Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Augustine and Aquinas. But there is at least one early theologian, Gaius Marius Victorinus (third or fourth century) who not only understood the Son as the action of the Father (the one through whom the Divine Being is channeled outward and downward into matter), but also held the Holy Spirit as the Divine Intelligence, the living thought of the Divine that leads us back to the Source. In our time this identification of the Divine Wisdom with the Holy Spirit has been almost forgotten, and so today the Christian tradition still lacks an adequate theology of the Holy Spirit.
What might such a theology of Wisdom as the Holy Spirit look like? It would address, among other issues, Her transcendence (otherness) and Her immanence (presence). These two modes are evident in the first appearance of Her personified figure in the Wisdom literature (in Job 28) where She appears as the divine secret (transcendent) in the created world (immanent). The chapter also intimates transcendence when it describes the divinity as having seen and appraised Wisdom (which would seem to attest to Wisdom’s having an independent existence apart from Yahweh, who discovers Her). Wisdom’s inaccessibility is echoed in Sirach 24:28 where we are told that "the first human never knew wisdom fully, nor will the last succeed in fathoming her." This message is also found in Baruch 3:15-31.
Many contemporary theologians, including Roland Murphy and Samuel Terrien, have noted Wisdom’s immanence (as well as Her transcendence). Murphy sees Wisdom as the divine communication (or extension of Self) to human beings. He identifies the Wisdom of Solomon 7:24 and 8:1 as passages that present Wisdom as immanent in the world. Terrien cites Proverbs 8:22-31 as describing Her as a divine being who communicates Her unique status, activity and mediating function. She is the presence of the Divinity to humankind, a presence communicated through play. More on the Divine immanence of Wisdom will be forthcoming when we look at Her in the context of creation theology in the next issue of the newsletter.
A Report from Suzanne Schaup
C:WED’s representative on the Women’s Committee in Vienna
As part of the celebrations around International Women's Day, an event took place in Vienna on March 9, 2003 which may signify the beginning of a new era in global sisterhood. "Women in War" was the title of a panel staged at Volkstheater, one of the big theatres in the city. There must have been over a thousand persons attending, mostly women. The speakers included Noorie Haaqnazar, the director of the Gender Department in the Afghan Ministry for Women; Viola Raheb, a prominent Palestinian peace activist, as well as her Israeli counterpart, Tsvia Walden-Peres; and representatives from Iran, Iraq, Bosnia, Zimbabwe, South Africa and the Ivory Coast. The stories these women shared with us were disturbing and moving. They were an appeal to women around the world to help them fight poverty and war. African women have a sad story to tell about AIDS and famine. The Afghan representative confirmed what most of us feared all along: in the new Afghan government women are marginalized again. She ended with an urgent plea to the world not to forget women in Afghanistan. The sister from Iraq warned against conferring the facile label of "good" or "bad" to any country, because the actual situation is far more complex. In a war waged against Iraq, women and children will once more be the prime sufferers. In Palestine, women's organizations are trying to join hands with Israeli women in an effort to bring peace about through understanding and personal reconciliation. Their present situation as prisoners in their own territories, or even in their own houses, is intolerable.
Therefore, the foundation of "Frauen ohne Grenzen" (Women without Borders), launched by this event, is of the greatest importance. Parallel to "Medecins sans frontieres" and "Reporters Without Frontiers", the aim of "Women Without Borders" is to provide a free flow of information and to give women an opportunity to form a world-wide network. In the future women will report regularly both through "Reporters without Borders" and "Women without Borders" about the situation in their countries. This will also serve the purpose of bringing the problems of crisis regions and war zones to greater public attention.
European-based, this network, initiated by Dr. Edit Schlaffer and Dr. Cheryl Benard of Vienna, is open to all. Please contact them if you are interested or if you have any inquiry or suggestions. In this time of worldwide upheaval, it is especially critical for C:WED’s members to stay involved in politics and with women in crisis areas who need our support.
E-mail: office@frauen-ohne-grenzen.org; Website: www.frauen-ohne-grenzen.org
Associates of C:WED:
Eleanor Rae, Ph.D., founder
Giles E. Rae, publisher
Anne Andersson, editor
Representatives at the United Nations:
New York: Rosalyn Dischiavo
Lina Gupta, Ph.D.
Alayne O’Reilly, Ph.D.
Vienna: Susanne Schaup, Ph.D.
Mission Statement
The Center for Women, the Earth, the Divine is dedicated to exploring the parallels that exist between the imaging and treatment of women and of the Earth, and how our images of the Divine are related to these parallels.
We began by exploring these relationships within the context of our own tradition--the Christian. While we continue our exploration in this tradition, we have also engaged people of other traditions such as the Buddhist, Goddess, Hindu, Indigenous, Jewish and Muslim. Our work is made available through talks, workshops, writings and retreats. The immediate purpose of the Center is educational, while the ultimate goal is the healing of the Creation.
The founder of C:WED is Eleanor Rae, Ph.D., author of Women, the Earth, the Divine, President Emerita of the North American Coalition for Christianity and Ecology and founder of the United Nations Earth Values Caucus.
MINDING ANIMALS--Marc Bekoff
Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2002
Cognitive ethology, the study of animal intelligence and thought, is the scientific concern of Marc Bekoff, a professor of biology at the University of Colorado. But the existence of such an endeavor at all is of historic import. For much of the 20th century, these qualities were denied to the animal kingdom. With the work of Jane Goodall, who writes a luminous preface, Donald Griffin of Harvard who as recent as his 1992 book had to argue for animal consciousness, along with a growing number of researchers, a revolution is taking place. This is seen as curious because everyone knows what rich personalities our animal companions have, both domestic and wild, so science is at last catching up.
But 'anthropomorphism,' the attribution of human emotions to animals, has long been anathema. What Marc Bekoff demonstrates is how a perceptive blend of anecdotal case studies and formal investigation, both in the field and laboratory, can reveal a quite human-like cognition and behavior. Foxes, elephants, hyenas, grosbeaks, chimpanzees and so on cooperate, play, mediate, gossip, deceive, nurture and grieve. Bekoff, an activist for animal rights, believes they can be rightly appreciated as 'persons' in their certain species niche. By this insightful step, they merit and ought to gain due consideration and respect. Citing Thomas Berry, human beings should strive for a benign presence in nature, to interact but not invade. By 'minding animals,' by seeing in a Teilhardian sense one might add, we move from observing just objects to a mutual communion and compassion.
Charles Darwin was of this sensibility and did intimate a continuum of consciousness, as Bekoff notes. But what seems still missing from behavioral and psychological studies of animals is a broad evolutionary perspective, with cosmological roots, that can properly integrate, inform and enrich human understanding. This is not to pose 'lower' or 'higher' stages as much as being able to witness, with Teilhard, an increasing, ascendant 'personalization' and self-awareness.
A central chapter proceeds to give a long overdue recognition and appreciation of the fact that animals have complex emotional lives not unlike human behavior. What is significant is that this is being said by someone of scientific and professional stature. From iguanas to primates, degrees of enjoyment, fear, sorrow, the need for communal interaction, empathy are clearly evident.
A final chapter Animals and Theology goes on to explore a spiritual communion with the integral animate kingdom. "When I study coyotes, I am coyote, when I study birds, I am bird" writes Bekoff. "As evolution may become conscious of itself in the human phenomenon, an immense responsibility then accrues to emphatically care for these myriad incarnations in fur and feather we share the earth community with."
These following works offer an entry to the revolution in our understanding and appreciation of animal sensibilities.
Bekoff, Marc, et al., eds., The Cognitive Animal. Cambridge: MIT Press, 2002. Many papers covering the whole spectrum.
Dawkins, M. S., Through Our Eyes Only? Oxford, UK: Freeman, 1993. In search of animal consciousness and thought.
Dugatkin, Lee, Cooperation Among Animals. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1997.
Griffin, Donald, Animal Minds. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001. An updated edition of the original 1992 work.
Hauser, Marc, Wild Minds. New York: Henry Holt, 2000. Each animal species has unique capabilities for its own environmental niche.
Pepperberg, Irene, The Alex Studies. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2000. A loquacious, intelligent grey parrot.
Review by Arthur Fabel from "Teilhard Perspective", Vol. 35, No. 2, Fall 2002. For further information on the "Teilhard Perspective" and the American Teilhard Association, please contact President John Grim at the Department of Religion, Bucknell University,Lewisburg, PA 17837, Phone 717-577-1205 Email: grim@bucknell.e
Why Do I March?--Eleanor Rae
On Saturday, March 22, 2003, I went—not as part of a group, but by myself— to the march for peace down Broadway in New York City. Because I was alone, I was able to easily move ahead through the midst of the crowd and get a sense of the marchers. The age spectrum and issues spectrum were vast but I was especially impressed by the many elderly couples who literally tottered down Broadway using one another for support. I cannot know why others marched, but I did feel the need to understand my own motivation for participation. Before the Iraqi invasion began, I marched to stop the war. But once it became a reality, I had to ask myself: Why do I march?
Why do I march? I am a person who is most content "living in my head." But with the invasion, I felt the need to somehow have myself counted physically as being there.
Why do I march? My first memory as a child is finding my Polish parents weeping at the contents of a letter. They had received word that their nephew, a seminarian in Poland, had been taken out of the seminary by the Germans and murdered. World War II had begun and, in a sense, it has never ended. Only the players keep changing. I march because I think that war is seldom, if ever, the answer to the world’s problems.
Why do I march? Few disagree that Saddam Hussein is a monster. But is using terror against a terrorist the answer? While this war is not a just war but a pre-emptive action, even "just war" theorists will argue that there never has been a just war; one may enter a conflict for all the right reasons, but the "good" armies have always taken on the behaviors of the "evil" ones. I march because I tremble at the thought of what America and Americans will become.
Why do I march? If democracy is something that is operative only in times of peace, it has lost its meaning. Further, will we know how to bring it back after the conflict has been resolved? I march because, as the words we chanted as we marched say, "This Is What Democracy Looks Like."
Why do I march? Since the first battle was fought with sticks and stones until this age of "smart missles", there has always been one and the same loser—the Earth itself. We are already preparing for the humanitarian aid, and rightly so, but what about the rape and pillage of the Earth. I march because I love the Earth and want it to be here for my grandchildren—both the human and non-human alike.