Feminist theology
Encyclopedia
Feminist
Feminism
Feminism is a collection of movements aimed at defining, establishing, and defending equal political, economic, and social rights and equal opportunities for women. Its concepts overlap with those of women's rights...

 theology
Theology
Theology is the systematic and rational study of religion and its influences and of the nature of religious truths, or the learned profession acquired by completing specialized training in religious studies, usually at a university or school of divinity or seminary.-Definition:Augustine of Hippo...

 is a movement found in several religions, including Buddhism
Buddhism
Buddhism is a religion and philosophy encompassing a variety of traditions, beliefs and practices, largely based on teachings attributed to Siddhartha Gautama, commonly known as the Buddha . The Buddha lived and taught in the northeastern Indian subcontinent some time between the 6th and 4th...

, Christianity
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...

, Judaism
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...

, and New Thought
New Thought
New Thought promotes the ideas that "Infinite Intelligence" or "God" is ubiquitous, spirit is the totality of real things, true human selfhood is divine, divine thought is a force for good, sickness originates in the mind, and "right thinking" has a healing effect.Although New Thought is neither...

, to reconsider the traditions, practices, scriptures, and theologies of those religions from a feminist
Feminism
Feminism is a collection of movements aimed at defining, establishing, and defending equal political, economic, and social rights and equal opportunities for women. Its concepts overlap with those of women's rights...

 perspective. Some of the goals of feminist theology include increasing the role of women among the clergy
Clergy
Clergy is the generic term used to describe the formal religious leadership within a given religion. A clergyman, churchman or cleric is a member of the clergy, especially one who is a priest, preacher, pastor, or other religious professional....

 and religious authorities, reinterpreting male-dominated imagery and language about God
God
God is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....

, determining women's place in relation to career
Career
Career is defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as a person's "course or progress through life ". It is usually considered to pertain to remunerative work ....

 and motherhood, and studying images of women in the religion's sacred texts and matriarchal religion
Matriarchal religion
The concept of a Matriarchal religion is a concept forwarded in second-wave feminism since the 1970s, based on the notion of a historical matriarchy first developed in the 19th century by J. J...

.

Methodology

Feminist theology attempts to consider every aspect of religious practice and thought. Some of the questions feminist theologians ask are:
  • How do we do theology
    Theology
    Theology is the systematic and rational study of religion and its influences and of the nature of religious truths, or the learned profession acquired by completing specialized training in religious studies, usually at a university or school of divinity or seminary.-Definition:Augustine of Hippo...

    ? The basic question of how theologians may go about creating systems of thought is currently being reinterpreted by feminist theologians. Many feminist theologians assert that personal experience can be an important component of insight into the divine, along with the more traditional sources of holy books or received tradition. (The relevance of personal experience to the policies of groups of people is a familiar notion to veterans of the feminist movement
    Feminist movement
    The feminist movement refers to a series of campaigns for reforms on issues such as reproductive rights, domestic violence, maternity leave, equal pay, women's suffrage, sexual harassment and sexual violence...

    .)

  • Who is God? Feminist theologians have supported the use of non- or multi-gender
    Gender
    Gender is a range of characteristics used to distinguish between males and females, particularly in the cases of men and women and the masculine and feminine attributes assigned to them. Depending on the context, the discriminating characteristics vary from sex to social role to gender identity...

    ed language for God, arguing that language powerfully impacts belief about the behavior and essence of God.

  • Where are women in religious history? Feminist historical theologians study the roles of women in periods throughout history that have impacted religion: the Biblical period, the early Christian era, medieval Europe, and any period of import to a particular religion. They study individual women who influenced their religion or whose religious faith led them to impact their culture. The work of these scholars has helped feminist theologians claim historical figures as their predecessors in feminist theology. For example, Sojourner Truth
    Sojourner Truth
    Sojourner Truth was the self-given name, from 1843 onward, of Isabella Baumfree, an African-American abolitionist and women's rights activist. Truth was born into slavery in Swartekill, New York, but escaped with her infant daughter to freedom in 1826. After going to court to recover her son, she...

    's "Ain't I a Woman?" speech pointed out, "And how came Jesus into the world? Through God who created him and the woman who bore him. Man, where was your part?" Elizabeth Cady Stanton
    Elizabeth Cady Stanton
    Elizabeth Cady Stanton was an American social activist, abolitionist, and leading figure of the early woman's movement...

     produced The Woman's Bible
    The Woman's Bible
    The Woman's Bible is a two-part book, written by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and a committee of 26 women, and published in 1895 and 1898 to challenge the traditional position of religious orthodoxy that woman should be subservient to man. By producing the book, Stanton wished to promote a radical...

    , excising the traditional Christian text of all references she thought contradicted the positions of women's rights.


Development of Theology
According to Grenz and Olson in their review of Feminist Theology, "it was developed in three distinct steps. They begin with a critique of the past” such that they review the ways women have been oppressed; “they seek alternative biblical and extrabiblical traditions that support” the ideals Feminists are trying to advance; and finally “feminists set forth their own unique method of theology, which includes the revisioning of Christian categories.” Grenz and Olson also mention, however, while all feminists agree there is a flaw in the system, there is disagreement over how far outside of the Bible and the Christian tradition women are willing to go to seek support for their ideals.

Prehistoric religion and archaeology

The primacy of a monotheistic or near-monotheistic "Great Goddess" is advocated by some modern matriarchists as a female version of, preceding, or analogue to, the Abrahamic God associated with the historical rise of monotheism
Monotheism
Monotheism is the belief in the existence of one and only one god. Monotheism is characteristic of the Baha'i Faith, Christianity, Druzism, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, Samaritanism, Sikhism and Zoroastrianism.While they profess the existence of only one deity, monotheistic religions may still...

 in the Mediterranean Axis Age.

Mother Nature
Mother Nature
Mother Nature is a common personification of nature that focuses on the life-giving and nurturing aspects of nature by embodying it in the form of the mother. Images of women representing mother earth, and mother nature, are timeless...

 (sometimes known as Mother Earth) is a common representation of nature
Nature
Nature, in the broadest sense, is equivalent to the natural world, physical world, or material world. "Nature" refers to the phenomena of the physical world, and also to life in general...

 that focuses on the life-giving and nurturing features of nature by embodying it in the form of the mother
Mother
A mother, mum, mom, momma, or mama is a woman who has raised a child, given birth to a child, and/or supplied the ovum that grew into a child. Because of the complexity and differences of a mother's social, cultural, and religious definitions and roles, it is challenging to specify a universally...

. Images of women representing mother earth, and mother nature, are timeless. In prehistoric times, goddess
Goddess
A goddess is a female deity. In some cultures goddesses are associated with Earth, motherhood, love, and the household. In other cultures, goddesses also rule over war, death, and destruction as well as healing....

es were worshipped for their association with fertility
Fertility
Fertility is the natural capability of producing offsprings. As a measure, "fertility rate" is the number of children born per couple, person or population. Fertility differs from fecundity, which is defined as the potential for reproduction...

, fecundity
Fecundity
Fecundity, derived from the word fecund, generally refers to the ability to reproduce. In demography, fecundity is the potential reproductive capacity of an individual or population. In biology, the definition is more equivalent to fertility, or the actual reproductive rate of an organism or...

, and agricultural bounty. Priestesses held dominion over aspects of Incan
Inca Empire
The Inca Empire, or Inka Empire , was the largest empire in pre-Columbian America. The administrative, political and military center of the empire was located in Cusco in modern-day Peru. The Inca civilization arose from the highlands of Peru sometime in the early 13th century...

, Assyria
Assyria
Assyria was a Semitic Akkadian kingdom, extant as a nation state from the mid–23rd century BC to 608 BC centred on the Upper Tigris river, in northern Mesopotamia , that came to rule regional empires a number of times through history. It was named for its original capital, the ancient city of Assur...

n, Babylonia
Babylonia
Babylonia was an ancient cultural region in central-southern Mesopotamia , with Babylon as its capital. Babylonia emerged as a major power when Hammurabi Babylonia was an ancient cultural region in central-southern Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq), with Babylon as its capital. Babylonia emerged as...

n, Slavonic
Slavic peoples
The Slavic people are an Indo-European panethnicity living in Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, North Asia and Central Asia. The term Slavic represents a broad ethno-linguistic group of people, who speak languages belonging to the Slavic language family and share, to varying degrees, certain...

, Roman
Roman mythology
Roman mythology is the body of traditional stories pertaining to ancient Rome's legendary origins and religious system, as represented in the literature and visual arts of the Romans...

, Greek
Greek mythology
Greek mythology is the body of myths and legends belonging to the ancient Greeks, concerning their gods and heroes, the nature of the world, and the origins and significance of their own cult and ritual practices. They were a part of religion in ancient Greece...

, Indian
Religion in India
Indian religions is a classification for religions that originated in the Indian subcontinent; namely Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism and Sikhism. These religions are also classified as Eastern religions...

, and Iroquoian
Iroquoian languages
The Iroquoian languages are a First Nation and Native American language family.-Family division:*Ruttenber, Edward Manning. 1992 [1872]. History of the Indian tribes of Hudson's River. Hope Farm Press....

 religions in the millennia prior to the inception of Patriarchal religion.

Gender and God

Others who practice feminist spirituality may instead adhere to a feminist re-interpretation of Western monotheistic traditions. In those cases, the notion of God
God
God is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....

 as having a male gender is rejected, and God is not referred to using male pronouns. Feminist spirituality may also object to images of God that they perceive as authoritarian, parental, or disciplinarian, instead emphasizing "maternal" attributes such as nurturing, acceptance, and creativity.

New Thought movement

New Thought as a movement had no single origin, but was rather propelled along by a number of spiritual thinkers and philosophers and emerged through a variety of religious denominations and churches, particularly the Unity Church
Unity Church
Unity, known informally as Unity Church, is a religious movement within the wider New Thought movement and is best known to many through its Daily Word devotional publication...

, Religious Science
Religious Science
Religious Science, also known as Science of Mind, was established in 1927 by Ernest Holmes and is a spiritual, philosophical and metaphysical religious movement within the New Thought movement. In general, the term "Science of Mind" applies to the teachings, while the term "Religious Science"...

, and Church of Divine Science. It was a feminist movement in that most of its teachers and students were women; notable among the founders of the movement were Emma Curtis Hopkins
Emma Curtis Hopkins
Emma Curtis Hopkins organized New Thought and was a primary theologian, teacher, writer, feminist, mystic and prophet who ordained women at what she named the Christian Science Theological Seminary of Chicago...

, known as the "teacher of teachers" Myrtle Fillmore
Myrtle Fillmore
Mary Caroline "Myrtle" Page Fillmore was co-founder of Unity, a church within the New Thought movement, along with her husband Charles Fillmore. Prior to that time, she worked as a schoolteacher....

, Malinda Cramer
Malinda Cramer
Malinda Elliott Cramer was a founder of the Church of Divine Science, a healer, and an important figure in the early New Thought movement.- Biography :...

, and Nona L. Brooks
Nona L. Brooks
Nona Lovell Brooks , described as a "prophet of modern mystical Christianity", was a leader in the New Thought movement and a founder of the Church of Divine Science.- Biography :...

; with its churches and community centers mostly led by women, from the 1880s to today.

Christianity

Christian feminism
Christian feminism
Christian feminism is an aspect of feminist theology which seeks to advance and understand the equality of men and women morally, socially, spiritually, and in leadership from a Christian perspective. Christian feminists argue that contributions by women in that direction are necessary for a...

 is an aspect of feminist theology which seeks to advance and understand the equality of men and women morally, socially, spiritually, and in leadership from a Christian
Christian
A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...

 perspective. Christian feminists argue that contributions by women in that direction are necessary for a complete understanding of Christianity. Christian feminists believe that God
God
God is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....

 does not discriminate on the basis of biologically-determined characteristics such as sex and race. Their major issues include the ordination of women
Ordination of women
Ordination in general religious usage is the process by which a person is consecrated . The ordination of women is a regular practice among some major religious groups, as it was of several religions of antiquity...

, male dominance in Christian marriage
Marriage
Marriage is a social union or legal contract between people that creates kinship. It is an institution in which interpersonal relationships, usually intimate and sexual, are acknowledged in a variety of ways, depending on the culture or subculture in which it is found...

, recognition of equal spiritual and moral abilities, reproductive rights, and the search for a feminine or gender-transcendent divine. Christian feminists often draw on the teachings of other religions and ideologies in addition to biblical evidence.

Two authors whose works are vital to an understanding of feminist theology are Mary Daly and Rosemary Radford Ruether.

Mary Daly
Mary Daly
Mary Daly was an American radical feminist philosopher, academic, and theologian. Daly, who described herself as a "radical lesbian feminist", taught at Boston College, a Jesuit-run institution, for 33 years. Daly retired in 1999, after violating university policy by refusing to allow male...

 grew up an Irish Catholic and all of her education was received through Catholic schools. She has three doctorate degrees. One from St. Mary’s College in sacred theology, and two from University of Fribourg, Switzerland in theology and philosophy. From 1966 till the end of her career she taught at Boston College. While in her early works Daly expressed a desire to reform Christianity from the inside, she would later come to the same point as several other feminists, that Christianity is not able to enact the necessary changes as it is. (Prologue Daly). “On November 14, 1971, when she was invited to be the first woman to preach at Harvard Memorial Chapel. She used the opportunity to denounce Christianity as irredeemable for women and to call for women (and men) to make an exodus from the Church. Almost all the women who attended this service walked out with her, as well as a few men.” Her works include: The Church and the Second Sex (1968), Beyond God the Father (1973), Gyn/ecology: The Metaethics of Radical Feminism (1978), Pure Lust: Elemental Feminist Philosophy (1984), Webster’s First Intergalactic Wickedary of the English Language (1987), and Outercourse: The Be-Dazzling Voyage (1992). According to Ford’s The Modern Theologians, “Mary Daly has done more than anyone to clarify the problems women have concerning the central core symbolism of Chrisianity, and its effects on their self-understanding and their relationship to God.”

Rosemary Radford Ruether grew up Roman Catholic and attended Catholic schools through her sophomore year of high school. She was a classics major at Scripps College, worked for the Delta Ministry in 1965 and taught at Howard University School of Religion from 1966 to 1976. She has also “been responsible for the production of some twenty-two books…and at least five hundred articles.” “Rosemary Ruether has written on the question of Christian credibility, with particular attention to ecclesiology and its engagement with church-world conflicts; Jewish-Christian relations…; politics and religion in America; and Feminism."

The term Christian egalitarianism
Christian Egalitarianism
Christian Egalitarianism , also known as biblical equality, is a Christian form of the moral doctrine of Egalitarianism. It holds that all human persons are created equally in God's sight—equal in fundamental worth and moral status...

 is sometimes preferred by those advocating gender equality and equity among Christians who do not wish to associate themselves with the feminist movement.

See also: Unity Church
Unity Church
Unity, known informally as Unity Church, is a religious movement within the wider New Thought movement and is best known to many through its Daily Word devotional publication...

, Christian Science
Christian Science
Christian Science is a system of thought and practice derived from the writings of Mary Baker Eddy and the Bible. It is practiced by members of The First Church of Christ, Scientist as well as some others who are nonmembers. Its central texts are the Bible and the Christian Science textbook,...

, Christian theological praxis
Christian Theological Praxis
Christian theological praxis is a term used by most liberation theologians to express how the Gospel of Jesus Christ is to be lived in the world.-Description:...

 and Postmodern Christianity
Postmodern Christianity
Postmodern Christianity is an outlook of Christianity that is closely associated with the body of writings known as postmodern philosophy. Although it is a relatively recent development in the Christian religion, some Christian postmodernists assert that their style of thought has an affinity with...

.

Islam

Islamic feminism
Islamic feminism
Islamic feminism is a form of feminism concerned with the role of women in Islam. It aims for the full equality of all Muslims, regardless of gender, in public and private life. Islamic feminists advocate women's rights, gender equality, and social justice grounded in an Islamic framework...

 is a form of feminism concerned with the role of women in Islam. It aims for the full equality of all Muslims, regardless of gender, in public and private life. Islamic feminists advocate women's rights
Women's rights
Women's rights are entitlements and freedoms claimed for women and girls of all ages in many societies.In some places these rights are institutionalized or supported by law, local custom, and behaviour, whereas in others they may be ignored or suppressed...

, gender equality
Gender equality
Gender equality is the goal of the equality of the genders, stemming from a belief in the injustice of myriad forms of gender inequality.- Concept :...

, and social justice
Social justice
Social justice generally refers to the idea of creating a society or institution that is based on the principles of equality and solidarity, that understands and values human rights, and that recognizes the dignity of every human being. The term and modern concept of "social justice" was coined by...

 grounded in an Islamic framework. Although rooted in Islam
Islam
Islam . The most common are and .   : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...

, the movement's pioneers have also utilised secular
Secularity
Secularity is the state of being separate from religion.For instance, eating and bathing may be regarded as examples of secular activities, because there may not be anything inherently religious about them...

 and European or non-Muslim feminist discourses and recognise the role of Islamic feminism as part of an integrated global feminist movement. Advocates of the movement seek to highlight the deeply rooted teachings of equality in the Quran and encourage a questioning of the patriarchal interpretation of Islamic teaching through the Quran (holy book), hadith
Hadith
The term Hadīth is used to denote a saying or an act or tacit approval or criticism ascribed either validly or invalidly to the Islamic prophet Muhammad....

 (sayings of Muhammad
Muhammad
Muhammad |ligature]] at U+FDF4 ;Arabic pronunciation varies regionally; the first vowel ranges from ~~; the second and the last vowel: ~~~. There are dialects which have no stress. In Egypt, it is pronounced not in religious contexts...

) and sharia
Sharia
Sharia law, is the moral code and religious law of Islam. Sharia is derived from two primary sources of Islamic law: the precepts set forth in the Quran, and the example set by the Islamic prophet Muhammad in the Sunnah. Fiqh jurisprudence interprets and extends the application of sharia to...

 (law) towards the creation of a more equal and just society. Muslim majority countries have produced more than seven female heads of state
Head of State
A head of state is the individual that serves as the chief public representative of a monarchy, republic, federation, commonwealth or other kind of state. His or her role generally includes legitimizing the state and exercising the political powers, functions, and duties granted to the head of...

 including Benazir Bhutto
Benazir Bhutto
Benazir Bhutto was a democratic socialist who served as the 11th Prime Minister of Pakistan in two non-consecutive terms from 1988 until 1990 and 1993 until 1996....

 of Pakistan
Pakistan
Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...

, Mame Madior Boye
Mame Madior Boye
Mame Madior Boye was Prime Minister of Senegal from 2001 to 2002. She was the first and so far only female holder of that position.Boye was born in Saint-Louis...

 of Senegal
Senegal
Senegal , officially the Republic of Senegal , is a country in western Africa. It owes its name to the Sénégal River that borders it to the east and north...

, Tansu Çiller
Tansu Çiller
Tansu Penbe Çiller is a Turkish economist and politician. She was Turkey's first and only female Prime Minister.- Early career :She is the daughter of a Turkish governor of Bilecik province during the 1950s. She graduated from the School of Economics at Robert College after finishing the American...

 of Turkey
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...

, Kaqusha Jashari
Kaqusha Jashari
Kaqusha Jashari born 1946 in Prishtina, Kosovo. She is a Kosovo Albanian politician and engineer and a member of the Assembly of Kosovo on the Democratic Party of Kosovo list since 2007. She is of Montenegrin descent on her mother's side....

 of Kosovo
Kosovo
Kosovo is a region in southeastern Europe. Part of the Ottoman Empire for more than five centuries, later the Autonomous Province of Kosovo and Metohija within Serbia...

, Megawati Sukarnoputri
Megawati Sukarnoputri
In this Indonesian name, the name "Sukarnoputri" is a patronymic, not a family name, and the person should be referred to by the given name "Megawati"....

 of Indonesia
Indonesia
Indonesia , officially the Republic of Indonesia , is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania. Indonesia is an archipelago comprising approximately 13,000 islands. It has 33 provinces with over 238 million people, and is the world's fourth most populous country. Indonesia is a republic, with an...

 and Bangladesh
Bangladesh
Bangladesh , officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh is a sovereign state located in South Asia. It is bordered by India on all sides except for a small border with Burma to the far southeast and by the Bay of Bengal to the south...

 was the first country in the world
World
World is a common name for the whole of human civilization, specifically human experience, history, or the human condition in general, worldwide, i.e. anywhere on Earth....

 to have an elected female head-of-state follow another which includes Khaleda Zia
Khaleda Zia
Begum Khaleda Zia is the former First Lady of Bangladesh , and then Prime Minister of Bangladesh, having served from 1991 to 1996, becoming the first woman in the country's history and second in the Muslim world to head a democratic government as prime minister. She served again from 2001 until...

 and Sheikh Hasina
Sheikh Hasina
Sheikh Hasina is a Bangladeshi politician and current Prime Minister of Bangladesh. She has been the President of the Awami League, a major political party, since 1981. She is the eldest of five children of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the founding father of Bangladesh and widow of a reputed nuclear...

.

Hinduism

Within Ancient Hinduism, women have been held in equal honor as men. Manusmriti for example states: The society that provides respect and dignity to women flourishes with nobility and prosperity. And a society that does not put women on such a high pedestal has to face miseries and failures regardless of howsomuch noble deeds they perform otherwise. Manusmrithi Chapter 3 Verse 56.

Within the Vedas
Vedas
The Vedas are a large body of texts originating in ancient India. Composed in Vedic Sanskrit, the texts constitute the oldest layer of Sanskrit literature and the oldest scriptures of Hinduism....

 the Hindu holy texts, Women were given the highest possible respect and equality. The Vedic
Vedic
Vedic may refer to:* the Vedas, the oldest preserved Indic texts** Vedic Sanskrit, the language of these texts** Vedic period, during which these texts were produced** Vedic pantheon of gods mentioned in Vedas/vedic period...

 period was glorified by this tradition. Many rishis were women. Indeed several of them authored many of the slokas in the Vedas. For instance, in the Rigveda there is a list of women rishis. Some of them are: Ghoshsha, Godha
Godha
The Godha are Hindu caste found in the state of Gujarat in India. They are also known as Gondha and Gonda. The Godha use Dengar as a community surname.-History and origin:...

, Gargi, Vishwawra, Apala, Upanishad, Brahmjaya, Aditi
Aditi
Aditi in Sanskrit, an ancient Indian language. In the Vedas Aditi is mother of the gods from whose cosmic matrix the heavenly bodies were born...

, Indrani, Sarma, Romsha, Maitreyi
Maitreyi
Maitreyi was a Vedic philosopher from ancient India. She was the second wife of famous sage and philosopher, Yajnavalkya, the first being Katyaayanee....

, Kathyayini
Kathyayini
Kathyayini is the sixth form of the Durga, part of the Navadurga or the nine forms of Hindu goddess Durga or Shakti, worshipped during the Navratri celebrations....

, Urvashi, Lopamudra
Lopamudra
Lopamudra was an ancient Indian female philosopher. She was the wife of the sage Agastya. Together with her husband she is credited with spreading the fame of the Lalita sahasranama . She is also called Kaushitaki and Varaprada...

, Yami, Shashwati, Sri, Laksha and many others. In the Vedic period women were free to enter into brahmacharya
Brahmacharya
Brahmacharya is one of the four stages of life in an age-based social system as laid out in the Manu Smrti and later Classical Sanskrit texts in Hinduism. It refers to an educational period of 14–20 years which starts before the age of puberty. During this time the traditional vedic sciences are...

 just like men, and attain salvation
Salvation
Within religion salvation is the phenomenon of being saved from the undesirable condition of bondage or suffering experienced by the psyche or soul that has arisen as a result of unskillful or immoral actions generically referred to as sins. Salvation may also be called "deliverance" or...

.

During Hindu marriage ceremonies the following slokas are uttered by the grooms but, these days, their import little understood or ever attempted to understand.

"O bride! I accept your hand to enhance our joint good fortune. I pray to you to accept me as your husband and live with me until our old age. …" Rigveda Samhita Part -4, sukta 85, sloka 9702
"O bride! May you be like the empress of your mother-in-law, father-in-law, sisters-in-law and brothers-in-law (sisters and brothers of the groom). May your writ run in your house."- Rigveda Samhita Part -4, sukta 85, sloka 9712

This beautifully lyrical sloka from the Atharvaveda clearly states that the woman leads and the man follows: "The Sun God follows the first illuminated and enlightened goddess Usha (dawn) in the same manner as men emulate and follow women." Athravaveda Samhita, Part 2, Kanda 27, sukta 107, sloka 5705.

Women were considered to be the embodiment of great virtue and wisdom.
Thus we have: "O bride! May the knowledge of the Vedas be in front of you and behind you, in your centre and in your ends. May you conduct your life after attaining the knowledge of the Vedas. May you be benevolent, the harbinger of good fortune and health and live in great dignity and indeed illuminate your husband's home." Atharva Veda 14-1-64.
Women were allowed full freedom of worship."The wife should do agnihotra (yagna), sandhya (puja) and all other daily religious rituals. If, for some reason, her husband is not present, the woman alone has full rights to do yagna." Rigveda Samhita, part 1, sukta 79, sloka 872.

Moving on towards the Monotheistic era of Hinduism when such ideals such as Shaivism
Shaivism
Shaivism is one of the four major sects of Hinduism, the others being Vaishnavism, Shaktism and Smartism. Followers of Shaivism, called "Shaivas," and also "Saivas" or "Saivites," revere Shiva as the Supreme Being. Shaivas believe that Shiva is All and in all, the creator, preserver, destroyer,...

 and Vaishnavism
Vaishnavism
Vaishnavism is a tradition of Hinduism, distinguished from other schools by its worship of Vishnu, or his associated Avatars such as Rama and Krishna, as the original and supreme God....

, a specific deity for feministic worship was bought about under the Shaktism
Shaktism
Shaktism is a denomination of Hinduism that focuses worship upon Shakti or Devi – the Hindu Divine Mother – as the absolute, ultimate Godhead...

 branch. From a Hinduism point of view women are equal in all measures to men in comparison.

Judaism

Jewish feminism
Jewish feminism
Jewish feminism is a movement that seeks to improve the religious, legal, and social status of women within Judaism and to open up new opportunities for religious experience and leadership for Jewish women...

 is a movement that seeks to improve the religious, legal, and social status of women within Judaism
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...

 and to open up new opportunities for religious experience and leadership for Jewish women. Feminist movements, with varying approaches and successes, have opened up within all major branches of Judaism.

Neopaganism

Some currents of Neopaganism
Neopaganism
Neopaganism is an umbrella term used to identify a wide variety of modern religious movements, particularly those influenced by or claiming to be derived from the various pagan beliefs of pre-modern Europe...

, in particular Wicca
Wicca
Wicca , is a modern Pagan religious movement. Developing in England in the first half of the 20th century, Wicca was popularised in the 1950s and early 1960s by a Wiccan High Priest named Gerald Gardner, who at the time called it the "witch cult" and "witchcraft," and its adherents "the Wica."...

, have a ditheistic concept of a single goddess and a single god, who in hieros gamos
Hieros gamos
Hieros gamos or Hierogamy refers to a sexual ritual that plays out a marriage between a god and a goddess, especially when enacted in a symbolic ritual where human participants represent the deities. It is the harmonization of opposites...

 represent a united whole. Polytheistic reconstructionists
Polytheistic reconstructionism
Polytheistic reconstructionism is an approach to Neopaganism first emerging in the late 1960s to early 1970s, and gathering momentum in the 1990s to 2000s...

 focus on reconstructing polytheistic religions, including the various goddesses and figures associated with indigenous cultures.

The term thealogy
Thealogy
Thealogy, a neologism coined by Isaac Bonewits in 1974, is a discourse that reflects upon the meaning of Goddess and Her relationship to life forms. It is a discourse that critically engages the beliefs, wisdom, practices, questions, and values of the Goddess community, both past and present...

 is sometimes used in the context of the Neopagan Goddess movement, a pun on theology
Theology
Theology is the systematic and rational study of religion and its influences and of the nature of religious truths, or the learned profession acquired by completing specialized training in religious studies, usually at a university or school of divinity or seminary.-Definition:Augustine of Hippo...

 and thea θεά "goddess" intended to suggest a feminist approach to theism
Theism
Theism, in the broadest sense, is the belief that at least one deity exists.In a more specific sense, theism refers to a doctrine concerning the nature of a monotheistic God and God's relationship to the universe....

.

The Goddess movement is a loose grouping of social and religious phenomena growing out of second-wave feminism
Second-wave feminism
The Feminist Movement, or the Women's Liberation Movement in the United States refers to a period of feminist activity which began during the early 1960s and lasted through the early 1990s....

, predominantly in North America, Western Europe, Australia, and New Zealand in the 1970s, and the metaphysical community as well. Spurred by the perception that women were not treated equitably in many religions, some women turned to a Female Deity as more in tune with their spiritual needs. Education in the Arts became a vehicle for the study of humanitarian philosophers like David Hume
David Hume
David Hume was a Scottish philosopher, historian, economist, and essayist, known especially for his philosophical empiricism and skepticism. He was one of the most important figures in the history of Western philosophy and the Scottish Enlightenment...

 at that time. A unifying theme of this diverse movement is the femaleness of Deity
Deity
A deity is a recognized preternatural or supernatural immortal being, who may be thought of as holy, divine, or sacred, held in high regard, and respected by believers....

 (as opposed and contrasted to a patriarchal God
God
God is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....

).

Goddess
Goddess
A goddess is a female deity. In some cultures goddesses are associated with Earth, motherhood, love, and the household. In other cultures, goddesses also rule over war, death, and destruction as well as healing....

 beliefs take many forms: some people in the Goddess movement recognize multiple goddesses; some also include gods; others honor what they refer to as "the Goddess," which is not necessarily seen as monotheistic, but is often understood to be an inclusive, encompassing term incorporating many goddesses in many different cultures. The term "the Goddess" may also be understood to include a multiplicity of ways to view deity personified as female, or as a metaphor, or as a process. (Christ 1997, 2003) The term "The Goddess" may also refer to the concept of The One Divine Power, or the traditionally worshipped "Great Goddess" of ancient times.

In the latter part of the 20th century, feminism was influential in the rise of Neopaganism
Neopaganism
Neopaganism is an umbrella term used to identify a wide variety of modern religious movements, particularly those influenced by or claiming to be derived from the various pagan beliefs of pre-modern Europe...

 in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

, and particularly the Dianic tradition. Some feminists find the worship of a goddess
Goddess
A goddess is a female deity. In some cultures goddesses are associated with Earth, motherhood, love, and the household. In other cultures, goddesses also rule over war, death, and destruction as well as healing....

, rather than a god
God
God is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....

, to be consonant with their views. Others are polytheists, and worship a number of goddesses. The collective set of beliefs associated with this is sometimes known as thealogy
Thealogy
Thealogy, a neologism coined by Isaac Bonewits in 1974, is a discourse that reflects upon the meaning of Goddess and Her relationship to life forms. It is a discourse that critically engages the beliefs, wisdom, practices, questions, and values of the Goddess community, both past and present...

 and sometimes referred to as the Goddess movement
Goddess movement
The Goddess movement is an overall trend in religious or spiritual beliefs or practices which emerged out of second-wave feminism, predominantly in North America, Western Europe, Australia and New Zealand in the 1970s...

. See also Dianic Wicca
Dianic Wicca
Dianic Witchcraft and Dianic Feminist Witchcraft, is a tradition, or denomination, of the Neopagan religion of Wicca. It was founded by Zsuzsanna Budapest in the United States in the 1970s, and is notable for its focus on the worship of the Goddess, and on feminism...

.

See also

  • Divine Science
    Divine Science
    The Church of Divine Science is a religious movement within the wider New Thought movement. The group was founded originally in San Francisco in the 1880s under Malinda Cramer...

  • Liberation theology
    Liberation theology
    Liberation theology is a Christian movement in political theology which interprets the teachings of Jesus Christ in terms of a liberation from unjust economic, political, or social conditions...

  • Ordination of women
    Ordination of women
    Ordination in general religious usage is the process by which a person is consecrated . The ordination of women is a regular practice among some major religious groups, as it was of several religions of antiquity...

  • When God Was a Woman
    When God Was a Woman
    When God Was a Woman is the U.S. title of a 1976 book by sculptor and art historian Merlin Stone. It was published earlier in the UK as The Paradise Papers: The Suppression of Women's Rites...

     (Book)
  • Marianism
    Marianism
    Marianism may refer to:* a term used to describe veneration of the Virgin Mary, especially in the Catholic Church.* the English translation of the sociological concept of Marianismo....

  • Atheist feminism
    Atheist feminism
    Atheist feminism is a movement that advocates the equality of the sexeswithin atheism. Atheist feminists also oppose religion as a main source of female oppression and inequality, believing that all religions are sexist and oppressive to women....


External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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