She Who Is: The Mystery of God in Feminist Theological Discourse

by Johnson, Elizabeth A.

• ISBN13: 9780824519254
• ISBN10: 0824519256
• Edition: 10th
• Format: Trade Paper
• Copyright: 2002-05-01
• Publisher: The Crossroad Publishing Company

Summary

Winner of the Louisville Grawemeyer Award in Religion. This classic explains what feminist theology is and how can we rediscover the feminine God within the Christian tradition. A profound vision of Christian theology, women's experience, and emancipation.

Table of Contents

Illustrations	x
Preface to the Tenth Anniversary Edition	xi
Acknowledgments	xiii
Part I BACKGROUND: SPEECH ABOUT GOD AT THE INTERSECTION OF MIGHTY CONCERNS
Introduction: To Speak Rightly of God	3	(14)
A Crucial Question	3	(3)
Context: Mystery Mediated in History	6	(2)
Purpose: Connecting Feminist and Classical Wisdom	8	(5)
Plan	13	(1)
Scotosis vs. the Glory of God	13	(4)
Feminist Theology and Critical Discourse About God	17	(25)
The Lens of Women's Flourishing	17	(2)
Speech about God at the Intersection of Mighty Concerns	19	(3)
Feminist Theology	22	(11)
Critique of Speech about God	33	(9)
Basic Linguistic Options: God, Women, Equivalence	42	(19)
Why the Word God?	42	(2)
Why Female Symbols of God?	44	(3)
Why Not Feminine Traits or Dimensions of God?	47	(7)
Equivalent Images of God Male and Female	54	(2)
Options	56	(5)
Part II FOREGROUND: RESOURCES FOR EMANCIPATORY SPEECH ABOUT GOD
Women's Interpreted Experience	61	(15)
The Dynamism of the Conversion Experience	62	(3)
Experience of Self, Experience of God	65	(2)
Moral Values	67	(2)
Image of God, Image of Christ	69	(7)
Scripture and Its Trajectories	76	(28)
A Hermeneutic of Revelation	76	(6)
Spirit/Shekinah	82	(4)
Wisdom/Sophia	86	(14)
Mother	100	(4)
Classical Theology	104	(20)
Divine Incomprehensibility	104	(9)
Analogy	113	(4)
Many Names	117	(7)
Part III SPEAKING ABOUT GOD FROM THE WORLD'S HISTORY
Spirit-Sophia	124	(26)
Divinity Drawing Near and Passing By	124	(4)
Forgetting the Spirit	128	(3)
The Human Analogue	131	(2)
Spirit-Sophia in Action	133	(8)
Speaking about Spirit	141	(5)
Speaking about God	146	(4)
Jesus-Sophia	150	(20)
Wisdom Made Flesh	150	(1)
Distorting the Christ	151	(3)
The Human Analogue	154	(2)
Jesus-Sophia in Action	156	(5)
Speaking about Christ	161	(6)
Speaking about God	167	(3)
Mother-Sophia	170	(21)
Unoriginate Origin	170	(2)
Eclipsing the Mother	172	(4)
The Human Analogue	176	(3)
Mother-Sophia in Action	179	(6)
Speaking about God	185	(6)
Part IV DENSE SYMBOLS AND THEIR DARK LIGHT
Triune God: Mystery of Relation	191	(33)
Tradition and Its Discontents	191	(6)
Freeing the Symbol from Literalness	197	(8)
Directing the Symbol toward Meaning	205	(6)
Female Metaphors	211	(4)
The Symbol Gives Rise to Thought	215	(7)
Speaking about the Triune God	222	(2)
One Living God: She Who Is	224	(22)
``No Real Relation'' and Women's Sensibility	224	(3)
Divine Nature: A Communion	227	(1)
Bespeaking God's Solidarity with the World	228	(5)
Female Metaphors	233	(3)
Divine Being, Sheer Liveliness	236	(5)
Speaking about the Living God: SHE WHO IS	241	(3)
To Practical and Critical Effect	244	(2)
Suffering God: Compassion Poured Out	246	(27)
The Apathic, Omnipotent God and ``His'' Critics	246	(8)
Female Metaphors	254	(11)
Divine Suffering	265	(4)
Divine Power	269	(2)
Speaking about the Suffering God	271	(2)
Epilogue	273	(2)
Notes	275	(32)
Index of Authors	307	(6)
Index of Subjects	313