Does God have a gender?

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Hello,

God is the Holy Trinity - Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. But my question is, does God have gender? I know that Jesus, in his human nature, was masculine.

Did God choose to simply reveal himself to us in the masculine gender, or is his essence masculine?

I guess I am asking because I have been thinking about how humans like to anthropomorphize things, and it has occurred to me that this is a point that a nonbeliever could (some day) bring up to me when discussing God’s existence.

Please, no opinions – I prefer theological, Church-approved facts 🙂
 
238 Many religions invoke God as “Father”. The deity is often considered the “father of gods and of men”. In Israel, God is called “Father” inasmuch as he is Creator of the world. Even more, God is Father because of the covenant and the gift of the law to Israel, “his first-born son”. God is also called the Father of the king of Israel. Most especially he is “the Father of the poor”, of the orphaned and the widowed, who are under his loving protection.
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239 By calling God “Father”, the language of faith indicates two main things: that God is the first origin of everything and transcendent authority; and that he is at the same time goodness and loving care for all his children. God’s parental tenderness can also be expressed by the image of motherhood, which emphasizes God’s immanence, the intimacy between Creator and creature. The language of faith thus draws on the human experience of parents, who are in a way the first representatives of God for man. But this experience also tells us that human parents are fallible and can disfigure the face of fatherhood and motherhood. We ought therefore to recall that God transcends the human distinction between the sexes. He is neither man nor woman: he is God. He also transcends human fatherhood and motherhood, although he is their origin and standard: no one is father as God is Father.
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From a Jewish perspective, the answer is No. Masculine references are grammatical.

God is neither male nor female, just not an ‘it’, if you get what I mean.
 
Being made in God’s image means that we have the rationality and freedom to choose to love, which is the essence of God. Our physical appearance is not tied to that at all.
 
Sarpedon said:
Being made in God’s image means that we have the rationality and freedom to choose to love, which is the essence of God. Our physical appearance is not tied to that at all.
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Are you sure about that?

Genesis 26;

…"Let us make man in our image, after our likeness…’
 
as I have been taught Jesus, God the Son, appeared to us on earth as man. God the Father and the Holy Spirit are “spirit” entities.

This is why it is a mystery – one God with three divine persons. We cannot comprehend what God looks like other than Jesus both God and man at the same time came to redeem the world – past, present and future.

If we are really good we should find out some day.
 
356 Of all visible creatures only man is “able to know and love his creator”. He is “the only creature on earth that God has willed for its own sake”, and he alone is called to share, by knowledge and love, in God’s own life. It was for this end that he was created, and this is the fundamental reason for his dignity:
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What made you establish man in so great a dignity? Certainly the incalculable love by which you have looked on your creature in yourself! You are taken with love for her; for by love indeed you created her, by love you have given her a being capable of tasting your eternal Good.
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Being in the image of God the human individual possesses the dignity of a person, who is not just something, but someone. He is capable of self-knowledge, of self-possession and of freely giving himself and entering into communion with other persons. And he is called by grace to a covenant with his Creator, to offer him a response of faith and love that no other creature can give in his stead.
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scborromeo.org/ccc/p1s2c1p6.htm

Furthermore, this article explains how God having a physical body as His basic nature is not correct (apart from the hypostatic union).

scborromeo.org/ccc/p1s2c1p6.htm
 
Zatzat said:
Are you sure about that?

Genesis 26;

…"Let us make man in our image, after our likeness…’
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“Image” and “likeness” can be intended as figures of speech. I mean, if someone says to you “you’re like a horse”, it doesn’t necessarily mean you look like a horse, and if someone says “you look like a horse”, you could have horse features, ie. long nose or jaw or something, but it doesn’t mean you really look like a horse.
 
Zatzat said:
Hmmm, in all my years, your the first person I’ve come across who hasn’t suggested that God looks like a man.

I think an awful lot of your brethren think just that.
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Really? I’ve never met someone who actually thought God had a body (apart from the hypostatic union). Maybe that’s because I’m a philosophy major. 😃
 
vera_dicere said:
“Image” and “likeness” can be intended as figures of speech. I mean, if someone says to you “you’re like a horse”, it doesn’t necessarily mean you look like a horse, and if someone says “you look like a horse”, you could have horse features, ie. long nose or jaw or something, but it doesn’t mean you really look like a horse.
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I would have thought the inspired word of God would have been crystal clear. Meaning that ’ image’ and ’ likeness’ would actually mean what they appear to say.
 
Zatzat said:
I would have thought the inspired word of God would have been crystal clear. Meaning that ’ image’ and ’ likeness’ would actually mean what they appear to say.
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The scripture’s aren’t crystal clear- otherwise we would not have 30,000 sola scriptura churches each claiming to have the correct interpretation. That’s why we need the Church to interpret things.
 
Sarpedon said:
The scripture’s aren’t crystal clear- otherwise we would not have 30,000 sola scriptura churches each claiming to have the correct interpretation. That’s why we need the Church to interpret things.
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I find it odd that there is any disparity, confusion or disagreement in a book that was apparently written by men who were directly and deliberately inspired by God.
 
God is LOVE. Love has no color and Love has no gender. Love knows no race and Love transcends all barriers. God is Love.
 
Gloria1 said:
God is LOVE. Love has no color and Love has no gender. Love knows no race and Love transcends all barriers. God is Love.
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The old testament doesn’t have a lot of love in it. It does however have a lot of death, blood and gore.
 
Zatzat said:
I find it odd that there is any disparity, confusion or disagreement in a book that was apparently written by men who were directly and deliberately inspired by God.
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They were inspired, but remained under their own volition- and therefore the writers imparted their own emphases and styles to the writings. That’s why we also need a direct interpretation by God.
 
Sarpedon said:
They were inspired, but remained under their own volition- and therefore the writers imparted their own emphases and styles to the writings. That’s why we also need a direct interpretation by God.
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Again, you would have thought God would have made certain is only Holy Book was written without any ambiguity.
 
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Sarpedon:
Sarpedon,

Thank you very much for this, it helped a lot.

So God has gender, only in so far as Jesus is a man because of the hypostatic union?
 
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