¹ Ramshaw-Schmidt, Gail, Worship 56 (1982): 117–131Google Scholar. This essay has been reprinted in Ramshaw, Gail, Searching for Language (Washington, D.C.: The Pastoral Press, 1988), pp. 189–204Google Scholar. All citations will be from this latter work.

² Ibid., pp. 198–199.

³ Ibid., p. 200. Hardesty, Nancy A., Inclusive Language in the Church (Atlanta: John Knox Press, 1987)Google Scholar, writes: ‘Using the male pronoun exclusively for God is theologically limiting and makes God into a gendered [i.e., sexed] object’ (pp. 101–102). We ask Ramshaw and Hardesty, Is the Christian God perceived to be less ‘male’ in genderless languages, such as Finnish or Hungarian?

⁴ Ramshaw, p. 202.

⁵ Johnson, Elizabeth, ‘The Incomprehensibility of God and the Image of God Male and Female’, Theological Studies 45 (1984): 441–465.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁶ Jewett, Paul K., God, Creation & Revelation: A Neo-Evangelical Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1991), pp. 44–48.Google Scholar

⁷ L'Engle, Madeleine, And It Was Good (Wheaton, lllinois: Harold Shaw Publishers, 1983), p. 25Google Scholar. Injustice to L'Engle, we must state that as far as we know she has not proposed this convention to the wider Church.

⁸ See, e.g., Christ, Carol, ‘Why Women Need the Goddess: Phenomenological, Psychological, and Political Reflections’, in Womanspirit Rising: A Feminist Reader in Religion (New York: Harper & Row, 1979), pp. 273–287Google Scholar. Christ is herself critical of sexneutral language for God because it does not force people to confront their sexism: ‘symbols of Goddess and God in Feminist Theology’, in The Book of the Goddess: Past and Present, ed. Olson, Carl (New York: Crossroad, 1983), p. 241.Google Scholar

⁹ See Lyons, John, Introduction to Theoretical Linguistics (London: Cambridge University Press, 1968), pp. 283–288.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

¹⁰ On notional gender, see Quirk, Randolph, Greenbaum, Sidney, Leech, Geoffrey, and Svarlik, JanA Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language (New York: Longman, 1985), pp. 314ffGoogle Scholar. The significant differences between grammatical and notional gender should not lead one to conclude that English nouns do not possess gender, nor should it lead one completely to reduce English gender to sex-reference (contra Ramshaw, p. 204). Gender is not sex. Gender as grammatical classification must also be clearly distinguished from gender as cultural-sociological identification of the learned behaviors of men and women. Duck, Ruth C. improperly conflates the two: Gender and the Name of God: The Trinitarian Baptismal Formula (New York: Pilgrim Press, 1991), pp. 32–40Google Scholar. For a thorough discussion of gender, see Corbett, Greville, Gender (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1991).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

¹¹ Quirk et. al., pp. 314–315.

¹² Kuryłowicz, Jerzy, The Inflectional Categories of Indo-European (Heidelberg: Carl Winter, Universitatsverlag, 1964), p. 244.Google Scholar

¹³ See, e.g., Palmer, Leonhard R., Descriptive and Comparative Linguistics: A Critical Introduction (London: Faber & Faber, 1972), p. 112.Google Scholar

¹⁴ For the purposes of this essay, ‘lexicon’ will signify the totality of open-class items.

¹⁵ Quirk et al., pp. 67, 71–72.

¹⁶ Evidence on both sides of the question is largely anecdotal. It seems to be true that the ‘consciousness’ of Americans has been ‘raised’ to a greater extent than that of peoples elsewhere in the English-speaking world. It follows from this assumption that Americans should be wary of extrapolating too much from their own experience. On recent movement toward an epicene pronoun, see Hook, Donald D., ‘Gender and Number in American English Pronouns’, IRAL XXVII (Feb. 1989): 64–66Google Scholar; and Hook, Donald D., ‘Toward an English Epicene Pronoun’, IRAL XXIX (Nov. 1991): 331–339.Google Scholar

¹⁷ English translations of the Bible assign feminine pronouns to wisdom in the book of Proverbs and the Wisdom of Solomon. The deciding factor here, though, is not the grammatical gender of hokmdh and sophia but the personification of wisdom as a woman.

¹⁸ Contra Ramshaw, p. 198.

¹⁹ On the masculine gender of the biblical God, see Fiymer-Kensky, Tikva, In the Wake of the Goddesses: Women, Culture, and the Biblical Transformation of Pagan Myth (New York: The Free Press, 1992), pp. 162–167, 187–189Google Scholar; Smith, Mark S., The Early History of Cod (San Francisco: Harper& Row, 1990), pp. 7–21, 97–104 passimGoogle Scholar; Hayter, Mary, The New Eve in Christ (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1987), pp. 7–44, 83–94Google Scholar; Achtemeier, Elizabeth, ‘Exchanging God for “No Gods”: A Discussion of Female Language for God’, in Speaking the Christian God: The Holy Trinity and the Challenge of Feminism, ed. Kimel, Alvin F. Jr. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1992), pp. 1–16Google Scholar; Frye, Roland M., ‘Language for God and Feminist Language: Problems and Principles’, in Speaking the Christian God, pp. 17–43Google Scholar; Mankowski, Paul, ‘Old Testament Iconology and the Nature of God’, in The Politics of Prayer: Feminist Language and the Worship of God, ed. Hitchcock, Helen (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1992), pp. 151–176Google Scholar; Arnold, Patrick, Wildmen, Warriors, and Kings: Masculine Spirituality and the Bible (New York: Crossroad, 1991), pp. 200–215.Google Scholar

^19a To speak of God as possessing masculine gender assumes the normative status of the Holy Scriptures and its grammatical-narrative identification of the deity. In fidelity to the gospel, the Church may not abstract from the biblical narrative to speak of a genderless, nonhistorical, nonanthropomorphic deity of whom no story may be told. Thus we are compelled to speak of the storied God who is assigned masculine gender yet who transcends the sexual and cultural categories of male and female. See Garrett Green, ‘The Gender of God and the Theology of Metaphor’, in Speaking the Christian God, pp. 44–64.

²⁰ OED (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1978), IV (F-G): 267. Note the following translated statement from a famous Gothic grammar: ‘The word gup, which according to its form is neuter, is used for the Christian God with masculine gender.’ Braune, Wilhelm and Helm, Karl, Gotische Grammatik, 13th ed. (Halle/Saale: Max Niemeyer Verlag, 1952)Google Scholar, §94, Anm. 3. But note especially this listing in the glossary of Moore's, Samuel and Knott's, Thomas A. respected Old English grammar, The Elements of Old English, 9th ed. (Ann Arbor: George Wahr, 1942), p. 310Google Scholar: [OE] God, masc, God [i.e., Christian God] [OE] god, neuter., masc. (heathen god)

²¹ OED, IV:267.

²² Ramshaw writes,‘ [S] ince God is not a male being, there is no need for the word goddess’ (p. 199). This statement is an example of theory triumphing over linguistic reality. If goddess were an unnecessary word, it would simply cease to be used. Given the burgeoning market for books on goddesses and the rediscovery of the Goddess by feminist, ecological, and New Age religionists, this obviously is not the case. Duck concedes that the word Goddess ‘may give credence to the idea that ‘the word’ “God” is masculine’, but she is willing to accept this for the larger goal of iconoclasm and the breaking of false images (pp. 36–37).

²³ See, e.g., Trible, Phyllis, ‘God, Nature of, in the OT’, in Interpreter's Dictionary of the Bible, supplementary vol. (Nashville: Abingdon, 1976): 368–369Google Scholar; Trible, Phyllis, God and the Rhetoric of Sexuality (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1978)Google Scholar; but cf. Miller, John W., ‘Depatriarchalizing God in Biblical Interpretation: A Critique’, Biblical Faith and Fathering (New York: Paulist Press, 1989), pp. 55–65.Google Scholar

²⁴ It is important, however, to distinguish descriptive metaphors and similes from vocative titles (such as ‘Father’, ‘Lord’, ‘Master’, etc.): the latter have unique reference and function as identifying titles of address. The notional gender of modern English (unlike more formal gendered systems) requires that the overt or covert gender of vocative titles agree with the gender of their referent. If the gender of the biblical God is masculine, then all vocative titles for God must also be masculine. (‘Father’ and ‘Lord’, e.g., are overtly marked for the masculine gender; ‘savior’ and ‘Redeemer’ only covertly so.) It is quite permissible to speak by way of metaphor or simile of (the gramatically masculine) God in feminine and maternal terms—under biblical and theological constraints, of course. It is grammatically impermissible to address God as ‘Mother’, which is a term explicitly marked for the feminine gender. To do so is to disrupt gender concord and thus confuse the hearer. (As we might expect, there are exceptions: e.g., one might address, with perhaps ironic intent, one's mother or female friend as ‘Dad’ when she is acting in paternal fashion.)

²⁵ See Duran, Jane, ‘Gender-Neutral Terms’, in Sexist Language: A Modem Philosophical Analysis, ed. Vetterling-Braggin, Mary (Totowa, New Jersey: Rowman and Littlefield, 1981), pp. 147–154.Google Scholar

²⁶ Scruton, Roger, ‘Ideologically Speaking’, in The State of the Lauguage, ed. Ricks, Christopher and Michaels, Leonard (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990), p. 121.Google Scholar

²⁷ Aryeh Faltz, ‘Comments on the Supplementary Liturgical Texts’ (Prayer Book Studies 30, 1990), p. 16.

²⁸ Contra Hardesty, p. 53.

²⁹ In a survey of an English hymnal, Brian Wren observes that of the 41 pronominal references to the Holy Spirit, 40 are masculine, 1 is neuter. He also notes that masculine titles are also assigned to the Spirit (e.g., ‘Lord’, ‘Father of the poor’). What Language Shall I Borrow? God-Talk in Worship: A Male Response to Feminist Theology (New York: Crossroad, 1989), pp. 118–119.Google Scholar

³⁰ This argument actually applies to the use of any single gender, though the biblical narrative disallows the assignment of the neuter or feminine gender to all three persons of the Trinity or to the one God.

³¹ See, e.g., Ong, Walter J., Fighting for Life: Contest, Sexuality, and Consciousness (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1981), pp. 167–183Google Scholar; Achtemeier, pp. 1–16; Hauke, Manfred, Women in the Priesthood? A Systematic Analysis in the Light of the Order of Creation and Redemption, trans. Kipp, David (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1986), pp. 121–194Google Scholar; Bloesch, Donald G., Battle for the Trinity (Ann Arbor: Sen-ant Books, 1985), pp. 29–41.Google Scholar

³² Levin, Michael, Feminism and Freedom (New Brunswick: Transaction Books, 1987), p. 252Google Scholar. The thesis that language determines thought is known in linguistic circles as the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis. In its strong form, it has received extensive critique. For an introductory discussion, see Devitt, Michael and Sterelny, Kim, Language and Reality: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Language (Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press, 1987), pp. 172–184, 201–206.Google Scholar

³³ Levin, p. 259. For a critique of the ideologization of language and grammar, see Scruton, pp. 123–129.

³⁴ We owe this point and example to Jenson, Robert W., ‘The Father, He…‘ in Speaking the Christian God, pp. 98–99Google Scholar. Also see Bolinger, Dwight, Language: The Loaded Weapon (New York: Longman, 1980), p. 95.Google Scholar

³⁵ Jenson, p. 99.

³⁶ Berger, Brigitte and Berger, Peter L., The War Over the Family (Garden City, New York: Anchor Press, 1984), pp. 48–49.Google Scholar

³⁷ This argument also applies to the use of Godself as an intensive pronoun. The sentence ‘God Godself is active in the life of God's Church’ is gibberish.

³⁸ Joseph C. Beaver, ‘Inclusive Language Re-examined’, dialog 27 (Fall 1988): 302–303. Also see Dennis Baron's account of the many unsuccessful attempts in the past two centuries to create and establish an epicene pronoun, Grammar and Gender (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1986), pp. 190–216Google Scholar. Baron concludes: ‘We cannot legislate new words into existence, and no unified mechanism of prescriptive grammar exists to enforce a rule, should we manage to agree on one. Furthermore, it is not likely that a new pronoun with ideal characteristics can be devised in the same way we create wonder drugs or market pet food’ (p. 215).

³⁹ Frye, p. 25. Cf. Paul K.Jewett, The Ordination of Women, pp. 44–47, 123–129.

⁴⁰ For some reformists the depersonalization of deity is itself part of the project. See, e.g., Rebecca Oxford-Carpenter, ‘Gender and the Trinity’, Theology Today 41 (April 1984): 7–25.

⁴¹ Brunner, Emil, Dogmatics, vol. 1: The Christian Doctrine of God, trans. Wyon, Olive (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1950), pp. 124–125Google Scholar. A discussion of the significance of anthropomorphism in Christian discourse is beyond the scope of this essay, but it does seem to us that it is at this point the theological issue must ultimately be joined. Post-Christian feminist Daphne Hampson agrees. See her Theology and Feminism (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Basil Blackwell, 1990).

⁴² Patrick Arnold, p. 200.

⁴³ It is important to distinguish linguistically-assigned stress, which is the phonological component of an individual's internalized grammar, from performance stress, which is the vocalized stress given to syllables and words by the speaker for a special purpose. In a given utterance the two may or may not be identical. We are grateful to Prof. Joseph Beaver for calling our attention to this point.

⁴⁴ Responding to the complaint of redundancy, Hardesty comments, ‘How strange that we never felt that way about using he. three or four times in the same sentence’ (p. 57). But this is precisely the point! The repetition of a noun linguistically stresses in a way that the repetition of a pronoun does not.

⁴⁵ See Bolinger, pp. 95–96.

⁴⁶ Ibid., p. 96. Bolinger was speaking specifically about the ‘clumsiness’ of the double ‘he or she’ pronoun in secular discourse.