This was originally posted on December 10, 2011
Recently, I saw the following line in a promotion for a book to which I contributed: “This volume includes voices from Christianity, Judaism, goddess religion, the Black church, and indigenous religions.” The editors of this book are to be strongly commended for expanding the dialogue in feminism and religion beyond the confines of the Christian hegemony in which it is still all too often framed. Nonetheless, I felt hurt and offended. I immediately wrote to the editors asking how they would feel if a book were promoted using the words: “This volume includes voices from Goddess religion and god traditions such as judaism and christianity.”
I am well aware that the conventions of English grammar dictate that the word “God” is to be capitalized when referring to the deity of the Bible and the Koran and in some other cases where a monotheistic deity is intended. I have been fighting this battle with editors of my work for years. Usually they automatically change “Goddess” to “goddess.” When I gained the courage to question this, an exception would usually be made for me, but the grammatical convention remained in force for other works by the publisher.
Feminists are well aware that the conventions of grammar are socially constructed. This is why we said forty some years ago that “man” did not “include woman” and that “he” did not “include she.” This is also the reason that many of us have argued that male language and imagery for God needs to be changed. We must also insist that “Goddess” always be capitalized in our own work and in works under our editorial control. Not to do so is to capitulate to conventions based in patriarchal, hegemonic, and colonial ideologies.
This brings me to the question of what to do about “Gods” and “Goddesses.” Here the issue is not simply the privileging of the Abrahamic traditions, but also a metaphysical preference for universalistic monotheism. Recently, I have been reading a number of feminist books on Hinduism. The authors often do capitalize “Goddess” when referring to a deity that conforms to monotheistic expectations, but use lower case when referring to localized or plural female divinities. Here is an example: “…there is one supreme Goddess who has many forms or who is the unity underlying all discrete goddesses.” In other lines from the same book we find: “a particular goddess like Parvati’”; and “scholarly interest in Hindu goddesses and goddess traditions.” As can be seen from these examples, lower case is used to refer to female divinities with particular names and to groups of female divinities. In books following these conventions, lower case would also be used to refer to groups of male divinities, especially in the phrase “gods and goddesses,” but (inconsistently) not necessarily to named male divinities, such as the “God “ Krishna.
After the author of an essay I encouraged her to submit to the Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion complained to me that the copy editor had lower cased both “Goddess” and “Goddesses” in her work, I spoke with the editors. I proposed that the standard convention of the journal should be to capitalize “God,” “Goddess,” “Gods,” and “Goddesses” in all cases. My argument was that to choose any other convention privileges male divinities and universalistic monotheism, following conventions that were established when grammarians believed that the Christian God was the only true God and extended grammatical privilege to the God of Judaism and the God of Islam. The editors accepted my suggestion.
It could be argued that all references to deities, including those to the “god” of Abrahamic traditions, should be lower case so as not to privilege hierarchical and transcendent understandings of deity. I do not disagree with this proposal in the abstract; the problem is that we cannot expect Christians, Jews, and Muslims to accept it. Moreover, if “God is the name for God” as Tillich once said, then the “G” words should be capitalized when used as proper names. But then do we say: “Goddess is the name for goddess”? And: “Goddess” in translations of invocations of Parvati, but “goddess Parvati” when the name is included and “goddess” in scholarly discussions of Parvati? Then do we also say “the god of the Hebrews” or “the Hebrew god Yahweh”? I think the simpler and more inclusive solution is to capitalize all of the “G” words whenever they occur. This seems to me to be the only practical way to put all Gods and Goddesses on the same grammatical, metaphysical, and postcolonial plane.
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I don’t remember reading this post before – what I recall from Carol’s more recent posts is that various goddesses can be experienced as aspects of Nature (as Carol did and I do). The latter of which I always capitalize because the Earth is so generally despised by the dominant culture. But I too struggle with this issue choosing to use both upper and lower cases depending on my context. I am not sure there is a ‘right’ way but I do resent it when christianized anythings are privileged over other religions… Part of this is bias of course, coming out of my own ‘her story’ and the rest is that which conservative ‘christians’ try to shove down my throat. I’m curious to know how others feel – as usual I love Carol’s Monday posts!
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I’ve never been particularly adept at capitalization rules, but after reading this and sitting with it a few moments, I would vote to capitalize God and Goddess equally. I would use the lower case in situations like ’goddammit’ though admittedly I rarely write that word anyway.
Thank you for the clarifying article.
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I think I agree at least in general – gosh so much depends on context doesn’t it?
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Yes! When I became a full-time Technical Writer, context was the first big lesson I was presented with!
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Reminds me of the battle I waged with my first book editor who did not want to capitalize Goddess. We went back and forth and he finally decided to let a poll of editors decide. No surprise the female editors wanted to capitalize Goddess and the male editors wanted to lower case goddess. They proved my point to him. I capitalized Goddess. And have in all my writings since. I don’t think this is as much as issue as it once was fortunately unless you’re reading some patriarchal publication.
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I am very interested in hearing what you have to say about nature Goddesses Sarah, i am familiar with Artemis being a Goddess of nature and I am aware of fairies protecting the natural realm, I would love to hear more about what you were speaking about.
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I am so pleased to see comments on Carol’s posts which are timeless. I almost never use that word wisdom – there is so little of it around – but Carol Christ was a true WISE WOMAN…. I love that you ask this question – it’s such an important one. If you dive into Mythology you will find goddesses of all kinds associated with Nature… Try looking up some of the winter goddesses like Baba Yaga… Carol’s position like mine was/is that some of us go through these goddesses and then experience them as aspects of Nature… We can personalize them or not – it doesn’t matter in the end in my mind because the reality of these energies is real and true. I loved Artemis still do – Also Persephone/Demeter – oh there are so many…. Hang around FAR and it won’t be long until you meet some! Women and Nature goddesses just go together!
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The grand irony of all this, is that the English word “God” comes from Greek Theos. Theos is one of the names for Zeus 😂 so they are calling the Abrahamic Higher Power by one of the names of Zeus. Whenever I tell Christians this, they lose their shit.
Also it should be noted that a bunch of God(desses) across the pantheons, are actually transgender. Zeus for example can become the Mother Goddess Dion or Dionesi. The name means “She Zeus”. And she can become pregnant all by herself without a single person touching her.
Also Shango the Yoruba warrior God of magic and fire and lightning and a bunch of other stuff, which includes masculine sexuality, can become a Goddess.
And his Wife Oya, actually changed herself into a man to join a battle with him. One of her epithets is “the woman who puts on pants to do war”.
Also, the Abrahamic God doesn’t seem to always be male either. At the very least, he has a wife or female counter part named Asherah. The Supreme Goddess of Creation.
And they had other Gods under them called the Elohim (the powerful ones) and the Asherim. Which I assume must be her God children.
The Latin Deus or Dei is the same as the Greek name Theos. So, Zeus!!!!!!!!!
And DION!!!!!!!
I wonder if Celine Dion realizes her last name is related to a female incarnation of the God Zeus?
Cheers,
– M
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