Not even a month ago, Julian Rose sent me a piece on the Christian doctrine of Original Sin which delighted me no end.
Deconstruct Original Sin: It’s over, folks, let it go!
Now Julian outdoes even his own passionate discourse with the message that women who commented on that post inspired him to take on the Christian doctrine of Immaculate Conception, and how original semantic subterfuge of the word “virgin” excised the female aspect from the creative — SEXUAL — act and thereby set in motion the “crypto-male” war against all that is holy on and in our blessed Mother Earth.
A magnificent piece. Thank you, Julian!
Immaculate Conception – Or Dark Side Deception
0 thoughts on “Julian Rose: On the horrific legacy of semantic subterfuge of one word: “virgin””
Using the “Immaculate Conception — A Dark Side Deception” link opens another tab in my browser for my gmail account (?).
I think I fixed it. Sorry! Let me know if it doesn’t open a pdf now.
Christian misogynism is very well documented in the writings of patristic and medieval religious. People such as Justin Martyr, Tertullian, Origen, Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, Bonaventure, and even the 16th century reformers like Martin Luther and John Knox and John Calvin. If you read this material you can see that notions of “women” were from the beginning theoretically entrenched theologies of Original Sin and in other theories of higher and lower nature. Women were considered to be (like Eve) a source of temptation to men; therefore they were symbolically identified with evil and disorder. They had to be controlled, relegated to ordered spheres (marriage and family or cloister). Women’s bodies needed redemption either through childbearing or alienation from the body by virginity. In my opinion this illustrates the need for a revised theology of gender and sexuality that is not based upon ancient understandings (it was only in the last 150 years that scientists discovered the ovum and once and for all dispelled the myth that women’s only role in creating a child was to provide a place for the person to grow until birth) – yes, that is right, before then most people used this thinking to underpin their misogyny. We need something that does not make literal use of ancient myths and also discards this notion that we are corrupt (sinful) and replaces it with something more life giving. Yes, we are separated from our true self (that which is eternal) and part of our work here is to discover that true self and when we do to give that away to everyone because it is love. But separated though we may be does not equate to being sinners. Yes, we can in our search for ourselves, stumble and we can fall but for those of us who have discovered “LOVE” we are the ones who reach out and catch those who fall and stumble. When we do that they too might make a discovery.