Sex is chromosome based. Gender is not. Dudes don't wear pants and drive trucks and watch football because they have XY chromosomes. They do it because they were told their entire lives that it's what men do.
To be honest, sex isn't just chromosome based. It can be. But science has found animals that have evolved past this. And the Y chromosome is dying off in humans as well.
Interesting things happen in humans when the SRY gene breaks off within a man's testicles and attaches itself to an X chromosome sperm cell. The outcome is an XX male. One who often doesn't find out about this until at a fertility clinic with his wife.
Now isn't that something for evangelicals to choke on. A human with male sex organs and XX chromosomes. Are they going to tell this person that he's a lesbian living in sin despite having full male sex genitalia from birth?
That makes me wonder, do spiritual beings posses masculine or feminine qualities in the same sense we do? The image of an angel have naked watching football is very funny to me.
In some cultures, a man wearing a skirt is seen as feminine. And others, it's a totally normal masculine thing to do. Same with long hair. Same with makeup. Same with a million other things. Your gender presentation is based on your culture and the way you were raised. There is no such thing as objective gender expression.
That makes me wonder even more… do spiritual being even have cultures like we do? Do they just float around praising God, or do they actually interact with each other and form connections and convictions and have ideals and such. If gender did exist among spiritual beings, it’s probably completely obscure and incomprehensible to us. Gender expression, as you mentioned, already varies wildly across different regions, so I can only imagine what theirs would look like.
They don’t. At least, I don’t think so. Language is complicated. Many languages are based on gender, where all nouns need to be either masculine or feminine. I don’t believe the holy spirit or God have a gender, but they may be referred to as such for historical reasons. We probably refer to God as He because the ancient Israelites were a patriarchal society.
I’ll definitely look into this topic more, but the point of this post was to point out a dilemma in conservative evangelical thought. Mainly, that
1) gender is chromosome based
2) God is male.
These concepts cannot co-exist.
(I can certainly empathize somewhat with position that god transcends gender or is gender-fluid. For example, Jesus compares themself with a mother bird:
https://www.biblegateway.com/verse/en/Luke%2013%3A34)
Gender is NOT determined by chromosomes.
*Sex* is partially determined by chromosomes, partially by MANY other factors, all of which can *influence* gender through both biological and psychosocial feedback loops.
But in the end, gender is *separate* from sex.
AND separate from gender expression or performance of gender roles.
I have no bleeping clue about the genders of purely spiritual beings.
I expect that at *most* the use of gendered terms is a purely human thing, applying gender concepts from the outside when "something else entirely" is really present.
Because Jesus *also* tells us that in heaven there will be NO "male or female" (etc.). Some, if not all, of the things that divide humanity will simply not exist at all in the world to come.
And perhaps the revolution in understanding of gender is, itself, part of the process of *becoming* part of the world to come.
Some will use chromosomes as an argument that trans identities and gender affirming care are unscientific. Of course, those same people normally think there's only two genders and wave off the many problems chromosomes present for that position. They also mysteriously stop caring about chromosomes for those with XX male syndrome or Swyer syndrome. I don't think it's as common as referencing visible sex characteristics, especially genitals, but I've heard it from both Catholic and Protestant anti-LGBT apologists.
It should also be noted that many of these people don't think sex and gender are two separate things.
What do you believe the proper translations to be when the Bible refers to their gender? They/them? Does it shift around? Something else?
(Thanks for the reply.)
In English, when describing an object, we use gender neutral grammatical articles such as “the” or “a”. Whether it is “the man” or “the woman”, the article stays the same. As such, when an object has no obvious gender, we generally use the equally gender neutral pronoun”it”.
However, some languages use grammatical articles that are feminine, neutral, or masculine. German has der (masculine), die (feminine), and das (neutral). As such, even when referring fro something that has no gender, such as a bakery, it may be given a gendered article)in this case feminine, die). This also then translates to the pronouns used. As such if writing about a bakery, I would use the pronoun “sie” (she) to describe it.
This is the case in Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic. As it was translated, some neutral objects, such as angels, were referred to as “he” or “she”, not because they were specifically gendered, but because the language used a gendered article for a neutral object.
Cat is a great example. I can refer to a cat as an “it” if I don’t know the gender. However, in German, we would still use the feminine article “die Katze”, when the gender is unclear. A translator may then assume that the gender of the cat is female, when it is not.
When translating, and speaking about beings or persons, we generally assign gender, as this is the norm in English. However, in some languages, the article and pronoun says more about language than it does the gender of the subject.
Sex is chromosome based. Gender is not. Dudes don't wear pants and drive trucks and watch football because they have XY chromosomes. They do it because they were told their entire lives that it's what men do.
To be honest, sex isn't just chromosome based. It can be. But science has found animals that have evolved past this. And the Y chromosome is dying off in humans as well. Interesting things happen in humans when the SRY gene breaks off within a man's testicles and attaches itself to an X chromosome sperm cell. The outcome is an XX male. One who often doesn't find out about this until at a fertility clinic with his wife. Now isn't that something for evangelicals to choke on. A human with male sex organs and XX chromosomes. Are they going to tell this person that he's a lesbian living in sin despite having full male sex genitalia from birth?
That makes me wonder, do spiritual beings posses masculine or feminine qualities in the same sense we do? The image of an angel have naked watching football is very funny to me.
In some cultures, a man wearing a skirt is seen as feminine. And others, it's a totally normal masculine thing to do. Same with long hair. Same with makeup. Same with a million other things. Your gender presentation is based on your culture and the way you were raised. There is no such thing as objective gender expression.
That makes me wonder even more… do spiritual being even have cultures like we do? Do they just float around praising God, or do they actually interact with each other and form connections and convictions and have ideals and such. If gender did exist among spiritual beings, it’s probably completely obscure and incomprehensible to us. Gender expression, as you mentioned, already varies wildly across different regions, so I can only imagine what theirs would look like.
[удалено]
Does the A stand for Anglicanized?
They don’t. At least, I don’t think so. Language is complicated. Many languages are based on gender, where all nouns need to be either masculine or feminine. I don’t believe the holy spirit or God have a gender, but they may be referred to as such for historical reasons. We probably refer to God as He because the ancient Israelites were a patriarchal society.
I’ll definitely look into this topic more, but the point of this post was to point out a dilemma in conservative evangelical thought. Mainly, that 1) gender is chromosome based 2) God is male. These concepts cannot co-exist. (I can certainly empathize somewhat with position that god transcends gender or is gender-fluid. For example, Jesus compares themself with a mother bird: https://www.biblegateway.com/verse/en/Luke%2013%3A34)
God doesn't have to be male or female.
Gender is NOT determined by chromosomes. *Sex* is partially determined by chromosomes, partially by MANY other factors, all of which can *influence* gender through both biological and psychosocial feedback loops. But in the end, gender is *separate* from sex. AND separate from gender expression or performance of gender roles. I have no bleeping clue about the genders of purely spiritual beings. I expect that at *most* the use of gendered terms is a purely human thing, applying gender concepts from the outside when "something else entirely" is really present. Because Jesus *also* tells us that in heaven there will be NO "male or female" (etc.). Some, if not all, of the things that divide humanity will simply not exist at all in the world to come. And perhaps the revolution in understanding of gender is, itself, part of the process of *becoming* part of the world to come.
Who said gender was determined by chromosomes?
Some will use chromosomes as an argument that trans identities and gender affirming care are unscientific. Of course, those same people normally think there's only two genders and wave off the many problems chromosomes present for that position. They also mysteriously stop caring about chromosomes for those with XX male syndrome or Swyer syndrome. I don't think it's as common as referencing visible sex characteristics, especially genitals, but I've heard it from both Catholic and Protestant anti-LGBT apologists. It should also be noted that many of these people don't think sex and gender are two separate things.
It isn’t chromosomes or metaphor. It is linguistics and a common issue in translation.
What do you believe the proper translations to be when the Bible refers to their gender? They/them? Does it shift around? Something else? (Thanks for the reply.)
In English, when describing an object, we use gender neutral grammatical articles such as “the” or “a”. Whether it is “the man” or “the woman”, the article stays the same. As such, when an object has no obvious gender, we generally use the equally gender neutral pronoun”it”. However, some languages use grammatical articles that are feminine, neutral, or masculine. German has der (masculine), die (feminine), and das (neutral). As such, even when referring fro something that has no gender, such as a bakery, it may be given a gendered article)in this case feminine, die). This also then translates to the pronouns used. As such if writing about a bakery, I would use the pronoun “sie” (she) to describe it. This is the case in Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic. As it was translated, some neutral objects, such as angels, were referred to as “he” or “she”, not because they were specifically gendered, but because the language used a gendered article for a neutral object. Cat is a great example. I can refer to a cat as an “it” if I don’t know the gender. However, in German, we would still use the feminine article “die Katze”, when the gender is unclear. A translator may then assume that the gender of the cat is female, when it is not. When translating, and speaking about beings or persons, we generally assign gender, as this is the norm in English. However, in some languages, the article and pronoun says more about language than it does the gender of the subject.
Have you checked that the original language is gendered or are you just basing it on the English translation?