God: An Anatomy - As heard on Radio 4

Product Information

So, all in all, speaking as a semi-academic — master’s degree, knowledge of Biblical languages, etc.? I’d rate this 3 3/4 if you let me be precise. Stavrakopoulou’s relationship to her evidence shows her respectful and intrigued attitude. For example, she mentions walking barefoot around the footprints at the ‘Ain Dara temple. She draws readers, on multiple occasions, into a “narrative” about the evidence in hand — for example, about the clay ossuary from Pequ‘in — a beautiful way to contextualise or capture readers’ imaginations. The humour of the writing also makes it an entertaining read, and a welcome break from academic writing that is dry, stuffy, and pedantic. I'm exceptionally torn about this book, in a way I'm often usually not. Stavrakopolou is exceptionally learned; her knowledge of South-West Asian cultures, Levantine history, Ugarit scripture and Jewish folklore is second-to-none. She really does have an excellent grip on these cultures, or at least what has been left of them. However, she consistently seems to fall down flat when it comes to actual theological analysis. She constantly speaks of how the concept of a bodily God has always been present within the Bible insofar as God actually, physically having a body for believers in these ancient times. I just don't see it as correct; it is eisegesis at best, and downright misleading at worst. The formulation of “Breasts-and-Womb” was also applied to Athirat, an older version of Asherah, in the Syrian city of Ugarit. Nor the disturbing sexual violence, metaphorical or not, that He threatened on a “whoring” Israel, imagined as a young woman, in Ezekiel 16:

Good Lord, Stavrakopoulou touches that sweet spot that is scholarly, funny, visceral and heavenly. A revelation.” —Adam Rutherford, author of A Brief History of Everyone Who Ever Lived As an undergraduate, Francesca Stavrakopoulou observed “lots of biblical texts suggest that God is masculine, with a male body” and was told by her theology professor that these texts were metaphorical, or poetic. “We shouldn’t get too distracted by references to his body,” her professor asserted, because to do so would be “to engage too simplistically with the biblical texts”. In many of the more obviously folkloric narratives, such as the story of Abraham or the account of the call of Moses in the book of Exodus, the voice and agency of the divine is still a regular presence interrupting the human story. But in the very sophisticated account of the life of Joseph, written probably in the fifth century BCE, God is active obliquely and non-coercively, communicating through dreams. In the equally novelistic tales set in the court of King David – above all, the long narrative of the rebellion and death of David’s son Absalom – this obliqueness is even more evident. David L. Paulsen, “ The Doctrine of Divine Embodiment: Restoration, Judeo-Christian, and Philosophical Perspectives,” BYU Studies Quarterly35, no. 4 (1995–1996): 7–94.The Book of Mormon and the book of Moses were translated in 1829 and 1830, respectively. 4Thus, humanity’s physical resemblance to deity was one of the earliest truths restored in modern times—a truth which Joseph Smith himself surely understood even earlier thanks to his First Vision. 5

After all, what is it that comes below the hands, resting there at a man’s sides, but above his thighs? Stavrakopopoulou, smartly adducing support from the learned Daniel Boyarin, infers from this jewel-studded evocation of a nude male lover that a comparably jewel-studded sculpture of the nude male Yahweh once stood in the Jerusalem Temple. She draws repeatedly not just on her close reading of the Hebrew but also on her wide and resourceful use of relevant and surprisingly copious lexical and archaeological work done just since the turn of the millennium. The numerous works of Dr Paula Gooder are highly relevant to the specification. Her book, Phoebe, provides a novel insight into the early Jesus movement and the actions of Paul. It is also useful for considering the importance of hermeneutics when reading various biblical passages, particularly those relating to women, sexuality, marriage and the family. Here, the premortal Christ reveals that humanity was created in the image of His spirit body, which has the same form and appearance as His future body of flesh. Similarly, Joseph Smith’s inspired revision of Genesis 1:26–27, now canonized as part of the book of Moses, indicates that humankind is in the image of the premortal Christ, who in turn is Himself in the image of the Father: Tellingly, the prophecies of Daniel, from the second century BCE reintroduce images of a “high god” and a second heavenly presence, superficially reminiscent of the archaic Syrian model. But here the second presence is a glorified human figure representing the struggles and sufferings of the Jewish people. This figure is received into the heavenly court as a sign of the triumph, not of the savage regional empires of the period, symbolised by giant beasts at war with each other, but of “the holy people of the Most High” – a society of properly human character, living in devotion, justice and humility. It is an image that can be perceived clearly behind some of the early Christian language about Jesus. But it originally reflects a second great thought-shift in later Hebrew writings.God: An Anatomy, written by Professor Francesca Stavrakopoulou, is very useful. Here, she argues for a corporeal view of God in the Jewish scriptures and the Christian Bible. Numerous passages are provided to support her thesis as she moves from looking at those which focus on his feet, to his legs, torso and finally head. The book is useful for exploring how language about God should be understood (via analogy, symbols, the via negativa or something else). It also provides further thought for units focusing on the attributes of God, especially discussions surrounding whether the philosophical concept of God is supported by the Bible. An astonishing and revelatory history that re-presents God as he was originally envisioned by ancient worshippers—with a distinctly male body, and with superhuman powers, earthly passions, and a penchant for the fantastic and monstrous. Many of the texts in the Hebrew Bible problematically depict Israel as a woman, using sexualised metaphors — for example, equating idolatry with adultery, or worship of other gods with prostitution. Regularly, macho, hyper-masculine depiction of Yahweh, couched in sexualised language, occurs. Stavrakopoulou is right to point out that there are problems. Biblical scholars have a responsibility to steward, or curate, the biblical texts carefully, and to read ethically. God, as he is now understood by monotheistic religions, wasn’t always a singular deity. When Sargon II of Assyria conquered Israel in the eighth century BCE, he described seizing statues of “the gods in whom they trusted”. Who were these other gods – and what was Yahweh to them? Thanks to second-millennium BCE texts from the Syrian city-state Ugarit, we know that Yahweh was once a minor storm god of a wild, mountainous region south of the Negev desert. He was part of a large pantheon of Levantine gods headed by the patriarch El and his consort Athirat.