Dan Brown and the Sacred Feminine, Part 2 (of 4)
This post continues a four day series showing how Dan Brown's assertions that the Old Testament of the Bible supports the worship of a female goddess are wrong. Each day's post is a small chunk of a complete article at my website at www.NewMediaMinistries.org Endnote references will appear at the end of the series.
Assertion 2: Old Testament Judaism condoned sex with priestesses.
Brief Answer
It is true that during a particularly degenerate period of time some Jews practiced temple prostitution in the divided kingdoms of Judah and Israel (c. 931-c. 640 B.C.). However, this was not the norm and God did not sanction or approve of it. Therefore, if men thought they were experiencing the divine through physical union they were mistaken. They were just experiencing emotional bliss for a short moment, a subjective psychological experience they misinterpreted as connecting with God. They were forsaking the worship of the God of Israel to worship false gods. God punished this idolatry later by allowing the Northern and Southern kingdoms to be independently taken into captivity by surrounding nations. The Jews apparently learned their lesson, as that kind of idolotry has not been practiced since.
In Old Testament times God condemned the practice of temple prostitution for the Jews because it promoted a false view of God and His creation as well as a false view of how to relate to and be reconciled to Him. First, the Old Testament scriptures (especially Genesis 1) taught that there is one God, who is neither male nor female but Spirit. They teach that He transcends His creation. He is completely distinct from what He has created. There are no other gods and goddesses that control different aspects of creation. He alone ultimately provides for our needs through his grace and blessing. One cannot be united with God or manipulate his reproductive blessing through a ritual of sacred sex. We cannot do anything to earn His blessings. His blessings are motivated by His love, grace and mercy. Second, neither can we be reconciled to God through our own efforts (especially ritual sex). Instead, God Himself, through Jesus Christ, paid for our sins through His death on the cross. We are reconciled to Him by His love, grace and mercy. One can readily see there is a world of difference between the uses and attitudes toward sex in Judaism and Christianity and those of the ancient pagan religions (and neopagan religions today). Some Jews did attempt to import pagan sex rituals into their worship at the Temple but with disastrous results.
Tomorrow I will address:
Assertion 3: The Old Testament name for God proves they believed in the divine feminine.
Assertion 2: Old Testament Judaism condoned sex with priestesses.
Langdon to Sophie: "Men seeking spiritual wholeness came to the Temple to visit priestesses-or hierodules-with whom they made love and experienced the divine through phyiscal union." (Chapter 74, p. 309)
Brief Answer
It is true that during a particularly degenerate period of time some Jews practiced temple prostitution in the divided kingdoms of Judah and Israel (c. 931-c. 640 B.C.). However, this was not the norm and God did not sanction or approve of it. Therefore, if men thought they were experiencing the divine through physical union they were mistaken. They were just experiencing emotional bliss for a short moment, a subjective psychological experience they misinterpreted as connecting with God. They were forsaking the worship of the God of Israel to worship false gods. God punished this idolatry later by allowing the Northern and Southern kingdoms to be independently taken into captivity by surrounding nations. The Jews apparently learned their lesson, as that kind of idolotry has not been practiced since.
In Old Testament times God condemned the practice of temple prostitution for the Jews because it promoted a false view of God and His creation as well as a false view of how to relate to and be reconciled to Him. First, the Old Testament scriptures (especially Genesis 1) taught that there is one God, who is neither male nor female but Spirit. They teach that He transcends His creation. He is completely distinct from what He has created. There are no other gods and goddesses that control different aspects of creation. He alone ultimately provides for our needs through his grace and blessing. One cannot be united with God or manipulate his reproductive blessing through a ritual of sacred sex. We cannot do anything to earn His blessings. His blessings are motivated by His love, grace and mercy. Second, neither can we be reconciled to God through our own efforts (especially ritual sex). Instead, God Himself, through Jesus Christ, paid for our sins through His death on the cross. We are reconciled to Him by His love, grace and mercy. One can readily see there is a world of difference between the uses and attitudes toward sex in Judaism and Christianity and those of the ancient pagan religions (and neopagan religions today). Some Jews did attempt to import pagan sex rituals into their worship at the Temple but with disastrous results.
Tomorrow I will address:
Assertion 3: The Old Testament name for God proves they believed in the divine feminine.
Langdon to Sophie: "The Jewish tetragrammaton YHWH-the sacred name of God-in fact derived from Jehovah, an androgynous physical union between the masculine Jah and the pre-Hebraic name for Eve, Havah." (Chapter 74, p. 309)
What do you think?
posted by Gary Burger at 7:57 PM
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