[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/www.lilithinstitute.com\/lilithwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/creator-woman-photo-2-566×1024.jpg” alt=”Creator woman by Raphalalani” title_text=”Creator woman by Raphalalani” url=”https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/-\/es\/Naomi-Ruth-Lowinsky\/dp\/1421835606″ url_new_window=”on” align=”center” _builder_version=”4.27.5″ _module_preset=”default” width=”51%” custom_margin=”||7px|||” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.27.5″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n
Creator woman by Raphalalani<\/h5>\n
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\u201cShe is Creator of the Universe, and of Mankind\u2026She is Creator Woman\u201d<\/strong> \u201cThe Shekhinah\u00b9 is considered an alternative way of thinking about God in the orthodox community\u2026 not the major way of thinking about God\u2026 but not heresy at all.\u00a0 It\u2019s right there in the tradition.\u201c \u2013Blu Greenberg, co-founder, Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance, interview, 2001<\/p>\n \u201cHe created me in his image so he\u2019s inside, within me.\u201c \u2013 Hanna Motenda, Lemba translator at Hamangilasi village, 2001<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.27.5″ _module_preset=”default” custom_margin=”||7px|||” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” text_font_size=”15px” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n These and other voices are heard in my dissertation, \u201cFor She Is A Tree of Life: Shared Roots Connecting Women To Deity,\u201d an organic\u00b2 theological inquiry into cultural and religious identities, beliefs and practices among South African Lemba and European American Jewish women.\u00a0 Despite my best efforts to remain impartial\u2014a mindset I know to be flawed, since \u201cobjectivity\u201d cannot exist in social science research\u2014I look for woman in the Divine and divinity in Woman wherever I go.\u00a0 In both my academic research and my daily life, I constantly scan the horizon, consciously or otherwise, for maps, icons, symbols and other tangible images providing clues to the identity or presence of the ever-mysterious, intangible Sacred Feminine.<\/p>\n For many years I could only conceive of God as male and transcendent.\u00a0 During the course of my early studies this began to change; later, as I did my doctoral research, I came to see the Sacred Feminine as immanent, and deity as both female and male.\u00a0 How else could I image God if we are all made \u201cin God\u2019s image\u201d?\u00a0\u00a0 As I found Her in the lives and beings of other women and in myself, I was able to view even mundane activities as sacred.\u00a0 I saw that She was everywhere \u2013 in the ritual cleaning of pots, in the cooking and sharing of meals, in women\u2019s secular, daily conversations and laughter even in the face of adversity.<\/p>\n When I learned of the female face of God within Judaism, the Shekhinah, I\u00a0wondered why I had never heard about Her, why She was not part of\u00a0the Jewish liturgy or ritual I experienced growing up.\u00a0 I did not hear anything but passing references to her as an adult and was well into adulthood by the time I found Rabbi Lynn Gottlieb\u2019s work,\u00a0She Who Dwells Within. People would sometimes say to me, at times defensively, that Shekhinah is part of Kabbalistic or mystical Judaism, but they neglected to mention that She was first written about in the Talmud, the body of Jewish oral and written laws and commentary dating back to 200-500 C.E.\u00a0 Others would note that Jewish women are respected for their knowledge, for holding their families together and for their communal contributions, but there was never a mention of a female Godhead or deity.\u00a0 And so I remained keenly aware of the patriarchy that still lived and lives within Judaism, who the decision makers are in its formal institutions, and of the absence of Shekhinah\u2019s voice and that of the Sacred Feminine in other forms such as Asherah from most of our liturgy, chants and conversation. READ MORE<\/strong><\/span><\/a><\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.27.5″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” text_font_size=”15px” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n
\u2013Meshack Raphalalani, Venda artist describing his sculpture, 2001<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.lilithinstitute.com\/lilithwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/Divider1-1024x105.png\")
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