Searching for the Holy Spirit

Feminist Theology and Traditional Doctrine

Anne Claar Thomasson-Rosingh

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2015
• Print ISBN: 9781138546271
• eBook ISBN: 9781317592679
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Religion

Is the doctrine of the Holy Spirit in Christian theology good news or bad news for women? Is the Holy Spirit in traditional Christian doctrine the guardian of the status quo or does it offer the dynamic possibility for change? How do the gifts of the Spirit, ecstatic and relational, inform feminist thinking of the Christian God. Opinions on these key questions vary wildly but are often formulated without coherent theological argument. Feminist theology has a history of questioning God the Father and God the Son - this study begins the theological questioning of God the Holy Spirit. Searching for the Holy Spirit brings feminist pneumatology into discussion with more traditional doctrine of the Spirit, notably the very significant early Christian treatise by Basil of Caesarea, De Spiritu Sancto. The results offer exciting new possibilities for both theology and the place of women in the church.

Part I
The Holy Spirit in feminist theology

A search

It is as though the Spirit has picked up a path left behind back when Christianity shut down its gender ambiguities, its communalizing complexity, and its perichoretic nuances in order to provide the empire with the kyriarchal service of Oneness.

(Keller 1996: 152)

I am searching for a part of the path of the Spirit, to see if it really opens up gender ambiguities, communalising complexity and perichoretic nuances. Perhaps I will find a clear direction in which way to go; maybe I will just find pieces of track that are lost again in the wilderness, but could be taken further; maybe I willfind highways that lead in the opposite direction. The reason I am searching is because I would like to join this path, follow it and subsequently help develop it for the Spirit in Christianity in this study.

The way in which I search is by reviewing feminist theology on the Holy Spirit, starting from feminist theology that has little reference to the Spirit and searching for increasingly more ‘Spirit-orientated’ works. Feminist theology that refers to the Spirit or has the Spirit as a topic can be divided into three categories. Thefirst is the largest because in the main body of feminist theology the Spirit has a marginal place. As an example of this forgetting of the Spirit, I will look at two works by Hampson (1990; 1996a). In these two books, the main thrust of Hampson’s feminist ideas comes through. The second category is concerned with books on the trinity in which the Spirit takes its place and is mentioned as one of three.¹ The third category consists of those writings that treat the Spirit as their main topic and could be called feminist pneumatologies.²

With these reviews I hope to show that, although some work has been done, there is little systematic feminist thought on the Spirit. The little that there is, I gather in these pages to reveal its diversity, creativity and opportunity for growth. I would like to argue that the lack of feminist pneumatology is not due to the unfruitfulness of the theology of the Spirit for feminist thinking, but rather that doing more critical theology on the Spirit might open up exciting possibilities for Christian feminist thought. I indicate that this critical thinking has to be done in dialogue with existing traditional pneumatologies and argue for the suitability of Cappadocian thought and Basil’s De Spiritu Sancto as a discussion partner.

Notes

1 Two main works will be discussed: She Who Is (Johnson 1992) and God for Us (LaCugna 1991).

2 Works that will be discussed include: The Raging Hearth (Victorin-Vangerud 2000), Die Weiblichkeit des Heiligen Geistes. Studien zur Feministischen Theologie (Moltmann-Wendel 1995), Zij waait waarheen zij wil (Bons-Storm et al. 1986), Sensing the Spirit (Prichard 1999), Life-Giving Spirit (Marriage 1989).

1 Forgetting the Spirit

Sometimes it can seem as if feminist theology has forgotten to mention the Spirit. Let me just give the example of three well-known names. In Daly’s seminal Beyond God the Father (1986) one chapter refers to God the Father, one chapter refers to Christ, but no chapter refers to the Spirit. The Spirit is neither found in the index nor in the passages on the trinity, whether unholy or holy. It seems that Daly sets both a precedent and an agenda for feminist theology. Ruether and McLaughlin mention in Women of Spirit (1979) that the Spirit makes space for the ‘ministry of women’ (19) but never elaborate this point or mention the Spirit again. Heyward (1984) equates the Holy Spirit with ‘sexuality’ (130) but writes more about the latter than about the former. These three examples are given as the tip of the iceberg. There is a large body of feminist theology in which the Spirit plays little or no role.

Sadly it is therefore impossible in the few pages of this book to review in depth all feminist theology that does not mention the Spirit. Instead, I would like to explore the work of one feminist theologian who ‘forgets’ the Spirit. My main interest is to analyse the nevertheless hidden pneumatology in her theology. Hampson’s work is especially interesting in this aspect because although Hampson does not write a lot about the Spirit, the term ‘spirituality’ is very important in her work. This gives me the assurance that there is a hidden pneumatology to analyse. I am also drawn to Hampson’s work because I wished to include in my search for the Spirit in feminist theology somebody who reflects on Christianity from the outside. And as I did not come across a ‘post-Christian’theologian in works in which the Spirit plays a bigger role, I had to include that voice in this section.

Hampson has a doctorate both in history and in systematic theology and was professor in theology at the University of St. Andrews. Her voyage through the church included membership of the Presbyterian Church of Scotland, the Anglican Church and the Society of Friends. Now she designates herself as a post-Christian who wishes to conceptualise God in continuity with the western tradition. It seems that for her theological journey, and for her journey through the church, her contribution to the fight for women’s ordination to the priesthood was important. It is significant that at the time this fight was lost.

In this chapter I am mainly looking at two of Hampson’s works – Theology and Feminism (1990) and After Christianity (1996a). Theology and Feminism explains how feminism and Christianity are mutually exclusive. Hampson critiques the historical nature of Christianity, the centrality of the male Jesus, Christian imagery (e.g. God as ‘father’) and Christian anthropology with, for example, sin at its centre. Hampson is sceptical about the alternative of a female God, as some feminists became ‘syncretistic’ in their renaming God. She prefers to start theology from an openness that captures the experience of God without the (Christian) mythology and anthropomorphic images.

In After Christianity, the argument from Theology and Feminism (that Christianity and feminism are mutually exclusive) is deepened and reworked. Again, the particularity of the person of Jesus and the historical context from which Christianity derives its sexism are dealt with. Hampson adds a critique of the structures of Christian theology and of the construct of woman and the feminine within Western religion. She then explores further what a post-Christian spirituality, both in theology and in practice, might look like. Hampson looks at feminist ethics in which the ‘self-in-relation’ is important. In this alternative to Christianity ‘there are powers on which we may draw; we are profoundly connected with what is in excess of what we are.’ Hampson’s ‘future theism’ is accompanied by a spiritual praxis of ‘attention, honesty and ordering’. Hampson places human beings at the centre of the stage.

In the following, I review the Holy Spirit in Hampson’s work in two stages. The first is a search for the empty spaces and the gaps, the moments in the argument in which Hampson might have been expected to mention the Holy Spirit. The second is the tracing of the emerging of the Spirit in ‘spirituality’ and in Hampson’s concept of God.

In search of the absent Spirit

Hampson’s aim in Theology and Feminism and in After Christianity is to repudiate Christianity as a patriarchal religion. Hampson describes the Christianity she refutes. It is fascinating to trace in her description the role and place of the Spirit. There are passages where you might have expected the Spirit to be mentioned but where there is no mention of the Spirit at all. In a few instances, Hampson does mention the Spirit (or topics relating to the Spirit) in the context of the trinity. In those passages it is interesting to look at the role of the Spirit Hampson describes.

The first place where I would expect the Spirit to feature is in Hampson’s definition of a Christian and her general remarks about Christianity. For Hampson, a Christian is somebody who, ‘in some way’, makes ‘reference to Christ’. Hampson does not mention that a Christian might be someone who is filled with the Spirit. Christians, Hampson writes, ‘believe revelation to have been given in the past’ and conservative faith is ‘a faith that theology is God-given and self-enclosed, unaffected by humanity’(1990:14,20). In this definition of a Christian, Hampson is ignoring Christian teaching about the Spirit. Pneumatology has room for revelation in the present, and a ‘faith’ that is a mix of human and God-given trust. Ruether (1990), in her critique of Theology and Feminism, has already made the same point. She explains that Christianity does not see revelation as unchangeable, because Christianity itself rose from the idea that the Spirit was disclosing new truths. Hampson’s definition of Christianity is even more starkly without Spirit. She defines Christianity as ‘a religion of the Son and the Father’ (1996a: 5). The Spirit is absent. Hampson’s general premises about Christianity are ‘Spirit-less’.

In Hampson’s arguments over and against Christianity, her omission of the Spirit leaves her open to valid counter arguments because her assertions could be part and parcel of a Christian pneumatology. Hampson writes of non-Christians that they may believe of God that God is equally available to people in all times and places, claiming that this is not the case for Christians. But Christians equally believe that God gives his Spirit to Jew and Gentile, slave and free, male and female (Gal. 3: 28). She also refers to feminists as people who are interested in self-actualisation, equality and the empowerment of others, which again in her argument is incompatible with Christianity. It is in the context of a discussion about the Holy Spirit that self-actualisation, equality and empowerment could be discussed in Christianity. In the same discussion, Hampson thinks that radical monotheism too easily tempts us away from a truly multiple integrity. Again the Spirit (as part of monotheism) is not mentioned, while it is the Spirit in Christianity who arguably guards diversity and multiple integrity.

Hampson treats the trinity as one of the central ideas of Christianity. In her discussion of it she tends to leave the Spirit out. She explains that, for some people, faith in the trinity has changed to polytheism; she writes: ‘a polytheism of two (perhaps three) gods’ (1990: 154). The ‘perhaps’ here is very telling in how she ignores the Spirit. She also refers to the ‘trinitarian expression of a movement between two poles’ (1996a: 265), but does not mention a third pole. The Spirit might, of course, be implied in the ‘movement’, but that is not made clear. Rather,

in Christianity we find the Trinitarian God conceived of as a relation, not between a female and a male pole, but between ‘father’ and ‘son’.( … ) (In the internal relations of the Trinity, in the absence of any female partner the male God alone generates the son.)

(1996a: 196)

I wonder what has become of the role of the Spirit in ‘generating’ a son?

Even so there are a few instances in Hampson’s discussions on the ‘trinity’ in which the Spirit is mentioned, or in which topics relating to the Spirit are mentioned. Hampson (1990: 58) explains how the classical view of the trinity, rather than being very suspicious because it originated in apatriarchal frame of thinking, might actually have saved this doctrine for feminists. In the patristic view of the trinity, in which the three persons are ‘alike in all save their mutual relations’, the maleness of Jesus is less exacerbated. For Hampson this theology is irretrievable because the philosophical framework that is necessary for it has been lost. Hampson does mention the Spirit as part of the trinity in this debate, but the Spirit’s role is not explored.

Hampson’s rendering of the doctrine of the trinity is ‘male’-centred and therefore part of the problem Hampson has with Christianity. Although feminists might value relationality within God, Hampson argues that the relationships within the trinity, even if they are believed to be equal, have not resulted in equality between God and humanity, or male and female, and are therefore of no value for feminists.¹ Moreover, according to Hampson the relationships within the trinity are a specificreflection of how men experience love in the sexual act and she even calls the doctrine of the trinity a manifestation of homoeroticism (1996a: 158–60).

As I understand Hampson, the problem with this sexually-motivated trinity is not the erotic but the exclusion of a female pole. The Spirit is not mentioned in this part of Hampson’s argument, but the connection between sexuality and the doctrine of the trinity brings to mind the, albeit loose, association of ecstasy in the experience of the Holy Spirit and in the experience of the sexual act. It might be interesting to ‘extend’ the doctrine of the trinity so as to include both the Spirit and women’s sexual experience.

The absent Spirit emerges in a pneuma-theology

There are a few instances in which Hampson discusses or mentions the Holy Spirit.² This is mainly in the context of gender. She argues that a female Spirit is not an appropriate counterbalance to a male Christ. She also maintains that it is not helpful to have female imagery or a feminine Spirit for feminists. The image of the Spirit that is given in these debates is ‘weak’, ‘undifferentiated’, ‘rather vague’, ‘diffuse’ and ‘lacking agency and subjectivity’. It gives women (yet again) a subordinaterole model. The (female)Spirit plays‘secondfiddle’to (the male) Christ.

Hampson’s argument is unconvincing as she treats two male theologians Hopko and Cobb as representative within Christendom, without acknowledging other Christian theologians that disagree with them. She seems to say that if one person can misuse or distort an idea, the whole idea is faulty. Hampson also works from the presupposition that, in Christianity, the Spirit is unconsciously seen as subordinate to Christ. Her argument is unclear and inconsistent in that ‘spirituality’ is positive for women even if it is ‘fragile’ and ‘fleeting’ (1996a: 285) but association with the Spirit is negative for women because the Spirit might be seen as diffuse and vague.

In a footnote Hampson explains that although her theology is ‘parallel’ to the idea that the self ‘embodies the spirit of the divine’, her concept of God is not to be associated with the Holy Spirit of Christianity.³ The big difference is, according to Hampson, that the Christian Holy Spirit ‘descends to (I want to write invades)’ creation but that she does not wish ‘to conjure up the idea of anything which is separate from or “more than” the creation’. In contradistinction, I would like to argue that Hampson’s conception of God could be seen in terms of Spirit, as the discussion on the dualism between ‘creation’ and ‘creator’is also part of Christia...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title page
• Gender, Theology and Spirituality
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Introduction
• Part I The Holy Spirit in feminist theology ‒ A search
• Part II The Holy Spirit in traditional theology ‒ An example
• Part III Freeing pneumatology ‒ An experiment
• Bibliography
• Index