Dan Brown's assertions about
the sacred feminine
Introduction
In The Da Vinci Code, Dan Brown makes several assertions about the worship of the sacred feminine in Old Testament Israel. In this article I address these assertions, quoting the actual dialogs in his book and providing the page number where it is found. I also include the chapter number in case the text appears on different page numbers in future editions. Second, I give Brief Answers to each assertion to show how it is wrong. I know that many people are only seeking a Brief Answer and will be satisfied. For those desiring more explanation I provide links to other resources that give more detailed background information to support my answers.
One of the main themes in the The Da Vinci Code is that early Christian leaders revised original Christian teaching to exclude goddesses and goddess worship. Other terms Brown uses are the "sacred feminine," "the feminine divine," and "sacred sex." Brown implies that because the worship of goddesses was ancient and common that it must be right. He sees Christianity's anti-goddess stance as wrong, misguided, and chauvinistic. He attempts to do this by making several (wrong) assertions including: (1) the Jews in Old Testament times worshipped a female goddess, Shekinah, (2) and used temple prostitutes to "experience the divine," (3) the sacred name for God was a union of masculine and feminine names for God.
Assertion 1: The Old Testament teaches that God had a female equal.
Langdon to Sophie: "Early Jews believed that the Holy of Holies in Solomon's Temple housed not only God but also His powerful female equal, Shekinah." (Chapter 74, p. 309)
Brief Answer
Dan Brown is trying to suggest that the Judaism of Old Testament times had two gods, one male and one female. This would make it a polytheistic religion that had pairs of gods just like the other religions of the time. Dan Brown is simply wrong. Its intense monotheism made Judaism distinct from all other religions of the time. The God of the Jews (and Christians) was and is one God who is neither male nor female. Sadly, some Jews at some times lapsed into worshipping other (false) gods (and were severely punished by God for it), but none of them were called Shekinah.
Shekinah does not refer to a goddess at all. Shekinah means "residence." Long after the Old Testament was finished, Jews used the term Shekinah to describe God's abiding presence and continual activity in the world and in the life of Israel.1
A little background in the difference between Judaism and other religions of the time will help us see this more clearly. I begin by defining two terms. Polytheism is the belief in the existence of many gods. Polytheism usually has elements of Pantheism, which is the belief that a god is inseparably linked to a material object like two sides of the same coin. For example, the sun would be the physical representation of the sun god. The river in front of you would be the physical representation of the river god, etc. Judaism and Christianity rejected this, teaching that there is only one God who created the universe, and that He is separate from it. The very beginning, the very foundation of the Hebrew Scriptures, Genesis chapter one, contains a strong polemic against polytheism and for monotheism. Therefore, if there is one and only one God who actually exists and is perfect in every way there is no need for any lesser gods. He created the natural universe to follow a program powered by inanimate natural forces so there is no need for gods to make nature work. In other words, the sun is an inanimate object that God created and follows natural forces to move (from our perspective) across the sky, so a god doesn't need to push, pull or carry it to make it move.
The word Shekinah then embodied two concepts that made the monotheism of Israel completely different from polytheism: First, God is "completely other" than the universe He created and second, He is still immanently present and at work in it. He was so interested in man's well being (which the other gods weren't) that He tangibly manifested His presence to Israel. The Targums, which were later Aramaic translations of the Hebrew Old Testament, did refer to the presence of God in the Holy of Holies as the "Shekinah" or "Shekinah Glory," and the Holy of Holies in the Temple certainly was the symbolic location of the presence of God, but this was the presence of the one and only God of Israel.2. This "glory of the Lord" (e.g. Ezekiel 9:3) was always understood to be a tangible manifestation of Israel's one God—Yahweh—never as a separate goddess. A proper understanding of Shekinah undermines Dan Brown's argument that the ancient Jews officially believed in a feminine god named Shekinah. Instead, it reaffirms Israel's official belief in one God who is neither male nor female but genderless Spirit.
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.
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)
Brief Answer
Dan Brown, like all conspiracy theorists, is manipulating the letters of words to read into them what he wants them to mean. He does this with other words and phrases throughout the book. What he comes up with, though, is nonsense. The word Jehovah is a German transliteration of the Hebrew word, not the other way around. Jehovah is derived from Yahweh. The next part of the nonsense is his "androgynous physical union between a masculine word and a female name." Think about it. That is nonsense. Did the words have sex or what? The fact is that Jah is simply an abbreviated form of Jehovah and is used mainly in the Psalms. So to say either Jah or Jehovah is to say the exact same thing. Finally, Jehovah does not derive from Eve's name. They both derive from a common word or family of words, the meaning of which I explain below in Appendix 1.
One God alone
At this point I would like to quote various Old Testament passages that make it clear that Judaism believed (and still does) in one God. There are no others. The very first of the Ten Commandments says: "You shall have no other gods before Me" (Exodus 20:3) The Hebrew can also be translated "besides Me" as the New International Version indicates in a footnote. The second commandment elaborates this prohibition to worship other Gods (Exodus 20:4-6).
Deuteronomy 12:1 - 13:18 makes it very clear that Israel is to follow God alone. It warns that if a prophet, a dreamer (one who receives revelations from God through a dream), a family member, or even a whole town says, "Let us go and worship other gods...do not yield to him (e.g. 13:8)." They are even to be put to death! "It is the Lord your God you must follow, and him you must revere (13:4)."
I Kings 11:1 - 13 tells us how God forbade King Solomon (King David's son and successor) to worship or build alters to foreign gods for his foreign wives. Solomon did anyway, and God promised, "I will most certainly tear the kingdom away from you and give to one of your subordinates...tear it out of the hand of your son." (which He did)
In the time of the prophet Jeremiah (627-586 B.C.E) , some of the Jews were worshipping a goddess referred to as Queen of Heaven (see 7:18, 44:17). She was called Ishtar by the Assyrians and Astarte or Ashtoreth by the Canaanites.3 But this and the worship of other gods and goddesses was a chief reason God punished the southern kingdom (Judah). In 586 the Babylonians destroyed Jerusalem and took thousands into captivity.4
The whole Bible, Old and New Testaments alike reflect and bask in this monotheism.
Conclusion
Although at different points in ancient Israel's history some of the Jews worshipped other gods besides Jehovah and even went so far as to employ religious prostitutes these practices were not part of the official teaching of Judaism nor were they sanctioned by God. In fact, there were always disastrous consequences for those who engaged in these practices. Dan Brown seems to be using his assertions to argue that Christianity derailed true religion, that we should be worshipping female deities as well as male ones and we ought to use religious prostitutes to "experience the divine." He seems to be advocating this practice, but I'd like to know what his wife would think about him going to a religious prostitute.
References
1 Unger, Merrill F. Unger's Bible Dictionary. Chicago: Moody Press. 1966. 1008. and Drumwright, Jr, H. L. "Shekinah." Volume Five Q-Z. Gen. ed. Merrill C. Tenney. Vol. 5 of The Zondervan Pictorial Encyclopedia of the Bible. Grand Rapids: Regency Reference Library-Zondervan. 1976. 5 vols. p. 388-391.
2 Ibid. p. 388-391.
3 Alden, R. L. "Queen of Heaven." Volume Five Q-Z. Gen. ed. Merrill C. Tenney. Vol. 5 of The Zondervan Pictorial Encyclopedia of the Bible. Grand Rapids: Regency Reference Library-Zondervan. 1976. 5 vols. p. 4.
4 Schultz, S. J. "Jeremiah." Volume Three H-L. Gen. ed. Merrill C. Tenney. Vol. 3 of The Zondervan Pictorial Encyclopedia of the Bible. Grand Rapids: Regency Reference Library-Zondervan. 1976. 5 vols. p. 434-435.
see also: "Goddess Worship" at http://www.watchman.org/profile/godsspro.htm
see also: "Sophia Worship" at http://www.watchman.org/reltop/sophia.htm
Appendix 1
The letters YHWH don't make much sense to anyone who doesn't know at least a little about the Hebrew language. First, tetragrammaton is a fancy 14 letter word that simply means "four letter word for God." Second, Hebrew doesn't use the Roman alphabet like English, French, Spanish and German so the letters YHWH are transliterations of Hebrew letters. The reason this is important to know is that depending on the dialect you can spell it with the Roman alphabet either YHWH or YHVH. The W and V are interchangeable. Third, the Hebrew alphabet does not contain any written vowels, only consonants. The vowel pronunciations must be learned by memory. A combination of consonants can be pronounced differently and mean different things based on the vowels in any language. For example, the consonants rck can form the words rack, Rick, rock, rocky or ruck. The vowels supplied make all the difference in the meaning. Fourth,the reason the word is in all capitals (in English) is to show respect for God. Fifth, this reverence for God's name even caused the ancient Jews to not even pronounce it, so we actually don't really know what vowels originally went in between the consonants, and hence how to pronounce it. To avoid pronouncing it with the original pronouciation they supplied the vowels from another word for God "Adonay" (which means "my Lord") and changed the initial "A" to "E." (Sorry, but the reason for this last change is too complicated for the present explanation.) Therefore, the vowels "e," "o," and "a" were applied to YHVH to yield YaHoVah (or YaHoWah if you prefer). Since German had no "y" but instead used "j" for that sound the Reformation scholars transliterated the word as "Jehovah." Whew! I hope you're still with me.
Most Hebrew scholars view YHWH as a form of the word HaVeH. In this form it means "the one who is" or "the absolute and unchangeable one."1 When Moses encountered God, he asked God for His name. God replied, "YHVH." Many scholars translate this word, "I AM WHO I AM." In other words, God has always existed, exists and will always continue to exist. However, God doesn't just exist like some aloof god way up on Mt. Olympus. He is also not an impersonal force like the Force in Star Wars that seeks an equal balance of good and evil. He is a personal God. He is ever present among us and active in the affairs of life on earth to lead us to a saving personal relationship with Him.
The word and its relatives are as rich and varied in meaning and uses as the concept of existence. Eve's name derives from the same word. Adam gave her this name when it became apparent that the existence and life of all future humans depended on her. Just as God was the original giver of human life she would now be the giver of human life. The name YHWH is not derived from her name. They are both derived from the same word or family of words. Finally, as pointed out above, Jah (YH) is not a full name but a contraction for YHWH and is used most frequently in the Psalms (but not exclusively). All of this shows that the Hebrew name for God reinforces the idea that God is one God not many and certainly not a combination of a male and female deity.
References in Appendix 1
1 Brown, Francis. The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon: With an Appendix Containing the Biblical Aramaic. Peabody: Hendrickson Publishers. 2001. p. 218.
Copyright 2005. Gary C. Burger and New Media Ministries. This article may be reproduced and distributed freely as long as it is done so in its entirety. If quoted it must be properly cited as a reference.
