Churches & Church Leadership
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God: An Anatomy
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.
"[A] rollicking journey through every aspect of Yahweh's body, from top to bottom (yes, that too) and from inside out ... Ms. Stavrakopoulou has almost too much fun."-The Economist
The scholarship of theology and religion teaches us that the God of the Bible was without a body, only revealing himself in the Old Testament in words mysteriously uttered through his prophets, and in the New Testament in the body of Christ. The portrayal of God as corporeal and masculine is seen as merely metaphorical, figurative, or poetic. But, in this revelatory study, Francesca Stavrakopoulou presents a vividly corporeal image of God: a human-shaped deity who walks and talks and weeps and laughs, who eats, sleeps, feels, and breathes, and who is undeniably male.
Here is a portrait-arrived at through the author's close examination of and research into the Bible-of a god in ancient myths and rituals who was a product of a particular society, at a particular time, made in the image of the people who lived then, shaped by their own circumstances and experience of the world. From head to toe-and every part of the body in between-this is a god of stunning surprise and complexity, one we have never encountered before.
"[A] rollicking journey through every aspect of Yahweh's body, from top to bottom (yes, that too) and from inside out ... Ms. Stavrakopoulou has almost too much fun."-The Economist
The scholarship of theology and religion teaches us that the God of the Bible was without a body, only revealing himself in the Old Testament in words mysteriously uttered through his prophets, and in the New Testament in the body of Christ. The portrayal of God as corporeal and masculine is seen as merely metaphorical, figurative, or poetic. But, in this revelatory study, Francesca Stavrakopoulou presents a vividly corporeal image of God: a human-shaped deity who walks and talks and weeps and laughs, who eats, sleeps, feels, and breathes, and who is undeniably male.
Here is a portrait-arrived at through the author's close examination of and research into the Bible-of a god in ancient myths and rituals who was a product of a particular society, at a particular time, made in the image of the people who lived then, shaped by their own circumstances and experience of the world. From head to toe-and every part of the body in between-this is a god of stunning surprise and complexity, one we have never encountered before.
Editorial Reviews
"A detailed and scrupulously researched book . . . [Stavrakopoulou] proceeds, in 21 chapters packed with knowledge and insight, to 'anatomize' the divinity from head to toe, starting with the 'standing stones' that marked the footsteps of deities in the Late Bronze and Early Iron Age and ending with images of God that enabled people to imagine that they were somehow communing with him 'face to face.'"-Karen Armstrong, The New York Times
"Brilliant . . . Fascinating . . . Boldly simple in concept, God: An Anatomy is stunning in its execution. It is a tour de force, a triumph, and I write this as one who disagrees with Stavrakopoulou both on broad theoretical grounds and one who finds himself engaged with her in one narrow textual spat after another . . . Great fun to read . . . A stunning book."-Jack Miles, Catholic Herald
"This book is a great rebel shout. . . [A] rollicking journey through every aspect of Yahweh's body, from top to bottom (yes, that too) and from inside out . . . Ms. Stavrakopoulou has almost too much fun."-The Economist
"In both Judaism and Christianity God is conceived as non-physical. In God: An Anatomy Francesca Stavrakopoulou shows that this was not yet so in the Bible, where God appears in a much more corporeal form. This provocative work will surprise and may shock, but it brings to light aspects of the biblical account of God that modern readers seldom appreciate."-John Barton, author of A History of the Bible
"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
"One of the most remarkable historians and communicators working today."-Dan Snow, author of On This Day in History
"In Stavrakopoulou's stunning dissection of historical religious texts, the real back-story and context of the God of Judaism and Christianity is revealed . . . Where pious theologians have abstracted him into emptiness, Stavrakopolou gives him back his substance, and he's so much more interesti...
"Brilliant . . . Fascinating . . . Boldly simple in concept, God: An Anatomy is stunning in its execution. It is a tour de force, a triumph, and I write this as one who disagrees with Stavrakopoulou both on broad theoretical grounds and one who finds himself engaged with her in one narrow textual spat after another . . . Great fun to read . . . A stunning book."-Jack Miles, Catholic Herald
"This book is a great rebel shout. . . [A] rollicking journey through every aspect of Yahweh's body, from top to bottom (yes, that too) and from inside out . . . Ms. Stavrakopoulou has almost too much fun."-The Economist
"In both Judaism and Christianity God is conceived as non-physical. In God: An Anatomy Francesca Stavrakopoulou shows that this was not yet so in the Bible, where God appears in a much more corporeal form. This provocative work will surprise and may shock, but it brings to light aspects of the biblical account of God that modern readers seldom appreciate."-John Barton, author of A History of the Bible
"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
"One of the most remarkable historians and communicators working today."-Dan Snow, author of On This Day in History
"In Stavrakopoulou's stunning dissection of historical religious texts, the real back-story and context of the God of Judaism and Christianity is revealed . . . Where pious theologians have abstracted him into emptiness, Stavrakopolou gives him back his substance, and he's so much more interesti...
Readers Top Reviews
paulclark42Joseph
I really loved this book. Francesca Stavrakopoulou is a professor of Hebrew Bible and Ancient Religion at a British university who occasionally makes programmes for TV. In this book, she draws on her knowledge of Egyptian religion and other south-wets Asian religions to help us understand the god of the Bible better. She also draws on her knowledge of Hebrew to show how Christian translators have modified the Hebrew Bible (a.k.a. Old Testament), airbrushing elements of the Biblical god that don’t fit in with their theology. She makes two key points. The first is that Christianity and Judaism are not Biblical religions; they are post-Biblical religions. Most of the Hebrew Bible was written in and refers to very different times when the concept of God was very different to the monotheistic Christian and Jewish concepts of God. The second is that Yahweh, the god of the Bible, started life as a fairly minor storm god in a larger pantheon of gods. The major god of this pantheon was El (whose name lives on in Israel). The Israelites prioritised Yahweh, who over time took on El’s attributes and even seems to have acquired his wife (renamed Ashera). In the centuries before the Babylonian exile, Yahweh retained many characteristics of a pagan god, and there is strong evidence that other gods were widely worshipped by the Israelites and Judeans. It was only after the return from Babylon that those who worshipped only Yahweh were able to centralise religious practice around him and the Second Temple in Jerusalem. Only then could true monotheism develop. As it did so, Jewish, and later Christian, thinkers found that the idea of a single, transcendent God was incompatible with the very physical god described in the Bible. It became common to see Biblical passages as analogous and esoteric, something we should not take literally but should instead read for the deeper meaning buried within it. Professor Stavrakopoulou disagrees. She thinks that when the Bible’s authors described Yahweh physically, they meant exactly what they said. The case she makes is compelling.
Mac McAleerpaulcl
The first impression of this book is that it is quite long (1) and that the title is not a metaphor. It is a book about the corporeal body of the Old Testament God. This explains the initially strange names of the different parts of the book, such as “Feet and Legs”, “Torso” and “Arms and Hands” (2). I was expecting the title to be a metaphor and the book to be about the history and development of the idea of the Old Testament God. This is discussed early in the book. El was the original high god, but the local god Yahweh took on more of his characteristics and eventually replaced him in the Bible. Yahweh was not a spirit (3), but a real, physical god (4); and he was definitely male. The corporeal approach took me a while to get used to. The Old Testament god is compared to the other gods of ancient south-west Asia (5), often with several detailed comparative examples given. I would have preferred a more conventional timeline, showing the development of Yahweh and all the other gods in the area. The physicality of Yahweh was often lost or obscured in translation. (6) When the book moves into post-biblical times the body of Yahweh dissolves into a finger or hand pointing or is not there at all (7), replaced by his angelic agents. In Christianity, the image of Christ appears and the discussion is more art-historical than corporeal. THE BOOK is divided into a useful Introduction followed by five major parts, an Epilogue and Notes etc. at the end. Each part is divided into chapters and each chapter has titled sections. It is well illustrated. There are two maps of the area in question and fifty-seven black and white matt figures embedded in the text. There are also thirty-three colour plates divided into two groups of eight pages each. The Notes, Bibliography and Index are extensive. _____________________________________________________________ (1) In total, the book is 583 pages. The text is 483 pages, followed by the Glossary (8 pages), Notes (68 pages), Bibliography (42 pages), Index (37 pages). (2) “The Christian construct of God as a transcendent, invisible and incorporeal being is a distorted refraction, not a reflection, of the biblical image of God. The real God of the Bible was an ancient Levantine deity whose footsteps shook the earth, whose voice thundered through the skies and whose beauty and radiance dazzled his worshippers. This was a deity who crafted god-shaped humans from clay, and breathed life into their nostrils. But this was also a god who wept and talked and slept and sulked. A god who felt and fought and loved and lost. A god who sometimes failed and sometimes triumphed. This was a god more like the best of us and the worst of us. A god made in our own image.” (Epilogue, Chapter 21, “An Autopsy”, page 422/423) (3) “This emerging theological emphasis on the hiddenness of God would eventua...
Restitution G.Mac
wish i was able to watch the TV series too! Her discoveries are very intriguing and sound!
VericRestitution
Look up interviews on YouTube. Her first "popular" book.
CésarCésarRobert
I was very excited about this book. But my excitement did not last. The cover was damaged and the binding is horrible!!! Just look the pictures!! I really need this book to my work, so I can not send it back. I’m very upset!
Short Excerpt Teaser
1
Dissecting the Divine
In June 2018, news platforms across much of the world published a photograph of God. ‘Does THIS photograph show the true face of God?' shouted one click-bait headline. ‘Science reveals the face of God and it looks like Elon Musk', teased another. Others, including NBC's website, were rather less sensationalist in their headlines: ‘The face of God is in the eye of the beholder'. The photograph in question showed a fuzzy black-and-white image of a middle-aged, beardless Caucasian male, with a soft, rounded face and just a hint of a smile (fig. 1). The image was produced by researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, who showed a demographically representative sample of US Christians a series of computer-generated faces embodying certain cultural stereotypes of emotional, ethical, social and spiritual values, and asked them to select those faces perceived to best reflect their mental image of God. Some of the faces were androgynous in appearance, while some were more feminine, and some more masculine. All the faces were grey, like a black-and-white photocopy, but some were lighter skinned and some were darker skinned. Some faces were expressive, some were seemingly blank. But each face was a canvas onto which the experiment's participants were free to project their own assumptions. The results were averaged out and used to create God's e-fit. Unsurprisingly, the study revealed that in the US, God is made in the image of a white American man.
Psychologists and social anthropologists have long understood that a very heavy dose of cognitive bias underlies the construction of the divine in human societies. But while modern studies like those conducted at Chapel Hill can tell us something of the psychological and social processes underlying this tendency, this is hardly news. Over two and a half thousand years ago, in the late sixth or early fifth century bce, the Greek intellectual and adventurer Xenophanes of Colophon had already arrived at a similar conclusion: ‘If cattle and horses or lions had hands, or were able to draw with their hands and do the works that men can do, horses would draw the forms of the gods like horses, and cattle like cattle, and they would make their bodies such as they each had themselves'. For Xenophanes, the human tendency to make gods in our own image was as much about local cultural preferences as overarching, lofty ideals, as the diversity of deities in his world attested: ‘The Ethiopians say that their gods are broad-nosed and dark-skinned, the Thracians that theirs have blue eyes and red hair'. As far as Xenophanes was concerned, the widespread assumption that the gods had bodies like those of their worshippers was inextricably linked to the notion that deities behaved very much like humans – and this was deeply problematic, for it inevitably cheapened the moral nature of the divine. Proof could be found in the Greek myths themselves: ‘Homer and Hesiod have attributed to the gods everything that leads to blame and abuse among men – stealing, committing adultery, and deceiving each other', Xenophanes complained. It was an objection rooted in his philosophically driven insistence that a god was inherently and necessarily a being ‘in no way like mortals either in body or thought'.
Similar ideas were soon championed by other Greek thinkers, most notably Plato (c. 429–347 bce), his student Aristotle (c. 384–322 bce) and subsequent generations of their elitist, learned adherents in the Graeco-Roman world, who theorized that the divine power ultimately undergirding the universe and everything in it was necessarily without a body – an incorporeal, invisible, abstract principle, force or intellect, wholly beyond and distinct from the material world. Not that these rarefied views made much of an impact on the religious lives of ordinary folk. Whether they were schooled in philosophy or not, and no matter the deities they worshipped, most people living in the Graeco-Roman world continued to envisage their gods as corporeal beings with bodies shaped like their own – much as they always had.
But towards the close of the first millennium bce, and into the early centuries of the Common Era, these erudite philosophical ideas would gradually come to shape the thinking of certain Jewish and Christian intellectuals, so that they began to re-imagine their deity in increasingly incorporeal, immaterial terms, drawing ever-sharper distinctions between the heavenly and the earthly, the divine and the human, and the spiritual and the bodily. It is the broadly Platonic notion of the otherness and unlikeness of the divine to anything in or beyond the universe that has shaped the more formal theological constructions of God in the Western religious imagination. And yet th...
Dissecting the Divine
In June 2018, news platforms across much of the world published a photograph of God. ‘Does THIS photograph show the true face of God?' shouted one click-bait headline. ‘Science reveals the face of God and it looks like Elon Musk', teased another. Others, including NBC's website, were rather less sensationalist in their headlines: ‘The face of God is in the eye of the beholder'. The photograph in question showed a fuzzy black-and-white image of a middle-aged, beardless Caucasian male, with a soft, rounded face and just a hint of a smile (fig. 1). The image was produced by researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, who showed a demographically representative sample of US Christians a series of computer-generated faces embodying certain cultural stereotypes of emotional, ethical, social and spiritual values, and asked them to select those faces perceived to best reflect their mental image of God. Some of the faces were androgynous in appearance, while some were more feminine, and some more masculine. All the faces were grey, like a black-and-white photocopy, but some were lighter skinned and some were darker skinned. Some faces were expressive, some were seemingly blank. But each face was a canvas onto which the experiment's participants were free to project their own assumptions. The results were averaged out and used to create God's e-fit. Unsurprisingly, the study revealed that in the US, God is made in the image of a white American man.
Psychologists and social anthropologists have long understood that a very heavy dose of cognitive bias underlies the construction of the divine in human societies. But while modern studies like those conducted at Chapel Hill can tell us something of the psychological and social processes underlying this tendency, this is hardly news. Over two and a half thousand years ago, in the late sixth or early fifth century bce, the Greek intellectual and adventurer Xenophanes of Colophon had already arrived at a similar conclusion: ‘If cattle and horses or lions had hands, or were able to draw with their hands and do the works that men can do, horses would draw the forms of the gods like horses, and cattle like cattle, and they would make their bodies such as they each had themselves'. For Xenophanes, the human tendency to make gods in our own image was as much about local cultural preferences as overarching, lofty ideals, as the diversity of deities in his world attested: ‘The Ethiopians say that their gods are broad-nosed and dark-skinned, the Thracians that theirs have blue eyes and red hair'. As far as Xenophanes was concerned, the widespread assumption that the gods had bodies like those of their worshippers was inextricably linked to the notion that deities behaved very much like humans – and this was deeply problematic, for it inevitably cheapened the moral nature of the divine. Proof could be found in the Greek myths themselves: ‘Homer and Hesiod have attributed to the gods everything that leads to blame and abuse among men – stealing, committing adultery, and deceiving each other', Xenophanes complained. It was an objection rooted in his philosophically driven insistence that a god was inherently and necessarily a being ‘in no way like mortals either in body or thought'.
Similar ideas were soon championed by other Greek thinkers, most notably Plato (c. 429–347 bce), his student Aristotle (c. 384–322 bce) and subsequent generations of their elitist, learned adherents in the Graeco-Roman world, who theorized that the divine power ultimately undergirding the universe and everything in it was necessarily without a body – an incorporeal, invisible, abstract principle, force or intellect, wholly beyond and distinct from the material world. Not that these rarefied views made much of an impact on the religious lives of ordinary folk. Whether they were schooled in philosophy or not, and no matter the deities they worshipped, most people living in the Graeco-Roman world continued to envisage their gods as corporeal beings with bodies shaped like their own – much as they always had.
But towards the close of the first millennium bce, and into the early centuries of the Common Era, these erudite philosophical ideas would gradually come to shape the thinking of certain Jewish and Christian intellectuals, so that they began to re-imagine their deity in increasingly incorporeal, immaterial terms, drawing ever-sharper distinctions between the heavenly and the earthly, the divine and the human, and the spiritual and the bodily. It is the broadly Platonic notion of the otherness and unlikeness of the divine to anything in or beyond the universe that has shaped the more formal theological constructions of God in the Western religious imagination. And yet th...
