HOLY GENDERS: Conception of the Divine

How the Internet Turns Spirituality into Gender Roles

1.    Introduction

Those who camp on the societal and spiritual side of social media must’ve come across the content which promises to align you with your femininity. They come in the form of reels with women in gardens wearing sundresses with the caption, ‘Imagine how much brainwashing it took to convince us that this is oppressive’, and in the form of Instagram carousals with a black background and Aptos text explaining young boys what kind of woman deserves to be taken care of (Hint: A woman established in her femininity).

2.      What is Divine Feminine?

Divine feminine is a conception of divinity with traits the culture it is conceived in associates with womanhood. While bifurcating cosmic archetypal traits into genders one must know that nature exists without humans naming it, and when they do, the name is embedded into the framework of language, and the said language is based in the context of its culture. Which means Divine Feminine is an exalted variant of what the culture believes it’s women should represent.

3.    Conception of Divine Masculine and Divine Feminine in Different Cultures

Cultures throughout the world have a different standard of what they consider the epitome of femininity or masculinity. Here are some of the dichotomies you must’ve heard of, however, are they really dichotomous?

3.1. The Internet Thought

This is what we see on the internet, and I will call it, “The American Tradwife Narrative”. These are gender roles, but served with no spiritual or historic resonance, just fun little harmless reels. (Read: When you’re at the airport, the luggage disappears, all doors open on their own, food is free, and you somehow reach the destination).

Here, the masculine is;

·         Backbone/Base/Ādhāra

·         Protector

·         Provider

·         The “hot” (forward moving, outward-flowing energy)

·         The Sun

·         The structure

·         The director

While the feminine is;

·         Flow

·         Peace

·         Creativity

·         Being present

·         Nourishment

·         The Moon

·         The “cold” (receptive, inward-replenishing energy)

·         Intuition

On the surface it looks like a fair share of good qualities but it’s almost as if they’re making people cosplay sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system with the household as one functioning body–a metaphor that feels profound, but reduces complete human beings with lived experiences and perspectives to cogs with a single function.

And for individuals with richer inner lives there’s a spiritual reiteration of the same list, often targeted at women. (Read: I am not made for jealousy, drama, or stress. I was made for soft life, where I am pampered and my feminine energy revered). More often than not these arguments carry a classic Association Fallacy. Every spiritual, or calm person in general does not like being jealous, angry, or stressed, and being taken care of by your partner is a valid desire—for both genders—but for one of them to claim exclusive rights over a certain treatment like being led by, or being pampered, is unfair to the versatility of an individual.

I shall call this content, “Gemstone Gender Roles”. It includes the creators that defer to the Universe itself as a living, responding force, and preach incompetence to young women in the name of choosing peace. Their idea of Divine Masculine and Divine Feminine here is an energetic polarity. Some agree that every individual has both potencies but more often than not it melts down to women naturally embodying more feminine, mother earth, or Venus’s energy while men naturally embodying the masculine, Sky Father, or Mars energy.

But I must ask, do women and men naturally embody the traits of Sky-Earth, Venus-Mars, or are these traits differentiated on the basis of gender in the first place? Let us look at the traits of the primordial parent Gods for once.

Sky Father;

·         Provider of Sunlight (The source of nourishment)

·         Irrigator of Rain-seed

·         Overlooking eternally constant roof

·         Uniform

·         Distant

Mother Earth;

·         Provider of all life

·         Sustainer

·         Ever-present

·         Ever-changing

·         Embedded and embodied by all

·         Annihilator of life

If the masculine is the protector and provider, then how come Earth provides with all forms of life and tools to humans to protect themselves? If nourishment is a feminine function, how come the sun/sky provides it? If the feminine is all loving and selfless, then why does Mother Earth cause earthquakes, erupt volcanoes, flood rivers, and makes civilizations vanish?

 3.2. The Indian Thought

At first glance, especially to an uninitiated eye, the equivalent of Divine Masculine and Feminine seem to be Shiva-Shakti, and why wouldn’t that be the case when we have made Shiv-Shakti synonymous with Lord Shiva and Goddess Pārvati? But as a concept, Shiva is the unmoving cosmic consciousness and Shakti is Energy—Potential, Kinetic, Nuclear, Thermal—any energy is Shakti.

However, Shakti (energy) itself travels through two major Nādi (mediums/channels) in human body. The Idā Nādi, or the Lunar Channel on the left, and the Pingalā Nādi, or the Solar Channel on the right inside the backbone.

Activation of the Idā Nādi is preferred during;

·         Study

·         Long-term decision making

·         Socializing

·         In long journeys

·         During any auspicious setting

Activated Pingalā Nādi is preferred during;

·         Work-out (or any physically taxing task)

·         Giving a moving speech to the masses

·         During and after eating

·         Speaking up against the wrong (anything that requires courage)

And there’s a middle channel which should be activated during meditation, or prayers. This middle channel, called the Sushumnā Nādi, is the path to reach Shiva/the consciousness/the Sahasrāra (crown) Chakra.

The Yogic traditions make it clear that when Shakti acts through humanity to experience the world it expresses itself in solar and lunar modes. None of the modes is ideal to be in forever, sages have invented Prānāyāma (breath-control practices) like Anulom-Vilom, Chandra Bhedanā, Surya Bhedanā, Nādi Shodhan Kriyā, just to balance or switch between these modes when necessary. Balanced Idā and Pingalā give way for Shakti to travel through the middle channel and reach Shiva.

This spiritual concept is explained through the story of Goddess Pārvati realizing her true self to marry Lord Shiva. She is Shakti and He is Shiva not because energy is a woman and consciousness is a man, but because we live in a society that has two genders, and received insights are always bound to the constraints of receiver’s reality.

 3.3. The Chinese Thought

If there’s any philosophy which gets cherry picked more than Shiv-Shakti, it’s Yin-Yang. A Chinese person will insist that the Yin-Yang includes, but does not exclusively symbolize male-female, or good-evil alone. It is the symbol of how everything exists because of harmony and conversion of polarities into one another.

The Yin is;

·         Dark

·         Stable

·         Resting

·         Cold

·         Moon

And Yang is;

·         Bright

·         Flowing

·         Acting

·         Hot

·         Sun

The world isn’t divided into clear Yin and Yang, rather the same object can have Yin-Yang aspects. A mountain’s sunny side is Yang while dark side is Yin. The same breath’s inhalation is Yang, exhalation is Yin. In Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) organs that store are Yin and the ones that secrete or transform are Yang. Womb–the most feminine organ imaginable is both Yin and Yang since it houses the uterine lining and ovum, but also transforms the embryo into a fully formed child and pushes it out. The male reproductive organ too, has both Yin and Yang functions. It is the harmony between Yin and Yang that becomes the base for creation itself. Men and women are widely believed to have one dominant force, but the ideal state is balance, not the embodiment or perfection of a naturally present dominant force.

4.    The Ideal Romance

When the voices around you demand you to ‘do your part’ and wait for your better half to arrive you’re left needing them to come so you can start living fully, and when they do, you consume them like you consume water when you’re thirsty. You empty them into yourself.

It’s selfishness, and love is never selfish. Love is when two people, who can otherwise independently function in this world choose to share their lives with one another because it is a pleasure to witness them live their life, and a blessing that they chose to witness yours.

5.    Conclusion

What’s fascinating is that these traditions challenge the irony of internet discourse that demands both stability/base and action (opposing traits according to Yin-Yang, and Shiva-Shakti concept) from men alone. And the stable traits of Yin (considered feminine) align more with Shiva (considered masculine) than they do with Shakti–who is motion, further emphasizing how identification of a philosophic/spiritual concept with a gender is by no means universal and cannot be generalized to men and women around the world.

Humans are a part of an interconnected hence interdependent ecology, and within this marcoecology our individual body, mind, and self is an independent force of nature that does not require the closed loop of a symbiotic relationship with another person based on their sex. After all, life isn’t a job that requires the specialization of being a man or woman, rather it is an experience best lived by beings who are whole enough to share themselves with others.