THE FEMININE HOLY SPIRIT OF PENTECOST

Receiving the Holy Spirit is a central tenet of Christianity and its beginning.

The backstory: Jesus has set his face towards Jerusalem where his destiny will be fulfilled at Passover. In the holy city he eats a final meal with his disciples, and he tells them that when he departs from this world, he will not leave them desolate (John 14). A counsellor and advocate, the Holy Spirit, will be with them and in them.

The baptism of Jesus in the Jordan river marked the singular purpose of the Christ about to be enacted in the world. That is why baptism, immersion in water, was one of the first Christian rites, although it was understood as more than John the Baptist’s baptism of repentance. John was the forerunner. Christ brought a new baptism by the Holy Spirit.

Sign of the divine feminine

We read that the Holy Spirit descended on Jesus in the form of a dove (Luke 3:21). As well as being a symbol of peace and renewal, the dove has long been associated with the divine feminine. This dove at the baptism directly references the Creation story in Genesis. The spirit, ruach, of God is feminine and bird-like it hovers over (m'rachephet) the face of the waters. In the original Hebrew language, m'rachephet is 'brooded like a bird' invoking the Wisdom aspect of the divine, like a mother bird warming the world-egg and hatching creation. As Wisdom says of the Creator in Proverbs 8:30, ‘I was beside him like a master weaver.’[1] The divine presence manifesting in the living world was familiar to Jews. It was the glory of God called Shekhinah a feminine noun.

Now through the Christ the Holy Spirit is heralding a new creation. In a real sense this spirit is one with Christ although revealed as a unique expression. The feminine Holy Spirit, a powerful aspect of the divine Trinity, works through nature’s elements of water, fire and air and comes to earth in Jesus the chosen human being. The promise is that She will abide in human consciousness.

In John 20:22 the Holy Spirit is depicted in the divine breath. Christ appears to disciples on ‘Easter Sunday’ evening. They are not named, although one may be Mary Magdalene who has just hours prior announced that she has seen the risen Lord. He breathes on them and speaks the words, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit’. For them the spirit flows on his breath and in the words he speaks carried on the air.

Did others who had been profoundly changed by Jesus during his life receive the Holy Spirit in similar ways? We don’t know although it is possible. Numerous encounters with the risen Christ are described in the gospels. But the only accounts of the Holy Spirit that have come down to us are John’s above and one more. In Matthew 3:11 the Holy Spirit is predicted as purifying fire. And this is the spirit’s expression at Pentecost, coming to a gathering of about 120 people as described in The Acts of the Apostles.

The master story takes over

The story in Acts of the Apostles become the dominant account of the coming of the Holy Spirit and this account is high drama indeed. Perhaps that is why it became the official version of Christianity’s beginning. It had the effect of overriding any other accounts. Cynthia Bourgeault calls it ‘the master story’.[2]  

Acts depicts Jesus appearing before disciples over a forty-day period telling them to wait in Jerusalem with the promise that that the Holy Spirit will come to them. So the disciples continued to meet in the upper room. Some of those who gathered there are named – the eleven men remaining from ‘the twelve’, the replacement disciple Matthias, Jesus’s brothers, his mother, and the women (although not named). At the Feast of Shavuot or Pentecost, fifty days after the resurrection, suddenly all 120 experienced a sound like a mighty wind and felt the powerful fire of the Holy Spirit upon each of them.

We only read about what followed for men there, well, mainly Peter who underwent such a dramatic transformation that from a rather ham-fisted individual he immediately became an inspired apostle and preacher of the gospel. John tagged along with Peter and two Greek disciples Stephen and Philip feature briefly. But the Pentecostal master story tells us nothing about the others, not even the mother of Jesus whose pure soul was a lightning rod and focus for the Holy Spirit.

Still, in the first century receiving the Holy Spirit meant disciples became apostles and went out to spread the message. Information gaps were filled in, partly by legends – Thomas journeying through Persia and as far as India, Andrew to Scythia north of the Caspian Sea, James to northern Spain, and Bartholomew to Armenia where he became patron saint of that church. Their dedication was understood to be confirmed by their various forms of martyrdom. Mary Magdalene gained many legends and in the Gospel of Mary (rediscovered in 1896) and the Nag Hammadi codices (found hidden in a cave in 1945) we may have genuine memories of her authority as an apostle.

Behind such legends of itinerant apostles, which were consolidated over the centuries, lies the story of the spread of Christianity. Behind this is a deeper reality of the spiritual seeds planted in those regions. The ‘Way’ of Christ began to take shape in communities across the Roman empire, some facilitated by Paul the extraordinary latecomer apostle.

I would love to know what the women did – those who were significant during Jesus’s ministry. Unlike most of the men they were present at the crucifixion, loyal and loving to the end – three Marys right beneath the cross, other women named Mary (it was a very common name), Joanna, wife of one of the ruler’s officials, Suzanna, Salome, Martha, and women healed by Jesus who may have chosen to follow him.  

Did they go out and from their own experience teach the word? Did they open their homes to seekers of wisdom? Homes did become the first churches, long before dedicated buildings. Women dominated early Christian gatherings (the ecclesia) and they did have leadership roles, which was at odds with the structure of society and religious practices with men as leaders, women as followers.

In Rome early Christians often met secretly in underground burial places, the catacombs, and covered the walls in images. Here is a first century drawing on a catacomb wall of a woman preaching or leading the eucharist. Her open raised arms are a liturgical gesture a priest will use today, sometimes with the words ‘Christ is in you’. The doves could indicate her message of the Holy Spirit.

Paul acknowledged women’s leadership. The church fathers exchanged ideas with certain female leaders. And for a while a few women remained in authority, even after 325 CE when the emperor Constantine made Christianity an official male-dominated religion. Female martyrs then became the main expression of love for Christ.

There are clues to be followed up for the very first female apostles. But most are lost to the records. We can’t find them now except through envisioning how it was for them and perhaps where they journeyed. Our imagination, which is to see the pictures spirit brings us, our inspiration, which is hearing the voice of spirit, and our intiuition, through which we know the life of spirit - these are the means of bringing them to life. And their lives will be powerful tools to honour the feminine Holy Spirit and the brave women who brought grace to the world through her potent presence in their souls. We need all their stories and more when women are still struggling to be accepted as the individuals they are spiritually empowered to be.

[1] ‘weaver’ is a close translation of the Hebrew. In some Bibles it is ‘craftsman’ or ‘worker’ or even ‘child’ (the latter perhaps prejudiced by the idea that God the Creator would never have a helper)

[2] In Cynthia Bourgeault, The Meaning of Mary Magdalene: Discovering the Woman at the Heart of Christianity