Thursday 27 April 2017

Plural language and the Trinity

Here is a quote from Nabeel Qureshi that delightfully ties in my points about French plural forms and knowing what the word Trinity refers to (previous post). It's from Qureshi's  2016 book No God But One; Allah or Jesus?, Chapter 6, the section entitled "The Trinity in the Bible":
"After emphasising that God created mankind in his image, the Bible then says he created them male and female. That's not to say God has genders, but it is to say that there is a plurality in his image. This is reflected in Scripture's use of him to refer to mankind, and then its switch to them. Mankind is in one sense singular, one humanity, but in another sense plural, composed of men and women. That is the image of God: both singular and plural. (p.58)
Who's to say that, far from being sexist, the French plural form in the masculine isn't in fact a glorious reflection of our status as divinely created and beloved beings?

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