More than 50 years ago, John Lennon wrote, “God is a concept by which we measure our pain.” Toying with his lyrics, it’s possible to express another observation: “God is a concept by which we muscle our gain.”
Man’s individual will to dominate and assert himself began thousands of years ago, long before the flowering of collaborative aggression that permeates much of humanity’s recorded history. As with other mammals, human males possessing an abundance of muscle and mass had an advantage over less endowed males. Bigger and stronger males could push aside weaker rivals for a first-in-line chance to swim in the gene pool. But with our strong two-legged ancestors, there was a covert hitchhiker; a swim through the pool was enhancing more than just muscle and mass. Along with the amplification of physical attributes, something else was growing: intelligence and the capacity for abstract thought. Homo sapiens (“wise men”) were emerging from the gene pool with more powerful brains that could both compliment and challenge the sovereignty of muscle and mass. Muscle, mass, and intelligence were stronger than muscle and mass alone, and intelligence increasingly became Homo sapiens’ pre-eminent attribute.
While the gift of enhanced human intelligence was not delivered exclusively to males, muscle and mass continued to be disproportionately allocated to them. Size still mattered; an equal distribution of intelligence did not alter the male-female imbalance of power. Larger and stronger males continued to dominate smaller and weaker females of comparable intelligence.
Meanwhile, the emergence of human abstract thought neatly coincided with another emergence: God. Seemingly, wherever human beings ventured, God followed. All around the world, every founding enclave of human expansion has articulated a concept of God (or gods). Whether in Africa, the Middle East, Asia, Europe, Australia, or the Americas, God, in some form or another, has provided context to the mystery of existence. But God provided more than an answer to mystery. Wise men learned that God could be cited to influence and manipulate human behavior. Wise men realized that God could offer an enhancement to muscle, mass, and intelligence. It was a moment of enlightenment: wise men with God were more powerful than wise men without God.
God’s arrival was not an equalization factor. From the outset, males controlled the God narrative. Already holding the reins of tribal/cultural power, the evocation of God provided a ready extension to male dominance. Unsurprisingly, males with ample power and charisma were the privileged recipients of nearly all acceptable godly communications. Strong males with superior “god-muscle” conveyed God’s will to those with less god-muscle (or none at all), and God became a convenient adjunct to male power and ambition. It’s been a near universal occurrence: where God appears, male power is enhanced and validated. Nowhere has this been more apparent than with the Abrahamic religions that pervade Western culture.
The refrain was set early (6,000 Biblical years ago). God created the first human couple (Adam and Eve) and placed them in a lush garden with but one stipulation: stay away from the apple tree. Were it not for a disobedient and gullible female, mankind might still reside in the earthly paradise of Eden. But Eve disregarded God’s clear warning and approached the tree where she allowed herself to be duped by a devilish snake. She then enticed Adam to join her in tasting the prohibited fruit. God was not pleased with their insouciant transgression, and as punishment, transformed Eden into the less than heavenly world that mankind populates today. Humans must now struggle on an imperfect planet because the first female allowed herself to be beguiled by a snake, and the first male allowed himself to be compromised by a female. Lesson learned: women are most gullible and require male oversight. Fittingly, through his prophet Moses, God instructed husbands to henceforth rule over their perhaps well-meaning, but naive wives. Women were declared subservient to men (Genesis 3:16), not simply because of male brawn, but because God (as proclaimed by a man) deemed males to be more scrupulous and of sounder temperament than females.
So, through the ordained word of Moses, thoughtful and compassionate men could point to something other than their biceps as justification for male dominance; faithful men were not just flexing primitive muscle, they were piously heeding the will of God. And faithful women, for their part, were not just bowing to male authority; they too, were following the will of God.
For thousands of years, godly men and women promoted (or at least accepted) the male-female power imbalance decreed by God and proclaimed through Moses. Perhaps because women were deemed less credible than men, or perhaps because it was men who compiled the tome of Biblical history, God almost always chose the mouth of a male to speak through. Nearly all prophets were male. In the 4,000 years of Old Testament recordings, there were a few females who actually did achieve minor prophetess status, but usually as advisors to decision-making men. Of the 55 prophets named in the Old Testament, 7 were women and of modest import. It seems that in whatever the societal strata, be it as rare prophet or as common home-making spouse, a pious woman was deferential to the men around her.
About 2,000 years ago, Jesus Christ appeared and was proclaimed by some to be not just a prophet, but the actual son of God. Those who believed he was the son of God became known as Christians. Those who believed that Jesus and his followers were exaggerating his gravitas held back and continued to honor their traditional faith. They became known as Jews. About 600 years after Christ, Mohammad came along and declared himself to be God’s final and most essential prophet. Those who believed him to be God’s ultimate messenger became known as Muslims. So, there came to be three main branches to the Abrahamic religion: Judaism (Jews), Christianity (Christians), and Islam (Muslims).
While they diverged in chosen prophets, all three branches maintained one common adherence: God-muscle was a male endowment (and some males were more endowed than others). In Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, God chose men for deliverance of important communications, and men were the appointed caretakers of God’s imparted will. In all three Abrahamic religions, the traditional prophets consulted for guidance were men, as were the clerics who nurtured the reverence for God and his prophets in temple, church, and synagogue.
The power dynamic governed for thousands of years. In much of the world, even where theocratic governance waned or disappeared, its legacy lived on. With or without a current godly decree, the male/female power imbalance had assumed a normalized acceptance. It was simply the way things were; mutual recognition of male ascendancy was a comfortable and time-honored compliance that avoided excessive conflict. Acceptance was enduring and broad enough that it hardly required the continuance of religious remembrance or justification. What had once been the thread of a godly proclamation was now woven into the fabric of societal perception. Male oversight was natural. Everything was male dominated: religions, governments, industries, and families (ostensibly) were controlled by men.
And then something happened. After nearly 6,000 years of relative stasis, much of the world’s population upholding the Abrahamic tradition wavered: perhaps a woman’s voice deserved political relevance. Hardly more than a hundred years ago (1920) and after almost 80 years of organized struggle (led by women), the Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was ratified, and women in the United States were politically enfranchised on an equal basis with men. The United States wasn’t alone, or even the first. Similar struggles were going on in many European countries and in other nations around the world. In little more than the blink of an eye (relative to 6,000 years) women in much of the Western world gained some political power; they could now vote for the man of their choice. And that limitation too, was soon upended; in the U.S. and elsewhere, women sought and attained political office. About a quarter of U.S. Congressional seats are now held by women. Governance is no longer an exclusively male fiefdom. While female representation still lags behind that of their male counterparts, more than a few countries have female lawmakers, and even heads of state.
So, have men stopped using god-muscle to subordinate women? If living in the United States or another such secular democracy, the ready answer might be a qualified “Yes!” While gender prejudice/discrimination still exists in governance and commerce, female political inclusion appears both obvious and culturally embedded. For citizens now living in most Western democracies, women’s suffrage has been a lifelong constant and shared male/female political power is an established norm. But even in our modern-day secular societies, religions continue to play prominent and ambitious roles. Clerical stewardship continues to be a male dominated privilege carrying the weight of a 6,000-year-old tradition. Comparatively, gender realignment has occurred in just an eye-blink of time (100 years). So, is the realignment truly permanent, or could it be reversed in another eye-blink? Were it to happen (as perhaps through an autocrat’s grab for power), our male dominated religions are still present and standing by, available to offer their 6,000 years’ worth of traditional assistance.
Meanwhile, in much of the world, the answer to the above question is a resounding “No!” In many countries, the use of god-muscle to suppress women is still religiously and governmentally sanctioned, and in some countries it’s more severely imposed than ever before. The Saudi Arabian monarchy, under Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, can be credited with easing some of the strictures imposed through Wahhabism. Nevertheless, god-muscle still affirms male domination in the country and allows Saudi men to nurture a hostile environment for women. Godly-sanctioned misogyny in Iran was put on world-wide display when Mahsa Amini was arrested by “morality police” for violating the Islamic Republic’s hijab mandate and died of head injuries while in captivity. The 2022 incident sparked protests across the country that were met with state-sponsored violent suppression. The hijab dictate is but a visible manifestation of the many repressive strictures placed on Iranian females. God-muscled male oversight provides “guidance” to nearly all aspects of female mobility. Probably nowhere though, is male god-muscle more severely exercised than in today’s Afghanistan. Their supreme leader, Hibatullah Akhundzad, guides the Taliban in exacting his version of Islamic domination over females more brutally than in any other country on Earth. Under his watch, women and girls have lost all semblances of freedom and independence and have been subjected to unspeakably violent atrocities perpetrated by men who pose their cruelty as reverence to Allah.
Will it ever end? We humans (mostly males) have wielded god-muscle through all of recorded history, and not just over women. God-muscle allows us to portray our ambitions and lust for power over one another as expressions of God’s will. When our endeavors are self-seeking, inhumane, or violent, we like to pretend they are in service to God. Putting God on our “man card” allows us to repress, enslave, murder, or exterminate fellow human beings as if in holy observance of the will of God, rather than as a rabid expression of self-indulgent aggression. When hearing, “To the glory of God,” or “Allahu Akbar,” outside of church or temple, there’s more than a slight chance that something terrible and ungodly is being ascribed to God.