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The Shekhinah
Where can we find a powerful image of the Divine feminine within
Jewish sources? One name for Her which has been with us for centuries
is the Shekhinah, the “dweller within.” In ancient
times, the Shekhinah was a Talmudic word for the glory of God
that rested on the mishkan (the mishkan was the Tabernacle, God’s
sacred dwelling space in the wilderness (see Exodus 26-28). The
Israelites saw the “glory of God” (kavod adonai)
as tangible, powerful, and sacred, a pillar of fire or cloud guiding
the Israelites through the wilderness.
According to the Talmud, the Shekhinah, the Indwelling, is the
Divine that resides within the life of the world, dwelling on
earth with the Jewish people and going into exile with them when
they are exiled. While the traditional Jewish image of the transcendent
God is male, in the kabbalah, that image has been accompanied
by the feminine image of the Shekhinah—the inner glory of
existence.
In the Zohar (a medieval mystical work), there are ten facets
or sefirot of the Divine, and the Shekhinah (also known as malchut)
is the tenth and final one, closest to the created world. She
is a mystical embodiment of the feminine, earth-centered presence
of God, and was also called the bride of God, the Sabbath, the
Torah, the moon, the earth, and the apple orchard. Mysticism depicts
the Shekhinah as female, but she can be both female and male.
Two biblical figures who symbolize her are Rachel (wife of Jacob
and mother of the Israelite nation) and David (shepherd, psalmist,
and king of Israel). The Shekhinah rests on those who study, pray,
visit the sick, welcome the new moon, welcome guests, give charity
to the poor, dwell in the harvest booth called the sukkah, or
perform other sacred activities.
The Shekhinah embodies joy, yet she is also a symbol of shared
suffering and empathy, not only with a nation’s exile, but
with all the hurts of the world. Mystics believe that in messianic
times She will be reunited with her heavenly partner and that
they will become one. Many Jewish poets of the nineteenth, twentieth,
and twenty-first centuries have reclaimed her as a powerful feminine
image of God.
Yet the Shekhinah as She is portrayed by Jewish sources is not
a panacea for all that ails the way we look at God. Until recently
kabbalists have considered Her the lowest and most inactive part
of the Godhead, the last and least in a series of ten steps of
creation.
The Shekhinah embodies traditional feminine traits like passivity
and nurturing, and at the same time she is associated with death
and darkness. These images, taken uncritically, can be damaging
to women and to the male conception of the feminine. To discover
the Shekhinah as the full embodiment of the feminine Divine, we
must transform her from a stereotype into a living divinity who
speaks to us in many different kinds of voices: mother and daughter,
old and young, light and dark, compassion and anger, revelation
and mystery.
We can rediscover the Shekhinah throughout Jewish text, throughout
history, and throughout the natural world. God in the Bible is
sometimes mother eagle and sometimes Holy Wisdom crying out in
the streets. In the Talmud and midrash, the Divine is sometimes
portrayed as a nursing mother or as the (female) twin of Israel.
In the Zohar, there are multiple feminine God-images, such as
Binah (understanding), also known as Immah Ilaah
(the higher mother), who is called the womb and palace of creation,
the fountain of understanding, the well of souls. Then there is
Lilith, a mythic figure whom the tradition demonized but who for
some is the embodiment of sexuality and freedom.
We also cannot forget that the images and stories of the Shekhinah
are connected to traditions of the Divine feminine around the
world, from the ancient goddess Inanna, who is described as a
warrior for her people just as the Shekhinah is in the Zohar;
to the Virgin Mary, who is an intercessor in matters of Divine
judgment like the Shekhinah; to Kuan Yin of Asia, who embodies
compassion for those who suffer, just as the Shekhinah does. Jews
have been afraid to acknowledge the Shekhinah’s relationship
to goddesses and goddess-like images because of the traditional
Jewish prohibition against idolatry. Yet to deny our connection
to the Divine feminine as it is expressed and loved by others
is to deny our connection to the human, and feminine, religious
experience, and to render invisible some of the sources of our
own spirituality.
Today feminist theologians and earth-centered Jews have reclaimed
the Shekhinah as a unified deity in her own right, dwelling within
living things and the earth, seeking peace and promoting human
connection, speaking through women as well as men, working through
the neglected and invisible, promoting change and healing brokenness.
She is the Goddess—an image of the forces of life and the
mysteries of creation.
As a rabbi, a feminist scholar, and a seeker, I have been looking
for the Divine feminine for many years. In my own dreams, I have
seen the Shekhinah as a pregnant woman glowing with light, as
a great bird, as an old, secretive woman in a black robe, and
as a stone with feathers. While I constantly look for her in texts,
I believe that our own experience of Her will guide us toward
Her, if we can open our eyes and ears.
The Shekhinah, for some, is a reminder that there is no division
between creation and divinity. The Shekhinah allows us to break
through the exclusively male and hierarchical visions of God and
imagine a God that changes as we change, that evokes nature as
well as the supernatural. Melissa Weintraub writes: “Shekhinah,
Mother of all being, you are the stream that runs through our
veins, and dances through the soil....” When we speak to
the immanent Shekhinah, She speaks not to us, but through us,
and through all the varied facets of the world.
—Jill Hammer
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