Words are singularly the most powerful force available to humanity. We can choose to use this force constructively with words of encouragement, or destructively using words of despair. Words have energy and power with the ability to help, to heal, to hinder, to hurt, to harm, to humiliate and to humble.
The language we use reflects and in turn shapes the way we construct our experience of the world. (Plaskow acknowledges that)...all of these images of God are humanly crafted metaphors, but our metaphors emerge out of specific cultural and political context. When these contexts change, the old metaphors must change with them.
~ from "The Feminist Critique of God Language" by Dr. Neil Gillman, reprinted from THE WAY INTO ENCOUNTERING GOD IN JUDAISM, discussing Judith Plaskow's book STANDING AGAIN AT SINAI
