[Antarananda]

Originally Posted by Angela

I understand the concept, alright, and I understand your point. I also reject the concept, heartily and blasphemously. "Masculine" and "feminine" metaphoric labels are harmful ones, was my point.

I don't see how it is harmful if I recognize that the world, with myself included in it, needs to cultivate more love, patience, compassion and tolerance to shift the present power dynamic towards one which is more peaceful and harmonious. I merely ascribed the label "feminine" to these traits because the original poster's beef was about religion having been historically patriarchal.

Hey, I'm a man and I'm espousing the cause of empowerment of women! A woman can be nurturing in ways a man cannot. All I'm saying is that it's time men learn to embrace those aspects of themselves. It's the macho attitude as exemplified by the likes of George Bush that have embroiled the planet in useless wars time and again.

Such concepts are routinely and systematically abused by religious and political individuals to control and manipulate male and female human beings.

Again, I don't see how celebrating and honoring traits exhibited by women as loving, nurturing, maternal beings can possibly lead to manipulation

"Universal yin-yang forces in all of nature" is a human invention, and an outdated one. Time to throw it out.

Ebb and flow, dynamism and passivity, positive and negative magnetic poles, are all natural phenomena, not human inventions.

Jesus and Buddha were not "embodiments of virtues", they were human beings who lived their lives in accordance with virtues. Why label those virtues as masculine or feminine? What good does that do?

See above.