Those who are concerned about gender-inclusive language and imagery in the Bible often face a slog finding maternal or feminine terms. There is Spirit language that can skew feminine. Late Isaiah has a startling passage in which the restored Jerusalem is likened to a nursing mother, in quite graphic language. Paul writes about having been like a nurse or governess to a community he has been mentoring. But references are few and far between. So people tend to go nuts with this remark of Jesus’ about Jerusalem:
“How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings…”
This is hardly a maternal scene, though. Jesus may desire to gather the children of Jerusalem like a hen gathers her brood, but he’s just noted their penchant for killing God’s messengers, and what follows this lovely, nurturing image is a stark negative: “…and you were not willing!”
If Jesus is expressing maternal feelings here, they are those of a mother who’s been rejected by her offspring (much as he brushed off his own motherwhen she tried to persuade him to stop all this foolishness and come home?). This is a thwarted mother, whose invitations to loving embrace have been rejected, who knows her beloved children are more than capable of turning on her next. Hardly the nurturing feminine imagery we are looking for.
Yet, a thwarted mother is not a bad way to convey God’s experience with a faithless people, and a good deal less jarring than the way the prophet Hosea depicts God, as a cuckolded husband. Most of us can relate to times when we pushed away our mothers or fathers and tried to go our own way. I still wince at how mean and “I can do it myself!” I was to my parents the day they drove me to college. Sometimes it’s the only way we can attain independence.
Whatever the context in which that phrase is uttered, the image has life for us: Jesus’ desire that God’s people would consent to be brooded over, to be gathered under God’s almighty wings. In that image, we are little fledglings, not fully able to take care of ourselves or protect ourselves. We like to think we’re big and tough and self-sufficient, but look at us from God’s perspective: we are barely hatched, trying to figure out how to move in a straight line. And Jesus desires to gather us in community, and hold us in his love.
Puts a whole new spin on Easter chicks, doesn’t it?
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