Reflections on God's Body,or,an Exercise in Examining the Limitations of Comparative Religious Studies for Understanding Israel's Theology of God

Abstract

How should we understand the allusions to God’s corporeality in the OT? Christoph Markschies book, God’s Body: Jewish, Christian, and Pagan Images of God, argues that for all religions of antiquity, including that of ancient Israel, “the notion that God possesses a body and form was thoroughly common sense” (x–xi). An examination of Israel's Scriptures, however, presents a more complex picture. This essay examines this complexity through the lens of Markschies’ magisterial study.