/lit/ - Literature

>>16672693
>ahh this is the life

I'm interested in this, but I'm also interested in mysticism and I was never able to talk about this with anyone due to prejudice from both sides.

In whatever religion or mythology, there is a clear distinction between male and female. Yin and yang, the receptive female side and the active male side, anima and animus and so on. I have a hard time figuring out what is a social construct and what is a religious universal.

For instance, Yin is associated with women, but also with black, night, coldness, etc. At first I thought this put women on the negative side, but then I realized how biased our culture is towards Yang (we value only what's positive, unlike ancient China) and that, even though there are plenty of differences between yin and yang, there is absolutely no words on one being better than other (on the contrary, the truth is in their complimentary nature). To certain daoists, androginy is a virtue. Some assume an androgenous image for Christ too. But still, is the male and female principle just characteristics that could serve whatever gender or no gender? Are these ancient texts just telling women to be receptive and stay where they are and let men rule the world? Is there any wisdom to this at all? Are we misunderstanding ancient texts? Were they changed later by men?

Learning from hunter-gatherer societies or indigenous tribes, the roles of women and men are very different, but there is no one above the other in any way. On the other side, there is no sign of homossexuality and some people argue that's because either homossexuality is not natural (by homophobics) or because they expel, pressure to be different or kill homossexuals in the same way our society does (by gender theories).

Gender theories won't even bother with this, because to them religion and mythology is just patriarchic bullshit. Mystic people couldn't give less of a shit about gender theories, they are very conservative and moralistic. But I believe that all the nonsense from religion (and there is a lot) revolves a center point that is an universal truth that gets misunderstood with time, the more we focus on the words. Religious reforms happen when people realize the right color of a robe is not the crucial issue to get to divinity. So the essential would go beyond social constructs of gender (if that is really a social construct).

I heard from a theologist once that God making Eve from the "rib" of Adam is actually about God making Eve from the "side" of Adam, that is to say, side by side, equal in importance. That changes everything and I wonder whether it is true to other ancient concepts as well.

What do you think?