gracedoes not exist without its light, Śiva cannot exist without Śakti, a form of
divine consciousness and creative power of the deity. From an iconograph-
ical perspective, the androgynous nature of Śiva is expressed in his pillar
or phallic form that rises from the yoni (vagina) of Śakti. Similar points can
be made about Krishna and the goddess Rādhā in Hinduism. The Greek
goddess Aphrodite, worshipped by the people of Cyprus as a bearded fig-
ure, is further described as possessing a woman’s body and clothing but
the beard and sexual organ of a male. Due to the sexual union of Eros, a
son of Aphrodite and Hermes, and the nymph Salmakis, the androgynous
Hermaphrodite is born. According to another tradition, he is the offspring
of Hermes and Aphrodite. In a Greek myth of Heracles, he exchanges
clothing with Omphale. On the island of Cos, the priests of Heracles don
feminine clothing in imitation of the deity. Roman worshippers of Hercules
also wear women’s garments, whereas worshippers of Dionysus, who
evolves from a virulent male figure to a later very effeminate deity, assume
the saffron-colored veil of women in imitation of their god.
In theistic religious traditions, theologians readily admit that God can-
not be genuinely known because of God’s transcendence, the limits of
human knowledge, and the inadequate nature of language to express the
nature of God. Beyond the categories of time and space, God is not an
object among other objects, which places God beyond human language
and knowledge. Thus, theistic theologians resort to apophatic theology,
a kind of negative path characterized by affirming what God is not. Other
theologians use another approach called the analogy of being (analogia
entis) that draws lessons between God’s nature as a Creator, for instance,
and what He produces. And still other thinkers argue that God is a projec-
tion of human wishes, whereas some postmodern thinkers claim that the
theistic God is indeed dead.
Further reading: Olson (2007); Peters (2003); Powers (1977); Ray (1976)GRACE
A concept that is germane in devotional types of religion. In the West,
grace is derived from the Latin gratia, and is connected to the notion of
gift. During the fourth century, Augustine, a bishop in North Africa, states
that salvation is a gift from God, rather than a reward for good deeds,
which leads to a protracted discussion within the Latin church about
merit and grace. For Augustine, grace is a liberating force affecting a