anthropomorphism

n.

Attribution of human motivation, characteristics, or behavior to inanimate objects, animals, or natural phenomena.

anthropomorphic an'thro·po·mor'phic adj.
anthropomorphically an'thro·po·mor'phi·cal·ly adv.
anthropomorphist an'thro·po·mor'phist n.

A New York Times editorial made light of the idea that one can find role models in the animal kingdom, specifically in the documentary March of the Penguins:

"It may be fun to find a moral lesson in that enthralling penguin movie, but anthropomorphism, like after-shave, is best used sparingly."

Link: Penguin Family Values

Posted September 19, 2005.

See our Word Overheard blog to see interesting uses of strange words.

Having the characteristics of a human being. For example, an anthropomorphic robot has a head, arms and legs.

Download Computer Desktop Encyclopedia to your iPhone/iTouch

Anthropomorphism can refer to the representation of the gods in human form or, more generally, to the attribution of human characteristics to animals or to inanimate objects. In both cases it can be seen as a statement of human superiority — everything else that there is must be just like us — or as an attempt to understand that to which we have no direct cognitive access, by imagining it to behave just like us.

The gods of many ancient societies were thoroughly anthropomorphized, both in their form and in their familial and social relationships; for example, as presented in the Homeric poems which were familiar throughout the ancient Mediterranean world, they get drunk, marry, quarrel, and make up just like people. The Greeks solved the problem of how, in this case, the gods are any different from us by attributing to them alone the features of being ‘immortal and ageless’. Either the cause or the effect of these two (usually related) features lies in a different diet: the diet of the gods consists of nectar and ‘ambrosia’, which literally means ‘immortal’, and this leads to a different fluid flowing in their bodies. The Greeks called this fluid ichor. In classical myth, the anthropomorphic nature of the gods meant that gods and mortals were thought to be fully capable of interbreeding, although the gods could also take on forms other than their human ones by metamorphosis. However, immortality and agelessness continued to be the prerogative of the gods; neither the children of mixed unions, nor mortals who were especially precious to the gods, could share them. For example, the mortal Tithonos was loved by Eos, goddess of dawn, and was granted the power to ask for anything he wanted. He asked for immortality, but forgot to mention agelessness, so that he grew older and older until all that was left of his physical self was his voice.

The body of a god may function sexually just like a mortal body, and Greek mythology included the difficult labour of the female Titan, Leto, in which she gave birth to the twin deities Apollo and Artemis — the first-born child Artemis helping to deliver her own brother.

One consequence of imagining the gods in human form, so that in art the only way to tell which figures are divine may be their representation on a larger scale, is that it can make it easier to believe that some humans may really be gods. This was a feature of the Mediterranean world before Alexander the Great decided that his mother's stories of having been impregnated by a god in the form of a snake conveyed divine status on him. The idea that a man could show himself to be a god by achieving something which was impossible for a mere mortal, such as conquest of a large proportion of the known world, meant that subsequent great generals could hint at such a status for themselves. From the third century bc, there was increased contact with Egypt, where for many centuries anthropomorphic representations of the gods had existed alongside the belief in the divinity of the ruler. This fuelled belief in the possession of divinity by certain humans, culminating in the cult of the living emperor in the Roman world.

Christianity, in common with the Islamic and Jewish traditions, generally avoids anthropomorphism, but still proposes that connections between the divine world and the human world can result in the birth of a child who is divine, as well as representing God the Father in art as a benign patriarch.

The attribution of human — particularly emotional or mental — characteristics to animals, or even to inanimate objects, has a long history, from Aesop's fables to fairy tales such as ‘Goldilocks and the three bears’ and on to Beatrix Potter. Pleading with one's computer or cajoling one's temperamental car can be variations on this theme. The whole animal kingdom can be anthropomorphized, with the lion as ‘King of the beasts’, or the hive as a ‘Queen’ bee running her obedient ‘workers’. The ‘politics’ of such an animal world then act as a commentary on our own, with the animal representing the ‘natural’ way of acting. Additionally, individual species — such as the ‘wily’ fox — can be given a dominant anthropomorphic character trait; this enables different valuations to be placed on each species, and on each trait, within a given social context.

— Helen King

See also Greeks; metamorphosis; reproduction myths; Titan.

(from the Greek words meaning "human form"). The description of God in human terms. There are numerous anthropomorphisms in the Scriptures, e.g. such phrases as "the image of God," "the hand of the Lord," "His outstretched arm," "the eyes of the Lord," or "His footstool." The prevailing view has always been the one expressed in the rabbinic phrase "the Torah speaks in the language of men" (Ber. 316); in other words, that the Bible uses such terms because they are the only kind of language which humans can understand. This is a clear affirmation that the biblical anthropomorphisms must not be taken literally, but should be viewed as metaphors to describe the otherwise impossible-to-describe Divine Presence and God's involvement in the history of Israel and of mankind. When the Bible refers to the "outstretched arm" of God, it is taken to indicate something of His power. Similarly, the expression "the eyes of the Lord" is interpreted as a metaphor for Divine omniscience. The first Aramaic translation (Targum) of the Bible by Onkelos (first cent. CE) attempted to avoid some of the strongest anthropomorphisms by means of paraphrase. The rabbis of the talmudic period, while frequently using anthropomorphisms homiletically, were also keenly aware of the potential danger to the purely spiritual concept of God, should such anthropomorphisms be taken literally. They therefore had recourse to several phrases which sought to diminish such a possibility, for example, their use of the term ki-ve-yakhol, "if it were possible to say this... [of God]," and of Shekhinah, Gevurah, Ha-Makom (the Divine Presence, the Omnipotent One, the Omnipresent One) as descriptions of God's manifestation which did not involve any physical form.

Maimonides is particularly insistent on the need to understand all biblical anthropomorphisms as metaphors, in keeping with his philosophical system which denies that God has any physical form whatsoever. Even the phrase, "and the Lord spoke," is to be understood in a non-literal way, for God does not "speak"; the verb is therefore only a metaphor pointing to the mystery of the Divine communication with Moses and the people, which is beyond mortal comprehension. The paramount significance for Maimonides of the doctrine of the total spirituality of God, without any shape or form, can be understood from its inclusion in his 13 Principles of Faith. Maimonides' position was not universally accepted. One of his sharpest critics was Abraham Ben David of Posquière, who wrote that there were scholars greater than Maimonides who believed in the literal words of the Bible ascribing physical proportions to the Divinity (see his comment on Yad, Teshuvah 3:7). However, apart from the Kabbalah (Judaism's mystical tradition), the mainstream of Jewish theology follows the Maimonidean teaching that God has no physical form or dimension.

Strictly speaking, expressions ascribing human feelings to God, such as, for example: God willed; God repented His oath; God showed his anger or his love, are anthropathisms, a related but separate phenomenon. The rabbis of the Talmud used anthropomorphisms extensively, while a modern writer like A J. Heschel uses the concept of "Divine pathos" to emphasize the reality of God's nearness, especially His concern about human affairs.

---

Religions are typically expressed in anthropomorphic ways. The term comes from the Greek anthropos ("man") and morphe ("form") and refers to the human tendency to visualize nonhuman concepts in human form. We say the waters of a placid lake "lie still." A fire "rages" within a forest. Gods, spirits, and abominable snowmen take on human attributes.

This concept is summarized by Kurtis Schaeffer of the University of Alabama in a review of Stewart Guthrie's book Faces in the Clouds: A New Theory of Religion:

Our tendency to find human characteristics in the non-human world stems from a deep-seated perceptual strategy: in the face of pervasive (if mostly unconscious) uncertainty about what we see, we bet on the most meaningful interpretation we can. If we are in the woods and see a dark shape that might be a bear or a boulder, for example, it is good policy to think it is a bear. If we are mistaken, we lose little, and if we are right, we gain much. So in scanning the world we always look for what most concerns us-living things, and especially human ones. Even animals watch for human attributes, as when birds avoid scarecrows. In short, we follow the principle, better safe than sorry.

Genesis teaches that humans were created in the image of God (although the television character Archie Bunker of All in the Family fame would later remark, "I won't say you can't tell us apart"). Some posit that, in art and literature, humans have recreated God in our image, both "Father God" and "Mother Earth."

Although all religions, even pantheistic ones, tend to see God or gods in human form, anthropomorphic expression of the divine found full expression in the Greek pantheon. Gods were, quite literally, made in the image of men. This tendency, however, was predated by biblical descriptions of God as a being with human form (Exodus 15:3)-with feet (Genesis 3:8), hands (Exodus 24:11), a mouth (Numbers 12:8), and heart (Hosea 11:8)-while at the same time displaying human emotions (Exodus 20:5). To be sure, when God is described as "a consuming fire," natural forces as well have been called upon to conceptualize the divine.

Much later, the Qur'an attributes noble human emotions to Allah, calling him "most merciful" and reminding us that "Allah heareth and knoweth all things."

Biblical writers must have been aware of this tendency, because they grappled with the problem of reducing spirit to human language. In the Greek Septuagint version of the Hebrew Bible, Alexandrian Jewish scholars felt the need to freely translate a few texts. Because the Israelites "saw no form" at Mount Sinai on the occasion of the delivery of the Ten Commandments, resulting in the instructions to make no images or idols of the divine, the translators felt free to add a descriptive word or two from time to time. Where Numbers 12:8 says, "I will speak with Him mouth to mouth," the Greek version reads, "I will speak to Him mouth to mouth apparently."

Perhaps it was the problem of anthropomorphism that caused early Hindu writers to insist that Brahman, the ultimate, universal creative principle, could not be "soiled by the tongue." The Upanishads describe Brahman as "Him the eye does not see, nor the tongue express, nor the mind grasp." Although there are said to be thirty-three million gods in India, ultimately all are faces of the inexpressible Brahman.

Sources: Ellwood, Robert S., and Barbara A. McGraw. Many Peoples, Many Faiths. 6th ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1999. Guthrie, Stewart Elliot. Faces in the Clouds: A New Theory of Religion. New York: Oxford University Press, 1995. The Holy Qur’an. Trans. with a commentary by Abdullah Yusuf Ali. Beirut, Lebanon: Dar Al Arabia, 1968. Prabhupada, A. C. Bhaktivedanata Swami. Bhagavad-Gita As It Is. Los Angeles: Bhaktivedanta Book Trust, 1986. The Septuagint Version of the Bible. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing, 1970. Schaeffer, Kurtis. Review of Faces in the Clouds: A New Theory of Religion, by Stewart Elliot Guthrie. http: //www.as.ua.edu/rel/faces.html. October 7, 2003.

---

The representation of Gods, or nature, or non-human animals, as having human form, or as having human thoughts and intentions. Sometimes this is avowedly metaphorical, the problem being to understand for what it is a metaphor.

Anthropomorphism is the attribution of human characteristics and feelings to nonhumans. An example of this is Bambi, a story written by Felix Salten (1869-1945) in 1923; the inspiration for the story came from the wildlife he saw while vacationing in the Alps. When the story was eventually made into a Disney movie, Bambi had become a talking animal, complete with human feelings and emotions. Anthropomorphism can obscure the true motivation for an animal's behavior.

Previous question:	What is behavioral ecology?
Next question:	What is sociobiology?

---

Seeing human capacities in 'lower' animals. It is all too easy to 'project' human characteristics into other animals, as we do in pictures, statues, and automata. This can be highly misleading in biology and psychology, but as we are derived from earlier species we should expect similarities — and can learn from them. With the recent dominating respect for evolution and evolutionary explanations of much behaviour, instincts, and emotions, criticisms of anthropomorphist analogies have greatly diminished. This is, indeed, the thrust of evolutionary biology and evolutionary psychology.

(Published 2004)

---

The tendency to attribute human characteristics to animals or inanimate objects.

The presentation of animals or objects in human shape or with human characteristics. The term is derived from the Greek word for "human form". The fables of Aesop, the animated films of Walt Disney, and Richard Adams's Watership Down feature anthropomorphic characters.

This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)

Dansk (Danish)
n. - antropomorfisme, menneskeliggørelse

Nederlands (Dutch)
toeschrijving van menselijke vorm aan god/ dier etc., antropomorfisme

Français (French)
n. - anthropomorphisme

Deutsch (German)
n. - Anthropomorphismus, (Vermenschlichung von Tieren oder Sachen)

Ελληνική (Greek)
n. - ανθρωπομορφισμός

Italiano (Italian)
antropomorfismo

Português (Portuguese)
n. - antropomorfismo (m) (Filos.)

Русский (Russian)
антропоморфизм

Español (Spanish)
n. - antropomorfismo

Svenska (Swedish)
n. - antropomorfism

中文（简体）(Chinese (Simplified))
拟人观, 拟人论

中文（繁體）(Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 擬人觀, 擬人論

한국어 (Korean)
n. - 의인법

日本語 (Japanese)
n. - 擬人化, 擬人観

العربيه (Arabic)
‏(الاسم) التجسيم : التشبيه, خلع الصفات البشريه على الله, عزو الصفات البشريه الى غير العاقل‏

עברית (Hebrew)
n. - ‮ייחוס תכונות אנושיות לאל, לחיה, לצמח או לדבר, אינוש‬

If you are unable to view some languages clearly, click here.

To select your translation preferences click here.