Oldies but Goodies (Genesis 1-4:16)

"In the beginning when God created..."
Genesis begins with the familiar six day plus one creation story. God sees "the primordial chaos," and starts sorting things out. Light from darkness. Sky from waters. Land from seas, and vegetation on the land. Specific tasks for lights to dictate passage of time. Sea monsters and birds. Cattle, creeping things (yes, specifically creeping things), wild animals, and finally humankind in God's own image, male and female, and God gave the living creatures "every tree with seed in its fruit; you shall have them for food" (Gen 1:29). And once God finished this process of creating, on the seventh day the Creator rested.

It's interesting to note that most things in the progression of the creation story fall into line with how scientists have discovered the Earth to have come into being and evolved life.  With that, we have our very first biblical genealogy of... the universe. The story even ends the way the familial genealogies do. "These are the generations of the heavens and earth when they were created." (Gen 2:4) We also get the first, albeit indirect, mention of the divine court. In Gen 1:26, "Then God said, 'Let us make humankind in our image...'" Now, I'd like to point out that little translation footnote that pops up at the bottom of your page, at least throughout the sections I'll be discussing today. In Hebrew, the word that means "humankind" or "man," until a woman is on the scene, is adam. My footnote (and my mom), told me that in Hebrew, species are always designated by the masculine and feminine forms of the word, except for adam. "No creature born of earth ('adamah) is yet a fitting partner." But I'm getting a little ahead of myself. I was still talking about the first creation story.

What's that? There's only one? Nope. The first one is very mystical and full of warm fuzzies, with God kickin' back at the end and having a little holiday...holy day... see what I did there? Okay, I'm a little sorry for that one.  Anyway, after God rests, we back-track to what seems like day number two. We've got heavens and earth, but no vegetation yet. While a stream is rising forth from the earth, as it seems wont to do, God forms an adam from the dust, and breathes life into, well, it.  Now that God's got a human, what's God to do with it? Let's give it a garden to tend with plenty of food to eat, and only one rule (Don't touch that special tree). The human got lonely though, so then  God made the animals with the purpose of the human finding a partner. Now, if this weren't before one of those special trees... that could have a whole other kind of terrible, spoiling of innocence type meanings, but the human didn't know about any of that yet. Still, as we know none of the animals were a suitable partner, so God created another human from the first human... and here's where physical sex differentiation comes in. The first human is in the habit of naming things, like all those animals, so he names himself Man, and his partner Woman (ish and ishshah respectively). Nakedness and innocence abounded.

Enter stage left: the serpent. Sneaky little creepy temptress. It uses doubt and curiosity (one of the best and most dangerous traits of humanity), to persuade the woman into eating from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and because everyone else was doing it, so did the man. In that split second, they became ashamed of their nakedness and tried to hide it. Bad call, 'cause now they've been caught red handed and won't admit it without blaming someone else. The man even blames God for it because God gave him the woman.  So what happens now that everyone's guilty and shameful? Well, the serpent (and his family forever) is cursed to crawl on it's belly and be hated by the woman and her children (forever). The woman has to suffer during childbirth, and be subservient to her husband, yep, husband. And the man? Well instead of just tending a pretty garden, he and his family are cast out and made to toil for their bread. Oh yeah, there's bread now instead of just fruit to eat. Also, the ultimate punishment, now humans die. Thanks guys. Way to go... I totally wouldn't ever have done the exact same thing probably even without the serpent's tantalizing words.  I never was very good at following directions.

And here we are at sin. God gave specific directions, and then backed away for a bit, allowing choice to come into play. I mean really, the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil probably had seeds, and according to God's own words (see creation story numero uno) was therefore food.  But God said not to eat it, and even said gave the worst of the consequences: death.  They still ate it.  What does that say about humans? Definitely that we're fallible. Too curious perhaps? Maybe just stupid? I mean, talked into it by a serpent? Still... we love to have that choice thing in play.

So we've got choice. We've got sin. We've got banishment and painful childbirth and toiling. How about a little murder too? By this point, the man is going by Adam, and he named his wife Eve (life-bringer). He "knew" his wife (yes, knowing her biblically, which is to say: sex, and yes this "knowledge" seems to have come from that tree), and Cain was born! By the way, so far, the bible loves punny names. Cain, in Hebrew folk etymology is "production." He was the first product of man and woman *ahem* knowing one another. He also had a brother named Abel ("emptiness, futility"), and together they had the first sibling rivalry. Cain grew crops while Abel tended sheep, and one day they both put forth an offering to God from their respective farming endeavors. God accepted Abel's, and not Cain's...for no apparent reason. I don't know about you, but I'd be pissed if that happened with my sisters and me. God calls Cain out on it, and tells him to do well in order to be accepted and not sin. So what's Cain do? Well he lures Abel to a field, kills him, and lies about it of course.  Choice again, friends. What do you think would've happened if Cain just said, "Okay God, I'll try harder next time. I'll pour my heart and soul into my tomatoes just for you"? Maybe it's just me, but in reading it... it sounds a little like God is pushin' his buttons to see how far Cain'll go before he snaps. Either way, Cain chose to do a terrible thing and commit the first premeditated murder, and God punishes him by marking him,  and making him wander all the days of his life.

So I know that was like, three stories all at once, but it seemed weird to break them up. They also bring up massively huge issues that are consistently struggled with, not only throughout the bible, but in theology and philosophy and art and just, life. Process. Choice. Sin. Punishment. Even on a slightly smaller scale: Women's rights, the relationship and "alienation between humans and animals" (footnote p.10), and how we figured out how to make bread.

Opinions, thoughts, comments, questions are always encouraged.

<3 Agnostic in the Pews