Genesis
In
the beginning God created the heavens and the earth...
- Genesis: 2: 7 "...Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being..."
- Genesis 2:19 “...Now the Lord God had formed out of the ground all the wild animals and all the birds in the sky..."
- Genesis 2:22 “...Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man..."
I
thought that it was interesting that God made Adam from dirt, the
same as every other creation, which came from the ground, but not
woman. Woman was created uniquely through a different process. You
would think that this would make woman important in the eyes of man,
especially 3000 years ago. It says that God wanted a companion for
man and could not find one in all of what He had already created.
Why would God create a male and female of every other creature, and
applicable plant species immediately, but not humans?
Why
did woman have to come from out of man? Why did God not just create
her from the dirt like everything else? The Bible also says that
when man is joined to his wife, that they become one flesh. How it
is that woman would ever be inferior to man if we complete each
other. Up to this point in history, there were some matriarchal
religions, and many more religions where women held an equal footing
with men. It’s hard to believe that women have been suppressed for
thousands of years when you consider her unique creation. This idea
is important to remember later on in the New Testament as well.
Side
note: Man must have began domesticating animals at some point early
on. God only created wild animals.
- Genesis 2:16,17 "...And the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die...”
- Genesis 3:4, 5 "...You will not certainly die,” the serpent said to the woman. “For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil...”
I
choose to give you these two verses but it is important to read
through the whole story. First, God is speaking to Adam, and not
Eve, when he says “...you must not eat...” Eve had not been
created yet. Second, I don't understand how anyone can read this
story without being confused by the truth of the situation that takes
place.
God
creates man and after that He places him in the Garden of Eden. God
then explains the boundaries of the garden and that man will not eat
of the tree of knowledge because if he does he will surely die. This
is important to me because, if you don't already know, you will find
out a little bit later, man and woman do not die when they eat the
apple. I only see two options here. Either God is deceiving man on
purpose, or God didn't know that man wouldn't die.
Beyond
this the serpent told man and woman the truth. How does that play
into the traditional evil serpent role? This story is often told as
the deception of Eve and evil entering the world. But Eve wasn't
deceived by the snake; only by God. Also, why would God deny us any
knowledge? Wouldn't he, being an all loving God, want Adam and Eve
to be prepared for evil to approach and be able to recognize it.
This would mean that it was Gods fault, not Eves, for what happened.
Both
of these ideas trouble me. I can't have faith in an all loving God,
as many Christians profess He is, that is going to deceive me on
purpose. On the flip side how can an omnipotent, omnipresent, and
omniscient God not know what would happen to his creation. Beyond
the literal interpretation of what would be God's words, the bigger
problem with this story is that there is a role reversal between good
and evil. Is it wrong for the serpent to tell woman the truth? Is
it ok for God to deceive mankind?
In
a debate that I have recently watched, a theist said that it doesn't
matter what we perceive as moral inaccuracies within the bible,
because God is always good and whatever God does is good because He
did it. I remember thinking – what does that even mean?
Obviously, if you read the Old Testament, God does or allows many
things that would be against the ten commandments He laid down for us
to follow. I would hate to think that God was hypocritical.
Next,
when God is forcing man and woman to leave the Garden of Eden -
"...the Lord God said, “The man has now become like one of Us,
knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand
and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.”
(Genesis 3:22) There are three interesting points to make early on
in Genesis. The first is that God was worried about man eating of
the tree of life too. But he told man that only the tree of
knowledge was off limits. What would have happened if man had eaten
of the life before the knowledge? Also, why did God place these
trees in the garden if He was worried about us eating of them?
(side-note: why would an omniscient God worry about these things
anyway)
Another
idea I want to bring forward is that beginning here in Genesis and
continuing throughout the Old Testament, God never claims to be the
only god. When He speaks about Himself here in Genesis, He always
uses the plural. Also later on He speaks of other gods, and I will
try to point them out when we come to them. This isn’t a new
notion, just one that I had never heard from religious people before.
It is everywhere today that the Judah-Christian god is the only god,
but you don’t find that kind of talk in the Old Testament.
Moving
on…
Genesis 4:9-10 “...And the LORD said unto Cain, Where is Abel thy brother? And he said, I know not: Am I my brother's keeper? And He said, What hast thou done? the voice of thy brother's blood crieth unto me from the ground...”
Aside
from being the worlds first murder, we are to believe that somewhere
between verse 3 and 7, Cain had sinned. What was the sin? Did God
tell them what sin was or what was against His law yet? Does God
take responsibility for the murder of Abel, because it was caused by
His rejection of Cains offering. Furthermore, why would God ask Cain
where his brother was? Wouldn't God know? So many confusing or
conflicting ideas of who God is said to be and who God is in this
written word.
- Genesis 4:17 “…And Cain knew his wife; and she conceived, and bare Enoch: and he built a city, and called the name of the city, after the name of his son, Enoch…”
Wait
a second… I might have skipped over a couple of important verses. A
couple of verses back Adam knew Eve (they had sex – shh). Eve gave
birth to Cain, Abel, and Seth, respectively. Now notice that I didn’t
mention any daughters. Not that it would be ok for Cain to marry his
sister, we’ll get into allowed sexual activate later, which might
surprise you, but we are only four chapters into the creation story
and ignoring the entire creation story up to this point, I don’t
know where this wife came from. Now I mention this interesting
verse, and many others to come, because it didn’t take me very long
to decide that the Bible should not be taken literally. In fact, I
may have started out with this hypothesis, but you will find many
confusing and less then explainable “facts” in the Old Testament.
Chapter
five is a bit boring on the surface, unless you like numbers. Let me
start with this list.
Adam
was 130 years old when Seth was born and lived 930 years
Seth
was 105 years old when Enos was born and lived 912 years
Enos
was 90 years old when Cainan was born and lived 905 years
Cainan
was 70 years old when Mahalaleel was born and lived 910 years
Mahalaleel
was 65 years old when Jared was born and lived 895 years
Jared
was 162 years old when Enoch was born and lived 962 years
Enoch
was 65 years old when Methuselah was born and lived 365 years (Shortened
because he walked with God)
Now,
Methuselah was 187 years old when Lamech was born and lived 969 years
Lamech
was 182 years old when Noah was born and lived 777 years
And
Noah was 500 years old, and begot Shem, Ham, and Japheth
Again,
we will not focus on the extraordinary longevity of these people and
simply take it on faith, because if God does exist then he determines
when people die. I don't think I'm wrong in this assumption
considering that most religious people today would say that God
decides this today as well.
Considering
this, Noah was born 1051 years after the creation of Adam. The flood
of chapter 7 happened when Noah was 600 years old or 1651 years after
creation. Interestingly, that is the same year that Noah's
grandfather, Methuselah, died, out living his son by four years.
Killed in the flood?
I
did skip over chapter six, and that is when many bad things start to
happen, which in turn leads to God's flood. The sons of God, aka:
Angels, begin having children with the daughters of men. As such
things happen, God becomes angry with his creation, but only with
mankind, except Noah, it seems. The angels aren't to blame at all,
just mans evil heart. Again, we have a problem that God wouldn't
have known this was going to happen. Why wouldn't He have created a
better man? Isn't He a prefect being/creator? Why not just start
off with Noah, instead of destroying all of His creation?
- Side-note: Something to remember for the New Testament. Angels are called the sons of God, while sons/daughters of man refers to mankind.
- Genesis 9:8-10 “...Then God spoke to Noah and to his sons with him, saying:“And as for Me, behold, I establish My covenant with you and with your descendants after you, and with every living creature that is with you: the birds, the cattle, and every beast of the earth with you, of all that go out of the ark, every beast of the earth...”
I
have never heard that God setup His covenant with every living
creature, not just Noah's descendants. I would think that if every
living creature has a religious covenant with God then how can He
serve them up as being under the control of mankind. Is it a lesser
covenant? If so, where does that leave us? Maybe there is another
creation that has a higher covenant then we do. Makes me take a
harder look at the vegetarian or vegan lifestyle also.
- Side-note: Genesis 9:4 - “...But you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood...” How does this play in with the New Testament communion. Jesus says eat of my flesh, drink of my blood. Even in a symbolic sense, God doesn't seem to play around with symbolic re-imaginings of his laws.
Chapter
10 deals with the descendants of Noah and how the nations of the
world became divided between them. But what of the America's,
certainly an all powerful God would have sent some of His people to
the America's or Australia. I know that the Mormon's have solved
this little problem in their revealed text, but I have a dilemma with
the idea that the native Americans are descendant from utterly evil
people from the near east. Call me crazy, but they seemed to have a
pretty good life before the colonist's showed up.
Chapter
11 is the story of Babel. Here might be an explanation of how humans
were spread over all the earth, but chapter 10 also said that the
nations were over all of the earth, so maybe, maybe not. Here again,
He refers to Himself in the plural, and They also seem to be afraid
of what mankind is capable of accomplishing. Even though God
destroyed our ability to communicate at this point, it does give me
hope that we will reach that level of cooperation again in the
future. But why would God bother? Why would God not want us to
achieve great things, and why is He, again, holding us back? As a
parent, would you tear down or disparage your child for their great
works, or destroy their work to keep them below your own greatness?
Skipping
ahead a bit, Chapter 17, this is where God makes His covenant with
Abraham. The endorsement, or at least acceptable acknowledgment, of
slavery is not to surprising, considering God treats mankind pretty
bad up to this point also. But why would Abraham be surprised that
he would have a son at the age of 100. That is relatively young
compared to other fathers in the Bible.
Chapter
19 begins with Lot bowing to angels and calling himself a servant to
their will. This falls into place in the context of 3000 years ago,
with angels thought of as Gods messengers, or even lesser gods in a
sense. But, isn't mankind Gods greatest creation, shouldn't they be
bowing to Lot? (Maybe this is where Paul in the New Testament gets
the belief that we will judge Angels) Also, it's interesting that
the men of Sodom wanted to know the angels carnally... And
to think that Lot would offer up his two virgin daughters as an
alternative is a bit appalling when the angels could surely have
defended themselves against the mob, and the daughters could not have
done so. Plus, he must have been lying to the mob because in verse 8
they had never known a man, but by verse 14 they were married.
Interesting...
Well
if you get through the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah then your in
for a real twist of an ending in this chapter. Verses 30-38 deal
with the apparent need for Lot to retain his family name. Not retain
or repopulate the species, just his family name. So his daughters
decide to get him drunk and sleep with him, carnally.
So, I guess incest is ok... REALLY... This is what people believe!
It's not like God wiped out the whole earth again, like the flood
story, or was starting from scratch with another Adam and Eve. Those
two stories only implied incest of some sort to allow mankind to
survive. I'm a little surprised that this would be ok, even 3000
years ago.
Moving
on...
Let
me ask you a quick question. If God came to you, and said, I want
you to kill your son/daughter as an offering or sacrifice to Me,
would you do it? Please, Stop here and think about it. I'm sure you
know this story, but would you do it, kill your child in the name of
God? Abraham would in chapter 22, and so did Deanna Laney on
Mother's Day 2003. While God was good enough to stop Abraham from
killing his only remaining son, Deanna wasn't as lucky, she killed
two of her kids and seriously injured the third. Now which one was
doing God's will and which one was acquitted by a jury who considered
her insane at the time of her actions... Why do we hold up Abraham
as a man of God, and condemn Deanna as a nut? (Article is from
CNN.com: written 2004) Both believed, even if wrongly, that God had
spoken to them.
Chapter
27 seems to say to me that if you can get away with deceit then do
it, to better your own self. Jacob tricks his blind father into
giving him the blessing of the lord that is his older brothers birth
right. It is more his mothers idea, but it is still Jacobs betrayal.
So the moral lesson here is, cheat, or steal and don't get caught
until it is to late to get in trouble for it.
I
guess Jacob gets a bit of his comeuppance in chapter 29, kind of.
Here, he has set out to find a bride. He finds Rachel and decides he
wants to marry her. He speaks to her father and they agree that
after seven years of service that Jacob can have Rachel as his bride.
Other then the slight sense of Rachel being like property this
doesn't seem to bad, in the context of 2500 years ago. Now, a common
custom in those times was to marry the daughters off from oldest to
youngest in order, so after seven years, when the father offers
Jacob, Rachel’s older sister Leah, I was not surprised by it. I
was surprised to read on and see that Jacob would stay on another
seven years to also marry Rachel. So, now I know where the polygamy
argument begins and perhaps the phrase sister/wife’s too.
Continuing
on, I wonder why God made Leah fertile and Rachel barren. I feel
very confused up to and including this story, in trying to understand
what God wants, or what his will is, which is not something your
suppose to understand, I know; but there should, at the very least,
be some sort of code to follow or consistence between stories. He
seems to let man do what he wants, then throws a monkey wrench in the
gears when we are close to what we want.
Maybe
that is the answer. Whatever it is that you want most is what God
will keep you from getting, unless of course you use deceit to get
it. And what about Rachel allowing Jacob to have children with her
hand maiden? Isn't adultery against the ten commandments? Or is it
only wrong if your wife doesn't know about it? I guess the ten
commandments hadn't been laid in stone yet, and there hasn't been any
talk of what a sin is, so it must be ok to live a morally
reprehensible life until it is revealed to humanity.
- Side-note: Chapter 35:10 – God changes Jacobs name to Israel. And his descendants become known as the people of Israel. I had always thought that when they referred to the people of Israel, that it was the land of Israel. Come to find out, it's not their land, its the land of Canaan. So they conquered another people, and lay claim to the land, because of the Bible. So, if the Bible isn't literal, and just human stories, then where do we stand on the issue of Israel as a Jewish state? Because they argue that it is the land promised them by God.
It
is important to read through the remaining chapters of Genesis,
because they are the prelude to the next book, Exodus. The critical
chapter is 47. This is where the people of Israel sale themselves
into slavery. Yes, you read that right. Joseph, son of Jacob who
was blessed by the lord and renamed Israel, processed the payment of
his people and their lands to the Pharaoh for seeds to grow crops.
Wait a second, there was suppose to be a famine and drought going on.
How is selling a group of people seeds for their very freedom and
lands going to stop the drought? Why would Joseph even consider
selling his family and his people into slavery, especially when he
know that the drought was coming to an end. Other then the fact that
his family sold him when he was little. Why would the Egyptians be
an evil people if the people of Israel sold themselves and their
land? Why wouldn't they just cultivate their own lands instead of
selling it to the Pharaoh? Do they take any personal responsibility
for their actions, or simply vilify the Egyptians for it? I guess it
was Gods' will that his chosen people become slaves, right... After
all, it wouldn't be much of a book, if it stopped here, would it...
