Can someone help me with a Bible question?

[dixiegrrrrl]

Adam and Eve, it says, had 3 sons....Cain.Abel, and Seth.

What happened to Seth?

OK..TWO questions.

Bible says...Cain had descendants.

Who with?

Not looking to start an interpretation war here or anything, just seriously curious.

[Warpy]

1. When they went to the east of Eden, in the land of Nod

that rather assumes the rest of us were here and that Adam and Eve were a couple of lab rats in a cage, created as an experiment in free will vs. blind obedience in a totally artificial environment. Throw in a serpent who told them the truth vs a god who consistently lied to them, and the whole story becomes more farcical than anything else.

[DetlefK]

32. Did he found the Brotherhood of Nod?

[Warren Stupidity]

2. Obviously with Eve.

Seth was born after Cain. It seems there were lots of daughters, but they don't get named 'cause women were effectively cattle. So Cain Able and Seth were either procreating with Eve or with their sisters, either of which actually explains a lot about how we turned out.

Or it is actually a metaphor for evolution, see the various apologists for religious nonsense here.

[thecrow]

129. Was Eve maried to Adam is what I'd like to know.

Because then the story is not just incestual, but one of adultery as well.

[okasha]

130. Only if Eve or Adam was married to someone else.

[thecrow]

131. Not other parents were mentioned, though

[okasha]

134. Precisely.

You can't commit adultery unless one of the parties is married to a third person.

[cbayer]

3. If you want something besides snark, you may want to post this in the Interfaith group.

Nice to see you here, though.

[dixiegrrrrl]

6. Hey cbayer....

thanks for the heads up.

[Warren Stupidity]

8. The story makes absolutely no sense at all.

So best to head over to the land where nonsense is normal.

[hrmjustin]

9. Your cofidence in us is always touching.

[Warren Stupidity]

10. Whatever. Give it a shot Justin. Explain how the sons of Eve procreated.

[hrmjustin]

11. As I said below, it is assumed Adam and Eve had daughters but were not named.

[Warren Stupidity]

12. So incest?

[hrmjustin]

13. Yes.

[Warren Stupidity]

17. You do understand that direct inbreeding like this has serious unfortunate consequences

and would likely have resulted in species failure. Plus of course it is directly prohibited by the wrathful ot deity.

Wouldn't it make more sense to just declare the whole thing a myth of no specific veracity? A metaphor for something or other?

[hrmjustin]

18. Well I believe it is allegory.

What others believe is their own business.

[Warren Stupidity]

21. synonyms: parable, analogy, metaphor, symbol, emblem

But what specifically is the story of everyone being descended from Eve an allegory for?

Wouldn't it have made more sense for Yahweh to have created a bunch of unrelated people so that a tribe of village idiots wasn't the obvious result? That way the prohibition on incest wouldn't get violated, we wouldn't have a bad seed problem, and the message that some off-universe deity did magic and made us special wouldn't look so basically flawed 2500 years after it was written by some bronze age priest.

[hrmjustin]

23. Why it was written like this I can not tell you.

Whenthey read it inchurch I get a chuckle.

[Warren Stupidity]

25. I don't understand why you just don't chuck defense of the indefensible.

Your faith certainly can withstand admitting the bible is mostly nonsense. I get believing in a "higher power" and a "purpose to life", I cannot understand, other than in the ways I've mentioned here before that cause some people to get all bent, believing that the specifics of ancient beliefs, the myths and fables in the texts, are meaningful, sacred, etc. Most if not all of it is either chuckle-worthy or horrific.

[hrmjustin]

26. I don't believe it is mostly nonsense. I don't know why you would say this to me.

[Fortinbras Armstrong]

145. Genesis is a collection of myths

I am using "myth" in the platonic sense. Plato defined it as a story which, while not necessarily true, reveals truth.

[okasha]

28. The prohibition against

brother-sister incest came much later in the Bible. Sarah is apparently Abraham's sister or half sister, and marriage between half siblings was considered acceptable at least until the 9-10th. Century BCE.

[Warren Stupidity]

73. So god didn't understand why incest was a bad idea, particularly between close relatives?

That Yahweh was a bit slow on the uptake, huh?

[okasha]

76. Apoplexy accepted.

to cbayer.

[Warren Stupidity]

77. lack of argument, personal attack noted.

stay classy theists.

[rug]

89. Broad brush noted.

Stay classy, and unbigoted, Warren.

[SummerSnow]

79. Sarah and Abraham were siblings.

[okasha]

91. Yes.

What some folk are failing to notice is that different cultures have different definitions of incest. The ancient Middle East and Mediterranean seem to have been comfortable with marriage between siblings but to have abhorred intergenerational incest.

At the other end of the spectrum, many Native American groups prohibit sexual relationships with any member of one's parents' clans. They all count as brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles, grandparents. Any potential spouse must come from a third clan, which does indeed keep the gene pool nicely stirred up.

[LTX]

96. Of course, it is also highly likely that humans engaged in episodic inbreeding during

population bottlenecks, thereby avoiding "species failure."

[Warren Stupidity]

97. I really don't think we were ever down to one pair of individuals.

But if you care to cite some evidence, please do. Note also that we apparently were busily having sex with Neandertals for quite a while, that book of fairy tales just forgot about that bit of our history.

[LTX]

98. One pair of individuals is not a prerequisite for inbreeding.

http://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1112806541/inbreeding-common-ancient-human-skulls-evidence-031913/

http://anthropology.net/2009/10/08/evidence-that-two-main-bottleneck-events-shaped-modern-human-genetic-diversity-proc-r-soc-b-firstcite/

http://evolution.about.com/od/Evolution-Glossary/g/Genetic-Drift.htm

http://academic.research.microsoft.com/Publication/57410002/evidence-of-inbreeding-depression-on-human-height

[Warren Stupidity]

99. Sure. Not my point. One pair is almost

certainly an inbreeding disaster.

[LTX]

100. Likely so. n/t

[unblock]

101. not at all almost certain. the risks are certainly much higher, but it's not even 50%.

never mind that in any small sample, results may not match statistics based on larger pools.

but it would not be unreasonable for 6 children out of 10 born of sibling incest to survive long enough to procreate.


of course, to account for our current great genetic diversity, you have to allow for mutations along the way, otherwise we're just mixing and matching genes from adam and eve. this would certainly seem to accept evolution, at least post "creation".

[SummerSnow]

81. Adam and Eve had daughters.

Genesis 5:4

[Warren Stupidity]

83. yes.

Although they got about as much mention as cattle.

So the story includes massive incest in the first family for several generations. Kind of wrong isn't it?

[Mariana]

139. I'll tell you how it was explained to me.

All the problems we associate with incest didn't exist then, because Adam and Eve were created perfect and had no genetic flaws. Those came later, and were a result of sin. Then incest had to be prohibited.

Of course, if Eve was made from Adam's rib, then she was essentially his clone, except that God made her the opposite sex. So all of their children, grandchildren, etc. would have had the exact same genetic material, in the same manner as identical twins.

[rug]

15. A&A?

[AtheistCrusader]

50. Nothing in the A&A SOP/Haven info about sagely nodding and respectfully withholding all questions

in the face of obvious bullshit.

[rug]

65. The word used was "nonsense".

There's ample evidence of that there.

[AtheistCrusader]

68. The word "nonsense" is charitable.

[rug]

69. It is. But I suspect we're thinking of different rooms.

[hrmjustin]

70. What are you saying is nonsense?

[edhopper]

71. My guess is

people who claim that somehow genesis describes the actual formation of the Earth and evolution.
Rather than it just being a fable or myth from the iron age.

[hrmjustin]

72. I thought this was becoming about safe havens. my mistake I guess.

[hrmjustin]

67. And I hope you enjoy AA.

Interfaith is about discussing but not criticism of people's beliefs.

[Bortman33]

87. It is the perfect place for criticism of beliefs especially

when those beliefs hold no more proofs then a flat earth, a cooling planet, trickle down economics, birth control are abortifaciants, there is a bearded guy in the sky watching everything you do, or pick your own bogus belief.

Lack of criticism only allows for the propagation of false narratives and the curtailing of man's/woman's ability to reach a higher plane of existence based on the realities that confront us, not the fantasies propagandized by various religions, cults, and authoritarian political and social organizations.

[hrmjustin]

88. And AA serves a good purpose and I am glad you have it.

[okasha]

90. Being charitable, I'm assuming

you're under the impression that this is the Interfaith group. It isn't.

I suggest that you click on the Interfaith tab and read the SoP. You should know exactly why you'll be banned if you come blustering into the room with posts that violate said SoP.

[rug]

92. That sounds good but doesn't explain all the posts complaining about DU and DU members.

[AtheistCrusader]

49. That book (collection of books) is so vile, it doesn't deserve better treatment.

[cbayer]

53. Lol! Well, that's your opinion and you are welcome to it.

I would suggest you not read it and please, please, please keep it away from your child!!

[AtheistCrusader]

54. I'm glad that it's funny to you.

[cbayer]

55. "it's" not funny to me. You are.

[AtheistCrusader]

56. Ok.

Please accept my apologies for panning a book that purports to justify everything from genocide to who gives a shit what else when your starting point is genocide, in the name of a purportedly loving god, who allegedly arranged everything all fucked up to begin with.

So sorry.

[cbayer]

57. Apology accepted. Or maybe I should say, apoplexy accepted.

To everything, turn, turn, turn, there is a season.

[AtheistCrusader]

58. Which season is the 'drown everyone, except one lucky family' thing again?

I want to get my sail boat ready.

[cbayer]

59. I would suggest you stay prepared at all times.

The rapture will come without warning.

[AtheistCrusader]

61. That doesn't bother me so much.

Think of all the spare clothes I'll have to choose from.

[okasha]

75. "Apoplexy accepted."

I'm stealing that one. Right now.

[Warren Stupidity]

74. wow, you just go right for the personal attack at every opportunity

knowing full well that your "enemies" aren't going to alert on you.

[okasha]

78. People who have a sense of humor

tend to consider it a compliment to be told they're humorous.

People who don't--well, they don't.

[Warren Stupidity]

80. no okasha, that is not what happened

but if that narrative keeps you thinking that you are "winning", more power to you.

[okasha]

84. Laugh every now and then.

It won't hurt you. Really.

[Warren Stupidity]

95. "smile honey" nt.

[rurallib]

4. Been wondering that all my life

when I asked the priest back in religion class at the catholic HS I got the "you must have faith" lecture.

If Eve was the only woman then Cain was a - well you know and we are descendants of incest.
If there were other women not related, then Adam and Eve were not the only humans.

Let me add another question
Who the heck was Lillith anyway?

[intaglio]

5. Right, Seth was born after Abel

but (theoretically) A&E had numerous sons and daughters. So presumably Seth indulged in a bit of incest so he could be the ancestor of Noah. Biblical literalists also say that not only was Cain exiled but also his wife (another of A&E's daughters). Cain and his children founded cities, tribes of tent dwellers, musicianship and metal working. Essentially Cain was another god the pre-monotheist Semitic canon, probably an earth god as the the earth is not allowed to hold his blood and earthquakes are supposed to be Cain shaking in remorse.

As an aside it can be argued that Cain was not marked and exiled because of murder but rather for lying to God

[Starboard Tack]

47. They also founded a fairly interesting cable TV channel

[hrmjustin]

7. It is assumed that Adam and Eve had daughters but they don't mention their names.

[SummerSnow]

14. ...

genesis 4:17 speaks about Cain and his wife

Cain had sexual relations with his wife, and she became pregnant and gave birth to Enoch. Then Cain founded a city, which he named Enoch, after his son.

nothing much about Seth

Genesis 5:8

And all the days of Seth were nine hundred and twelve years: and he died.

[rug]

16. Augustine discussed that question nearly 1700 years ago.

As, therefore, the human race, subsequently to the first marriage of the man who was made of dust, and his wife who was made out of his side, required the union of males and females in order that it might multiply, and as there were no human beings except those who had been born of these two, men took their sisters for wives,—an act which was as certainly dictated by necessity in these ancient days as afterwards it was condemned by the prohibitions of religion . . . and though it was quite allowable in the earliest ages of the human race to marry one’s sister, it is now abhorred as a thing which no circumstances could justify. (The City of God XV.16)

[Leontius]

19. Augustine being quite the Biblical literalist here don't you think.

[rug]

20. There was a lot of that going on in the fourth century.

[Leontius]

22. More's the shame that Origen was pushed to the fringes of our Faith in that period.

What might have been.

[rug]

27. That's an excellent point.

While many said he castrated himself, following Matthew 19:12, others disagreed, stating Origen "strongly deplored any literal interpretation of the words". -Henry Chadwick, The Penguin History of the Church: The Early Church, (New York: Penguin Books, 1993) 108-109.

A good question indeed. What if literalism were rejected centuries ago?

[LoveIsNow]

24. First off it's a myth, which isn't a dirty word.

Myths, by their nature, have a symbolic meaning which is much more important than the literal one, so in one sense, where Cain and Seth found wives is simply not that important compared to the overall themes of the story.

Anyhow, what happened to Seth is easy. Chapter 5of Genesis lists his descendents, all the way down to Noah.Chapter 4 gives Cain's descendents which are oddly similar. The last three of Cain's descendents are Methusael, Lamech, and Naamah, while Seth's are Methuselah, Lamech, and Noah. This suggests that the editors of Genesis combined two different traditions: one in which Cain was the ancestor of the family who went into the ark and one where it was Seth, but ultimately gave the honor to Seth because he wasn't a murderer.

As to where they got wives, if one insists on taking this impossible story literally, the only possibilities are that God made other women and didn't tell Adam and Eve or that they had daughters and no one bothered to write it in Genesis, because who would want to read a book about women?

There is an apocryphal book called the Book of Jubilees, which was written by the Essenes (the Dead Sea scrolls guys) that is basically an alternative version of everything in the Bible up to the Passover, which tries to correct this and the many other ambiguities, repetitions and paradoxes of Genesis and Exodus. In that version, Eve has daughters and Cain and Seth marry their sisters, who are named as are all wives in this version.

[muriel_volestrangler]

36. Naamah was, however, a woman, so not really connectable with Noah

Cain's Lamech has a couple of named sons - Jabal and Tubal-Cain. I don't think that's enough to say "you should regard one of Jabal, Tubal-Cain or Naamah as being Noah".

[LostOne4Ever]

29. If you want to find workable solutions to this myth

my answers would be:

1.) What happened to Seth

He went on to sire a line of children which eventually led to Noah. (Genesis Chapter 5).

2) If you are trying to make sense of this you have a couple of options with varying degrees of issues on their own:

a) That Adam and Eve had many children who went unmentioned and that he married an unnamed sister or niece or grandneice or great grand neice - ewww

b) That god created other people in addition to Adam and Eve and that he married one of them or their descendants - Contradictions

Of the two a) is probably the most workable solution as supposedly many people lived to be over 900 years old back then (according to the bible). Seth was born when Adam was a fairly young 130 after all..

[mr blur]

30. But...you're not supposed to ask questions like that -

That spoils the whole thing!

I'm sure you could get loads of varied and inventive answers from believers but they'll all ignore the serious point behind your question.

[Arugula Latte]

138. "Discuss religious and theological issues. All relevant topics are permitted."

Official description of the group.

And yet, whenever anybody tries to discuss a specific topic, the shit hits the fan.

Funny how that goes.

[mr blur]

141. Sorry, I didn't think I needed the Sarcasm smiley

Guess I was wrong.

[Arugula Latte]

142. No, I got what you were saying ...

Just adding my 2 cents in with yours.

[mr blur]

144. No problem!

[TexasProgresive]

33. Perhaps their sisters

If one must take the creation story literally then it has to be sisters.
Gen 5:4 Adam lived eight hundred years after he begot Seth, and he had other sons and daughters.

[edhopper]

34. If Adam and Eve

had no knowledge of Good and Evil before they ate the fruit, why were they punished for something that they had no way to know was wrong until after the act they were punished for.
Sure God told them not to, but why would they know disobeying God was wrong if they hadn't acquired that knowledge yet.

And is eating the forbidden fruit an metaphor for fucking?

[dixiegrrrrl]

35. As many times as the versions of the Bible has been written and re-written and etc

I have no idea what is meant by what, then or now.

I do appreciate the thought provoking answers and comments to my post, however,

[edhopper]

37. That's both the benefit and problem with metaphor

it can always be reworked to fit a new scenario.
We can go from a tale about how important it is to obey God and shy away from evil, to how we are all icky because sex is bad.

[okasha]

38. Nope.

Adam didn't need an opposite-gender companion if this story wasn't meant to explain human origins. If companionship was all Adam needed, then a case of Bud Lite, a wide-screen tv and Bubba would have done the trick.

[edhopper]

39. What are you saying

"Nope" too?

[okasha]

40. Whether eating the apple

is a metaphor for sex. All creation myths about the origin of humans involve a First Man and First Woman. Reproduction is a given in these narratives.

[edhopper]

41. Sure, but what is the story with the fruit all about.

And what about original sin?

And then there's the Freudian interpretation.

[okasha]

42. The fruit gives knowledge of good and evil.

If you don't know the difference, you can't commit a sin. That requires the intention to do wrong.

Original sin, for those who believe in it, was either pride--the serpent's promise that "you shall be as gods--or the disobedience itself. Or both.

Yeah, there's Freud. But long before Freud there was a mythic/iconographic complex about a primordial serpent-goddess associated with a sycamore tree at the confluence of four rivers.

I'll go with the archetypal interpretation, thanks.

[edhopper]

43. So my original post about

Their diobediace can't be a sin because they didn't know it wrong until the did it holds.

[okasha]

44. Which is one reason I'd go with pride

instead of disobedience.

But they are told that they'll die if the eat the fruit--which leads to a third interpretation, that the sin was to believe the serpent rather than Yahweh.

[edhopper]

45. Hmmm

One thing would be interesting would be to see the earliest versions of the tale. See the changes from Babylonian to early Hebrew tribes to Judea and so forth.

[okasha]

46. I would suspect

that the transmission went straight from Mesopotamia to the priestly scribes in Judah (Yahwist source) and Israel (Elohist source.) Or it was filtered directly from Canaanite culture (Serpent Mother) into the population that would become the Hebrews.

If I had to speculate about the very first form of the story--and I don't have to, but I'm going to anyway--it would be a tale in which the Sky God and the Earth Goddess (Serpent Mother) meet and mate at the center of the world, symbolized by the World Tree and the primordial waters. Their twin offspring are the first man and the first woman, who are the ancestors of all humans.

It's not a very large leap from that to the Genesis story, given that the version that has come down to us is the product of the Yahweh-alone movement and the Josian reforms.

[edhopper]

62. So the serpent goddess

becomes Satan. There is a lot of cultural anthropology that can be written about that

[okasha]

82. Oh, yeah.

Especially given that in Genesis, the Serpent is "the wisest of all the beasts." But there's evidence that her worship persisted in Israel and Judah persisted at least until the reign of Josiah, when he had the image of a serpent removed from the Temple in the course of his monotheistic reforms.

[arcane1]

85. They proved the serpent was telling the truth and God lied to them. That pissed Him off.

That's my take on it, anyway.

[LTX]

102. Actually, neither God nor the serpent lied.

The eden mythology consists of much more suggestive metaphor than its subsequent, reductionist interpretations allow. It is worth a re-reading (in its many iterations), if only for the mysteriousness of its amalgamations.

[AtheistCrusader]

48. It's all bullshit. If you left a age-appropriately ignorant child, say 2 years old, in a room with a

wild animal chained to the wall, and admonished the child not to pet the kitty, and then you left the room for a while, and the child got predictably mauled, who would you punish? The 2 year old? The cat? Both?

Or yourself?


The whole story is 100% purestrain unadulterated bullshit. A sexist, stupid, illogical mindfuck from stem to stern. Which is apparently the new commonly accepted definition for the word 'allegory'.


Also, there's a species of snake that can fly, so there goes god's supposed "Cursed are you above all livestock and all wild animals! You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life." omnipotent cursing thingy out the window. Same place the rest of the text this bullshit is found in, should follow.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chrysopelea

[LTX]

103. Actually, I find the eden mythology to be among the most thought provoking aspects of Genesis.

As for "mindfuck" allegories, try Alice again. Her wonderland is anything but "age appropriate."

[AtheistCrusader]

113. Thought provoking in what manner?

[LTX]

116. Among others, the pantheistic implications of the tale,

the contradictions between banishment and ensuing freedom (and the tortured blessing of familial and tribal independence), the short and long implications of truthfulness, the power and responsibility of knowledge, and perhaps most curiously, the curse of godliness.

[AtheistCrusader]

123. The latter is not interesting to me.

I would not choose to have/gain, nor would I respect any other being that shouldered that sort of power, if I hypothetically presumed such power was a thing to exist at all.

The former is a conundrum to me. Religious conservatives screech continuously about 'freedom', yet they seek the same chains in heaven, that were (allegorically and allegedly of course) shuffled off in the garden of eden in that banishment. I cannot help but see the pre-wisdom Adam as an abject and pitiable slave. Wearing chains of ignorance, rather than iron. Deliberately kept unarmed and unawares by his creator.

I do not believe in any of it, satan or god, but if I did, I would be unable to avoid the inevitable conclusion of adopting luciferian Satanism. Knowing what I know now, I would choose the light, every time. I would choose to know. I would reject a being that designed to keep me ignorant. That demanded adulation and worship.

What many (not all, but many) evangelicals describe as heaven, sounds a lot like hell to me. In order for me to fit in such an environment, with grateful worship 24x7 of a being, forever, you would have to utterly remove much of my knowledge. You would have to excise most of my mental faculties, for me to bear such a condition for any length of time at all.

As Hitchens put it:

"It will happen to all of us, that at some point you get tapped on the shoulder and told, not just that the party’s over, but slightly worse: the party’s going on — but you have to leave. And it’s going on without you. That’s the reflection that I think most upsets people about their demise. All right, then, because it might make us feel better, let’s pretend the opposite. Instead, you’ll get tapped on the shoulder and told, Great news: this party’s going on forever – and you can’t leave. You’ve got to stay; the boss says so. And he also insists that you have a good time."

To use pop culture as a metaphor, 'm quite sure the Wachowski Brothers were contrasting either (or both) Eden/Heaven, and Earth as we know it, when the Agent describes the first iteration of the Matrix in which everything was perfect, and the human 'batches' rejected it and died by the droves. So they had to create a matrix with some chaos, misery, suffering, etc, for humans to accept it.

Without the potential for suffering, one cannot pretend we have free will.

[LTX]

126. You say,

"I cannot help but see the pre-wisdom Adam as an abject and pitiable slave. Wearing chains of ignorance, rather than iron. Deliberately kept unarmed and unawares by his creator." Therein lies one of the conundrums of the story. You are right. And that implicit aspect of the story has been obliterated by later, reductionist, institutional interpretations. As have the explicit moral equations of man with god, the predominance of "nature" in the imposition of the lessons that man learns as he acquires the essential attributes of godhood, and the responsibilities that man shoulders upon the acquisition of the knowledge of good and evil (responsibilities that include independence from servitude, and the consequent need to exercise independent moral judgment).

The eden mythology does not jive at all well with christian theology (mainly because it was not a product of christian theology).

[Kalidurga]

51. Seth got Chucked...

like Chuck from Happy Days this is just the bible version of Happy Days.

[Petrushka]

52. Cain apparently found a wife among people of the sixth-day creation . . .

. . . http://www.debed.com/Bible/comments/sixth-day-creation.html

[The Blue Flower]

60. The word 'adam' meant mankind

I was taught in Hebrew school that the word 'adam' (ah-DAHM) didn't refer to a single person.

[edhopper]

63. I also had teacher in Hebrew school

attempt to make some sense out of obvious fables and tortuously try to get these fanciful stories to account for what really happened.
It's a Sisyphean task at best because the stories are just myths accumulated over the centuries and bear no relation to what actually happened.
You can deconstruct them until they can mean anything you want.

[LTX]

104. Were you raised Orthodox? n/t

[edhopper]

105. Conservative

[LTX]

109. Reform, here.

Or as my father once casually said at dinner, atheists with holidays (which I recall vividly because of the theatrical choking from my grandmother that followed).

[edhopper]

110. Lol

[dixiegrrrrl]

64. Interesting.....

what about the Eve, then? What does that name refer to?

[rug]

66. Life.

Eve in the Hebrew language is Ḥawwāh, meaning: "living one" or "source of life", and is related to ḥāyâ, "to live". The name derives from the Semitic root ḥyw.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eve#cite_note-2

[RadicalGeek]

86. Some have said

Lilith.

[WovenGems]

93. What???

God creates genetics yet understands it not? And understands it not twice, again with the Noah story. The OT is a lesson book, not a history book. Much like Aesop's Fables.

[Act_of_Reparation]

94. Genesis is more myth than fable

A fable is a story told to convey a moral message. Genesis, on the other hand, is pretty bereft of moral instruction. Rather, it is an early attempt to explain the origins of the various tribes and kingdoms native to the ancient Near East and to give their geopolitical interactions an historical context. For the ancient Hebrews, Genesis was very much a history book -- no less so than was the tale of Aeneas to the Romans.

[LTX]

106. For a large part of Genesis, I would agree that

it is an effort to sort out tribal affiliations and power structures. But the creation and eden mythologies, as amalgamations of pre-existing creation mythologies, have, in my view, decidedly moral implications. They would, in many ways, have been better presented as a separate "book."

[trotsky]

108. The main moral message in Genesis, and indeed most of the OT, seems to be:

OBEY GOD.

Not a very complicated or nuanced message. Seems to have fit right into just about every OT story.

[LTX]

111. Is that really what you draw from chapters 2 and 3 of Genesis? n/t

[trotsky]

114. Yup.

Especially since each chapter references specific orders from god to be followed, and that there are serious consequences for disobeying. A central theme to so many of the OT stories.

[LTX]

117. There are serious consequences to obeying as well.

What do you make of the phrase "as one of us"? And are the consequences of obedience and disobedience simply good and bad, or are they the price of admission to knowledge and independence?

[trotsky]

118. Who knows?

All anyone has is a guess. No one interpretation can be said to be "correct." You have chosen for there to be deep mystical implications. Another plausible explanation is that this is just how a primitive people tried to explain why life was so hard, and codify the laws they chose to run their society with.

[LTX]

120. Right. As with all mythologies, oral and written.

And literature, ancient and modern. And philosophies. And constitutions. How do we know any of that stuff means anything? After all, "no one interpretation can be said to be 'correct.'" Let's go bowling.

[trotsky]

122. So what do we do with folks who take them seriously?

Who insist they alone have the correct interpretation, and want people to live under their rules? (E.g., the recent Hobby Lobby ruling. Or the Catholic Church taking over hospitals and restricting treatment options for non-Catholics.)

[LTX]

132. I take it seriously. But I assume you mean those christians who profess to take it literally,

(which, ironically enough, is anything but the case, since the literal story is a great deal more subtle than they concede; the story is, as you say, open to a wide array of thought provoking interpretations; and the story is indeed decidedly at odds with christian theology). What do we do with them? Perhaps all we can do is continue to fight tooth and nail for separation of church and state.

[trotsky]

135. No argument from me there.

But since we on the left can't even seem to agree where that church-state line should be drawn, it's tough. Especially if some of us agree with some on the right that "because god wants us to" is a legitimate reason to promote a policy.

[LTX]

140. Oops. By "them" you obviously meant the whole biblical kit and caboodle.

I was still stuck on genesis chapters 2 and 3. Nevertheless, same answer. Because "god wants us to" is to policy what "looks about right" is to engineering.

[Act_of_Reparation]

112. I would hesitate to consider them moral lessons

The Creation and Fall from Eden stories don't convey a moral message so much as they seek to explain the more unpleasant aspects of the human condition. Adam and Eve offended God and thus all were made to suffer for it. It isn't drastically different from the outlooks of the ancient pagan religions, which often attributed calamities or suffering to failing to properly honor the gods.

The only lesson conveyed by these stories is that the only way to stay on God's good side -- and thereby avoid invoking his wrath -- is to show him total obedience. How one goes about that, however, doesn't show up until Exodus, Deuteronomy, Leviticus, and Numbers.

[trotsky]

115. Agreed.

And after the orders, and the ways one must obey, there's a disappointing lack of actual moral reasoning. Just basically do as you're told, and no one gets hurt.

[LTX]

124. You say "Adam and Eve offended God, and thus they all were made to suffer for it."

Was god offended? He clothed them, and he said "behold, the man is become as one of us." Were the litany of "curses" an imposition of otherwise unnatural conditions, or were they the inevitable consequence of acquiring the knowledge of the gods and by extension the ability to perceive the perils and capriciousness of nature and independence? The actual story does not jive at all comfortably with the theological spin placed on it by later institutional interpretations. The later interpretations ignore, for all practical purposes, the curse of ignorant and comfortable servitude implicit in the story, the metaphorical elephant in the room (the knowledge of good and evil), and the explicit moral equation of man with god. Obedience and disobedience in the story are a multi-bladed knife.

In my religious traditions, argument with god is an expected part of maturation (for the individual and for mankind), and blind obedience is as foolish as peckish disobedience.

[AtheistCrusader]

125. blind obediance would have kept man in the Garden eternally.

If god had otherwise plans to develop our freedom and independence, it was not indicated.

You captured what I was trying to say upthread perfectly with 'ignorant and comfortable servitude'. That's exactly what I was getting at.

[LTX]

127. The "plan" in the story, of course, was to permit (or place) the serpent.

Freedom from the chains of servitude, and moral independence (for good and naught), was all but inevitable.

[okasha]

133. In Christian theology

this becomes the idea of "the fortunate fall." Even Milton, Puritan that he was, presents Eve as willing to disobey because she's bored out of her mind.

[LTX]

136. Indeed, and perhaps I've overstated the discordance between christian theology

and the eden mythology. Many christian theologians have grappled with the implications of the story. But I have also seen many commentaries that give short shrift to the story, reducing it to "god said don't eat, they ate, and they were cursed." This frankly renders juvenile an otherwise subtle, and theologically disturbing, story.

[okasha]

137. True.

"Do what you're told, and don't ask questions" sums up the literalist/fundamentalist reading. But Aquinas developed the idea of the "felix culpa" in the thirteenth century, and it was sufficiently well known among lay Christians to become the subject of a popular song ("Adam lay y-bounden&quot a century later.

[riqster]

107. We were taught that Genesis was at least part allegory.

The point being illustrated was that God made a wonderful Earth, and that humans were and are stubborn, greedy, arrogant, violent, judgemental jackasses who trash the world we were supposed to hold in stewardship.

What some call "original sin".

So a lot of details aren't there because they don't matter.

[JohnnyRingo]

119. You pose an interesting question...

If Cain had children, I too wonder with whom now. The Bible certainly seems to fast forward there. Maybe that's about the time Jehovahs Witnesses began knocking on doors, but I don't think the so called Holy Book provided for another magical rib produced woman.

I'll have to ask this of my religious friends just to see their face as the ponder the imponderable.

Thanx for posting.

[dixiegrrrrl]

121. I am tempted to ask the fundy minister across the street

but he is really annoying to talk with.

[AuntPatsy]

128. Beware of the word "faith" the very real truth that as a whole not one of any self labeled

Religious text books validate their own nonsense, in the end, after back and forth bickering in attempts top evade answering a question that cannot with honesty nor truth with a reply that will make sense, the responder will then speak only one word to end the endless need for truth....

Faith. It's all they have, those that believe whatever their teachers and or leaders of their own personal faith have spoken to them...

The truth scares far too many, simply reasoning why, is this all there is? For some it's too heartbreaking to believe...

[AlbertCat]

143. It's a myth....

.... don't sweat the details....