What The Adam and Eve story could mean.
If the Adam and Eve story (which I will refer to as Eden) is an allegory, is it alluding to something?, and in this day and age that 'something' can only mean one thing.
I have noted in past posts that the Adam and Eve story is similar to other ancient Mesopotamian cultures', but different too. In the Gilgemesh epic the woman seduces the man, in Eden the woman compels the man to eat forbidden fruit.
The story, as an allegory, sounds like the "forbidden fruit" means something else, but weather that is because it is alluding to sexual sin/temptation or weather it is carried over from the early epic that did deal with sexual enticement is something that needs to be considered.
I am going to assume it is not dealing with sexual sin per se but all sin. here is what I think the allegory is telling us.
Humans are great at making excuses for bad behaviour. Sure, in the olden days Judges didn't go lenient on youth because of a broken home, or poverty, but they sure blamed one group for their sins. In the Middle East of the gospels women were not only less then men, they were the tempters. The Pharasees bring Jesus a woman "caught in the act of adultery"!!!! Um, and she was alone? Of course not (rhetorical question). But she was the women in this act, and a man was considered to be easily tempted, so easily, in fact, that he wasn't really capable of saying "no", so the Pharasees are implying she is a wanton woman, or a prostitute or someone who enticed the poor man, who is just a victim of her cunning charm.
Well, maybe not entirely, but think about the East for a second. Who has to cover up - the women. Why? in order to not tempt men. Um, if a man sees a beautiful woman he is incapable of restraining himself? If a couple is caught in adultery who is going to get stoned? Never have I heard of a human rights case pleading for a man to be spared a stoning, lashing, jail sentence because he was caught in adultery (with a woman). No matter how 'right wing' and 'eye for eye' a society is, it seems the concept of a woman's charms are a guaranteed excuse for immoral behaviour.
So, back to Eden. In Eden the man and woman are completely innocent - that is, unaware of the power of sexual attraction as well as sinless. They can walk around naked, yet never fear being overcome with lust, sort of the opposite of the Bibical Jewish, and all ancient eastern, culture(s) - that would assume any young couple left to wander around naked together ought to be stoned for their sin (for a sin would surely have occurred). Adam is free from the tyranny of a Woman's charm, in the beginning.
This is where it gets tricky. Is the women then, once fallen, able to tempt Adam because she is now sexually alluring? Is she using her sexuality/femininity to win him over to herself? or her schemes - apple eating-? Or, is this a story about people in a state of innocence, unencumbered by worldly lusts just being human and sinning no matter how free from excuses they may be?
I side with the second idea - Eden is a sin-free, excuse-free setting. God is not saying people lived in a state of innocence once, he is saying IF people lived in a state of innocence, raised free from parental foibles (hence no mom or dad), societal/ cultural pressures (hence no one else around) and other's sins (hence no 'fallen' world) they would still mess up. We are sinful by nature, not nurture.
I like the fact that Eden doesn't really have a 'real' sin in the story. Eating fruit is hardly a sin, but disobedience is a sin and is actually what all sin is. So, from this analogy we all let God down (aka fall short of the Glory of God), even if God eradicated our past, scrubbed our memories and put us in a magical garden, made us as pure as the driven snow, and hung out with us every day, we would sin (and not be slow about it).
Note: This is just my opinion and could change. I can find very little in evangelical literature on what the allegory of Adam and Eve in Eden is saying, since most evangelical's take it literally or if not, debate it's veracity. I just want to learn what God is telling us through this allegory, and throwing out my own views here.
Thursday, August 26, 2010
Monday, August 9, 2010
So This Is Where it is at.
I am still not fully able to appreciate the allegorical aspects of the Garden of Eden, because of my desire to 'stay the course' on the New Testament. It is one thing to take Adam and Eve as an allegory, written for less scientifically minded types over at least three thousand (if not more millennia) years ago. All of the time I have spent attending Christian Churches, the one thing that is drilled into us is that the New Testament is the tenant of our faith. Most Evangelicals allow poetic license for old testament writers. The Psalms are poetic, Job was not a scientist (hence the world's pillars mentioned), The Israelites didn't understand the earth's orbit - so Joshua stopped the Sun to buy time. But that same poetic, free license is not given to New Testament interpretations. Of course all scripture has been translated, cultural differences are noted, but to varying degrees. What is often enshrined in our sub-culture of Evangelical Christianity is that Paul spoke directly from the mouth of God.
If Paul says.... then that must be the truth. Which is fine, to a point. Paul is almost infallible. I have heard many an evangelical comment negatively about the Catholic notion that the Pope is the continuation of the apostle Peter's work, and, due to this, he speaks infallibly when the Catholic church has it's huge once-a-century Council of Trent (or somewhere) meetings. Evangelicals know everyone is sinful and cannot be infallible. Unless that person is Paul and he is writing down something, even if it is a letter to a specific person, about a specific situation, at a specific time in history. Oh, it is never directly said, but it is implied. Just try to question whether Paul really was speaking from God, or himself of as a product of his time.
But lately I have been realizing that God never changed. He addressed Job in his world (a flat disk-shaped earth) held up by pillars (Job 9:6), the Israelites in theirs (Joshua 10:13) as stopping the Sun meant lengthening their day (something an over-tilt of the earth's axis would do - as it does in an arctic summer) and he does it again in Paul's day. Paul is subject to his own biases and world views?!? If so should we take him at face value for validity of Adam and Eve?
Here is where Paul is subject to his time and culture's understanding:
9One might even say that Levi, who collects the tenth, paid the tenth through Abraham, 10because when Melchizedek met Abraham, Levi was still in the body of his ancestor. Hebrews 7: 9 - 10
Here is what Paul means.
In Paul's time, and for millennia before babies were made in this manner. Adam, or first man, whose name varies in various cultures, was formed with all of humankind inside his testes. His sperm were tiny formed babies (hence, his seed). Inside the microscopic, fully formed Seth was an even more microscopic fully formed Enosh and inside Enosh was a tinier, yet, fully formed Kenan... all the way to Paul's day. Since Levi was a future relative of Abraham, inside Abraham was a fully formed, yet microscopic Isac and inside this tiny Isac's sperm was an even tinier Jacob who had a microscopic Levi in him when Abraham tithed to Melchizedek. This is also how Adam can bring down everyone with his sin (and not Eve, since she sinned alone, not having 'seeds' within her). (Romans 5: 12 -14, well actually verses 12 - 19).
Whew. So Paul, thinks that Adam caused humankind's fall because only Adam carried humankind in his loins. Did God know women also carried (slightly over) half of our genetic make-up? And Paul didn't get this correct, even though he (supposedly) heard each word he wrote straight from God? So if God isn't teaching his leaders scientific details, would it be safe to assume that God isn't about to challenge the one Mother/Father theory of humankind, widely held in Paul's day? Does that mean it is a fact? Not if the Old Testament is any indication.
The more I live the more I am convinced that our current focus on the New Testament being a direct quote from God is seriously flawed. Paul does speak from a prophetic. apostolic state of grace, most of the time. But not every letter of every word of every scroll is a direct quote from God Himself. Some is from God, prompted by the Holy Spirit, but some is just Paul, being Paul in his 35 (?) AD Grecco/Roman world.
Paul is busy writing to people, sometimes it is a reply to a long-lost letter, sometimes it is a response to something that he has been told about. Paul's letters are to a group of people who see the world very differently from us. In their world everyone is related to a first father. In their world men make the babies, women grow them. The point isn't how much Paul got scientifically correct, it is that he responded to the points of their letters, queries and situations correctly, of Jews and Non-Jews getting access to God (another reason why he brings up Adam and Eve rather than those sinning Isrealites in the dessert), of the poor and slaves being treated as equal, of how to manage a meeting of Christians and other important concepts that make Christianity what it is. Does it really matter if he had the concept of genetics correct, or weather he believed in a literal Adam or Eve?
If Paul says.... then that must be the truth. Which is fine, to a point. Paul is almost infallible. I have heard many an evangelical comment negatively about the Catholic notion that the Pope is the continuation of the apostle Peter's work, and, due to this, he speaks infallibly when the Catholic church has it's huge once-a-century Council of Trent (or somewhere) meetings. Evangelicals know everyone is sinful and cannot be infallible. Unless that person is Paul and he is writing down something, even if it is a letter to a specific person, about a specific situation, at a specific time in history. Oh, it is never directly said, but it is implied. Just try to question whether Paul really was speaking from God, or himself of as a product of his time.
But lately I have been realizing that God never changed. He addressed Job in his world (a flat disk-shaped earth) held up by pillars (Job 9:6), the Israelites in theirs (Joshua 10:13) as stopping the Sun meant lengthening their day (something an over-tilt of the earth's axis would do - as it does in an arctic summer) and he does it again in Paul's day. Paul is subject to his own biases and world views?!? If so should we take him at face value for validity of Adam and Eve?
Here is where Paul is subject to his time and culture's understanding:
9One might even say that Levi, who collects the tenth, paid the tenth through Abraham, 10because when Melchizedek met Abraham, Levi was still in the body of his ancestor. Hebrews 7: 9 - 10
Here is what Paul means.
In Paul's time, and for millennia before babies were made in this manner. Adam, or first man, whose name varies in various cultures, was formed with all of humankind inside his testes. His sperm were tiny formed babies (hence, his seed). Inside the microscopic, fully formed Seth was an even more microscopic fully formed Enosh and inside Enosh was a tinier, yet, fully formed Kenan... all the way to Paul's day. Since Levi was a future relative of Abraham, inside Abraham was a fully formed, yet microscopic Isac and inside this tiny Isac's sperm was an even tinier Jacob who had a microscopic Levi in him when Abraham tithed to Melchizedek. This is also how Adam can bring down everyone with his sin (and not Eve, since she sinned alone, not having 'seeds' within her). (Romans 5: 12 -14, well actually verses 12 - 19).
Whew. So Paul, thinks that Adam caused humankind's fall because only Adam carried humankind in his loins. Did God know women also carried (slightly over) half of our genetic make-up? And Paul didn't get this correct, even though he (supposedly) heard each word he wrote straight from God? So if God isn't teaching his leaders scientific details, would it be safe to assume that God isn't about to challenge the one Mother/Father theory of humankind, widely held in Paul's day? Does that mean it is a fact? Not if the Old Testament is any indication.
The more I live the more I am convinced that our current focus on the New Testament being a direct quote from God is seriously flawed. Paul does speak from a prophetic. apostolic state of grace, most of the time. But not every letter of every word of every scroll is a direct quote from God Himself. Some is from God, prompted by the Holy Spirit, but some is just Paul, being Paul in his 35 (?) AD Grecco/Roman world.
Paul is busy writing to people, sometimes it is a reply to a long-lost letter, sometimes it is a response to something that he has been told about. Paul's letters are to a group of people who see the world very differently from us. In their world everyone is related to a first father. In their world men make the babies, women grow them. The point isn't how much Paul got scientifically correct, it is that he responded to the points of their letters, queries and situations correctly, of Jews and Non-Jews getting access to God (another reason why he brings up Adam and Eve rather than those sinning Isrealites in the dessert), of the poor and slaves being treated as equal, of how to manage a meeting of Christians and other important concepts that make Christianity what it is. Does it really matter if he had the concept of genetics correct, or weather he believed in a literal Adam or Eve?
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