Thursday, August 29, 2013

Adam and Eve and Everybody Everywhere

In every culture, the dominant race is seen more favorably than the rest.  This has been verified by studies that track people’s impulse reaction to pictures of people from different races with various adjectives attached to them.  In the United States, whiter people are seen more favorably than other skin tones.  Even by those with darker skin tones.  Of course, we are all equal, but it is interesting how our vision gets shaped by our environment, often unbeknownst to us.

The reality of our vision being shaped by the dominant influences in which we are immersed is true in the church as well.  There are some concepts that have been stated so loudly and proudly that many simply assume that the statements must be true.  Not only to we find ourselves trusting what the loud, proud voice says, but we also have a tendency to distrust and perhaps even feel threatened by voices that speak to the contrary.  Sometimes the line get blurred so much that we feel like our faith is on the line.

One excellent case in point has to do with the first three chapters of the first book in the Bible.  A loud and proud voice in 1895 stated that true Christians believe that the scriptures (Bible) are inerrant.  This was one of five points that came to be known as the fundamentals of Christianity.  While the movement had been growing for nearly a century at that point, it was in the early 1900’s that the word fundamentalist became part of our religious vernacular.  Fundamentalism is the foundation for Evangelicalism which has been a dominant religious and political force in the United States for a long time.

According to the fundamentals, then, if you are a true Christian, you believe that the Bible is incapable of being wrong.  Marry that idea with a Greek-oriented, Western mindset that increasingly oriented toward a truth-defined-as-facts disposition, and you have this: what the Bible says is – and has to be – literally (factually) true.  When we read the first three chapters of Genesis, then, we must believe that God created the world in seven days, created a guy named Adam and his wife, Eve, and, well, you know the story.

But what if the original writers of Genesis – and their audience – lived long before 1895, and long before the Greeks were even a thought?  Does that make any difference?  Of course it does.

I have dedicated my life’s work to be a pastor, helping people come to greater faith in God through the ups and downs of life.  The Bible is the text I use every week – I’m a big fan – I’ve read it many times.  But I think that, while their intent may have been honorable, the early Fundamentalists were simply wrong about some key issues, one of which is certainly the way they tried to keep scripture intact.  Just remember as you read on that I love the Bible, God, and am a  dedicated follower of Jesus.

But I don’t think the world was created in seven days like the Bible says.  And I don’t think there was an actual guy named Adam or a woman made from his rib named Eve.  Yet I believe the stories are true nonetheless.

Many scholars believe that the stories that we find in Genesis had been passed down through the oral tradition for centuries, and were finally compiled somewhere between 1000-600 BCE.  When those stories were put on the scroll, those who wrote them down left their fingerprints on the text.  As was common in that time, they also crafted the stories at times to address issues of their day.  The first chapter of Genesis was likely written in 600 BCE, which may conflict with what your study bibles say.  The reason there is confidence in this has to do with the priestly language that is used here and in other passages.  The author was not trying to be scientific.  He was trying to make a bold theological statement, which he certainly did.  In a world where myths were abundant about how gods created the world through their fierce battle with each other, the priestly author told a different story from the Jewish perspective.  There is only one God.  God is benevolent, blessing the creation God alone made, and when God created humanity in God’s own image, it was God’s crowing achievement.  This was a very different theological expression, and it would have certainly grabbed the attention of those who heard it.  The truth the author was trying to communicate is what I believe.  Seven literal days was not the truth he was trying to get across.  If he were asked about the literalness of his writing today, I am sure he would shake his head and say, “You have totally missed the point!”  I don’t know how God, the Creator, created.

The first chapter of Genesis was not intended to be a historical account of the beginning of life but a meditation upon the nature of being itself. – Karen Armstrong, In the Beginning: A New Interpretation of Genesis (26)

The weird thing about Genesis is that right after we read the 600 BCE version of creation in chapter one, we then find ourselves immersed in an older story of how God created everything.  In the early part of the fifth century, St. Augustine wrote and shared his doctrine of original sin – Adam and Eve’s “catastrophic fall from perfect innocence to chronic guilt” (Armstrong, 30) .  His doctrine has been one of the strongest lenses through which we view the Adam and Eve drama.  For some, the Adam and Eve story happened to set the stage for Jesus to come and rescue them (and us) from sin.  Some see Paul’s use of the story affirming such a view.  But Paul referenced Adam as a means to help some Jewish Christians see their Gentile Christians as equals because of the work of Christ.  Paul likely knew he was using the text in ways it probably had never been used before.  The question is, what did the writer of this story intend to communicate?

Arum and arumim.  The second story, written by a person who referred to God by the name Yahweh (in contrast to Elohim, the name preferred by the first story’s author), throws us right into the middle of a portrait of God very different from the first.  Humanity is created differently, and unequally.  The potential for sin is simply there with no explanation – different from the very good picture we see in the first chapter.  God isn’t in as much control, either, as a walk-talking serpent thing wanders about, and a tree exists, the fruit of which is lethal.  Our fundamental-affected eyes want to see this story as the entrance of sin into the world, but that’s not really how the author portrays it.  Rather than seeing this as a story simply for theological reflection – how do we get rid of sin? – the ancients would reflect on the story and consider the fact that sin is a reality in our world.  The knowledge that was sought was not so much an attempt to dethrone God, but to become more like the God who gave humanity life and breath.  Who doesn’t want to realize their potential?  If there is wisdom to be had, why not go for it?  The Hebrew word used for crafty is arum.  The Hebrew word used for naked is arumim.  Crafty and naked don’t seem in any way connected.  In an oral tradition, however, even though the words have different etymologies, the oral similarity would not be missed, and the connection would be made.  We are not so different than the serpent.  We have the creative capacity for revising what we’ve heard, for justifying poor choices.  And our nakedness – read vulnerability – makes us woundable.  Our innocence can be lost.  Wisdom sought for seemingly good purposes – we tell ourselves – can bite us hard.

The man and woman had acquired a new knowledge of their frailty in what was becoming an increasingly difficult world. – Karen Armstrong, In the Beginning: A New Interpretation of Genesis (39)

Here in the US, we don’t really like not being God, not being completely autonomous.  We generally don’t take well to authority.  It’s un-American!  But, as Eve learned, seeking blessing often comes with consequences. A lust for life can be an expression of rampant egotism and a desire for self-aggrandizement which takes no care for the rest of the world (Armstrong, 41).  Community broken.  Innocence lost.  Unity messed up.  Blame gaming.

Everybody sooner or later sits down to a banquet of consequences. – Robert Louis Stevenson

The original audience weren’t so much concerned with the problem of sin as much as the reality that sin is a problem.  Sin separates us from God, from each other, from the garden.  Sin leads to desert places where life is harsh.  Sin leads to loneliness.  Sin destroys intimacy and unity.  Adults would reflect on the deep implications of this story and affirm its truth.  Parents would do their best to communicate the truth of the story to their kids, helping them to realize that too many cheeseburgers will catch up with you.

The Bible makes it clear from the very beginning that it will not give neat, tidy answers to questions that simply do not admit of a simple solution.  Instead, the authors make us wrestle with the complexities of the text, and in the process we come to realize at a deeper level than before that there is no easy, straightforward path to enlightenment.  We cannot treat the Bile as a holy encyclopedia where we can look up information about the divine, because we are likely to find contradictory data in the very next chapter. – Karen Armstrong, In the Beginning, (28)

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