For this blog, what I’d like us to do is take account of the
Bible from a new perspective. What we’re going to do – as a thought experiment
– is read the Book of Genesis from the perspective of a person who has never
been told anything whatsoever about the Bible or the god therein. We’re
going to pretend that as a reasonably conscious adult, we’ve been given this
book and told that we should read it because it is the word of God, with no
further guidance or instruction. Why pursue this perspective? To illustrate
that the Bible being the word of God brings with it a need to suspend
disbelief, if not morality. I’m going to show that if the Bible were truly the
word of a deity, we might not be so interested in what this god has to say.
For the purpose of this venture, we’re going to use the King
James Version of the Bible. I know…version? Yes, remarkably there are
different versions of God’s infallible word, not that we know that God is infallible
because we’re supposing we haven’t read the Bible yet. But we’re going to open
this book to its first chapter, Genesis, and focus our attention there.
Remember that we have no preconceived notions about what we’re about to read.
Chapter
1 verse 1 reads: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, and
the earth was without form and void; and darkness was upon the face of the
deep. And the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.”
For the next 23 verses the Bible laments about how God is
forming the earth over a period of 5 ½ days. Now, we might suppose that this is
very incredible. God is forming our planet over the course of days, which
happens to fly in the face of everything scientists have figured out about
planet formation. Now perhaps the scientists are wrong. After all, earth was
formed by God, a supernatural being…we think. Unfortunately the Bible is not very
clear about who or what ‘God’ is, which would seem like a likely place the
author should start considering everything we’re about to read. Heck, we’re not
even given a reason why God created
the earth. We may be mistaken about how long a day is anyway. Truth be told,
the Bible was written well before the establishment of 24 hour days and 7 day
weeks. Perhaps then we should forgive this oversight. There’s more trouble
afoot.
Chapter 1 verse 26: “And God said, let us make man in our
image, after our likeness, etc, etc. So God created man in His own image, in
the image of God he created him, male and female He created them.”
Forgive me if this verse seems a bit peculiar. God clearly
says the words ‘in our image.’ Our.
So, is it reasonable to assume, without anyone else’s input, that there are
other gods besides the creator? The verse also states that we were created in
His image yet it is clear that God is male. Perhaps he modeled a female upon
one of His peers though perhaps He was just being creative. We don’t know.
Maybe the next chapter will clear things up.
Chapter 2 gives us a separate account of the creation of man
and woman, again for no apparent reason, except to clarify that the woman was
created from the rib of the man. This is perhaps to infer that women are
inferior to men because man came first and/or that man was needed first in
order to create women. But there is no direct implication that women are
unequal to men, yet. Meanwhile, chapter 2 goes on to tell us where Eden is – the land in
which this Adam and Eve live – and that in this land or Garden of Eden, there
exists two unique trees: the Tree of Life and the Tree of Knowledge of Good and
Evil. At this point we’re not sure what the point of God setting up things like
this is but as we’ll see in the next
chapter, this scenario will play out as being a sort of set-up.
Chapter 3 begins with a serpent, another of God’s creatures,
talking with the woman, Eve. Eve tells the serpent about the fruit from the
unique trees and that God has forbidden the couple from eating the fruit from
these trees or else they will die. The serpent (which keep in mind is just a
serpent because nothing here tells us otherwise) lies to the woman and says
that she will not die if she eats the fruit from the Tree of Knowledge. The
serpent does however tell the truth that if she eats the fruit she will have
knowledge of good and evil. Verse 6 says, “And when the woman saw that the tree
was good for food and it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to
make one wise she took of the fruit thereof and did eat, and gave unto her
husband with her and he did eat.”
Adam and Eve now know the difference between good and evil. They
have become like gods yet hide from God the next time He comes around because
they now know they are naked. Thus we conclude being naked is a bad thing,
though, if that were true why had God not clothed them from the beginning? Just
a question. So, in His anger, God smites the serpent for lying (about dying), making
him crawl on his belly forevermore, intensifies the pain of labor for the woman
and subjugates her to the husband, while the man gets off relatively easy
having to now work the land in order to eat. God finally forces the couple from
the Garden of Eden, “least (man) put forth his hand and take from the Tree of
Life, and eat and live forever.”
Let’s think about this a minute. Before eating the fruit Eve
has no knowledge of good and evil. She has no reason to suspect the serpent is
lying much less know that lying is bad because she has no knowledge of such
things before she eats the fruit.
This may have led her to become conflicted with what God said, not to eat of
that particular tree. Still, she cannot fully understand the undesirable
consequences of her actions until after
she eats the fruit regardless of God’s warning. It may be that Eve understood
something – that knowledge is desirable, though it seems God would prefer that
mankind be ignorant. Perhaps the acquisition of knowledge outweighed the
possibility of punishment in Eve’s mind. Her dilemma may have been this: Is it
better to live comfortably though remain ignorant or be wise and potentially
know uncomfortable truths? You can ask yourself that question too but remember,
there’s no guarantee that ignorance leads to a life of bliss.
Closing the door on Chapter 3, what conclusions might we
draw from the first three books of the Bible? We have learned that God made the
heavens and the earth but not why. We
see that God made the earth in 6 days and needed to rest when he was done; an
indication that God is not all-powerful. We know of course that a literal six
day creation of the Earth doesn’t mesh with what science currently understands,
raising the question of how long a day is in the Bible. [Btw, the 24 hour day
did not come into use until 4000 years ago, courtesy of the Egyptians and
Babylonians. And that is younger than the 6000 years old Bible literalists say
the earth is. We’re not supposed to know that at this point in our reading of
the Bible, but let’s say we intended on doing some research.]
We have learned as well that there are other gods besides
God, though it was a particular god who created us. We are unable to conclude
whether of not this god is good or evil when we consider the circumstances in
which his creations fail Him by eating forbidden fruit. After all, God if
nothing else set the stage for this failure in numerous ways, least of all by
creating a serpent that not only talks, but lies to people as well. We cannot
conclude that God is perfect. His creations are imperfect. Adam and Eve disobey
their creator. Do perfect creations disobey their creator? Also, if we are
curious enough to cross reference other mythologies, we’ll see that the first
few lines of the Bible are strikingly similar to Babylonian, Sumerian, and even
African creation myths. These regions are (by no coincidence one would think)
directly related to the areas in which texts of the Bible were written. Odd?
The least we learn from these first three chapters is that
God frowns upon the acquisition of knowledge. He doesn’t want you to know as
much as he does. He’d rather you prance around the Garden of Eden naked as a
jay bird. That’s very disturbing in light of the fact that there is no compelling reason given why having knowledge
of good and evil is so bad other than to spare God’s ego.
Moving on to Chapter 4 is the story of Cain and Able, the
first two children of Adam and Eve. We read and discover that Cain kills Abel
in a fit of jealousy because Cain’s ritual offering to God is not as pleasing
to God as is Abel’s offering. We can conclude that God is vain being that he
requires or at least does not refuse worship and offerings. We also see that
knowledge of good and evil and the consequences thereof do not stop Cain from
slaying Abel. When God comes along He asks Cain where his brother is, to which
Cain replies, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” Until Abel’s blood calls out to God
in the next verse, God doesn’t know where Abel is which is in contradiction to
God saying that he knows all things elsewhere in the Bible (although we haven’t
gotten there yet, but we must assume we would). So, we’re not sure if God is
all-knowing or not. Having learned of Abel’s murder, God sends Cain away with a
mark upon his head so that anyone who runs into Cain will know not to take
vengeance upon him, because...? Where these other people would come from is not
clear being that until now, only four people have been named in the Bible. I
guess Adam and Eve were actually made more in the likeness of rabbits.
The moral of the story is threefold. Work hard to please the
Lord, do not be jealous of your brother, and moreover do not commit to murder.
That’s all well and good I suppose, but as an author, this God whoever He is, is remarkably unclear in important places. While
it’s not entirely unreasonable to go searching through the Bible for clarity,
it does make it remarkably difficult to understand exactly what’s going on at
times. Though, I suppose there’s no reason our creator (according to the Bible)
should make understanding easy for us. Especially if they’re a dick.
Moving onto Chapter 5 we read with a fair amount of
skepticism that men routinely live in excess of 900 years. It’s just that as
far as modern records have shown, at best humans can only live to about 120.
Hmm, just keep that in mind for now. Chapter 6 Verse 3 goes on to say, for no
reason other than men being made of flesh, that their days shall now be limited
to 120 years. But if we are to read as far as Psalms, that chapter says the
days of men are limited to 70 years. Furthermore, many people in the Bible live
to exceed these limits, least of all right here in the Book of Genesis
following this announcement. Well c’mon now, which is it? God keeps changing
his mind. Here’s a god who is really on top of things. Further on in this
chapter we read that there were giants back in these days. Strangely enough,
the fossilized bones of giants have never been found. I don’t know about you
but I’m starting not to believe any of this.
Also in Verse 5 God suddenly turns on mankind immediately
after speaking of ‘men of renown.’ Okay, sure. In fact God repents (that is regrets) having made men upon the earth. This is
important, for it shows God to be awfully human; in a word, fallible. Forgive
me if I expect any god of mine to refrain from making such mistakes.
For the rest of Chapter 6 and continuing in Chapter 7 we
savor the story of Noah and his arc. Because we’re fair minded people we’re
going to gloss over what could be considered some absurdities. A 450 foot long
boat that houses two of every animal
on earth? Sure, why not. All the
animals boarding the boat in one day (7:13-14)? Why naturally. A worldwide
flood that at one point lasts 40 days while a few verses later it lasts 150
days? I’m a believer. How about you?
On a side note, let me ask my readers a question. Do you
like the smell of burning animals? No? I didn’t think so. But God sure does,
for at the end of Chapter 8 Noah makes an offering that is quite pleasing to
God’s nose. It smells so sweet God revisits his sense of regret, this time for
flooding the earth. Oh creator thou art very confused and primitive. Make a
decision and stand by it, please.
In Chapter 9 Verse 20-21 there are some peculiar family
affairs afoot. “And Noah began to be a husband-man and he planted a vineyard.
And he drank of the wine and was drunken, and he was uncovered in his tent.”
Noah, God’s perfect and righteous man as previously described, is a drunkard. Well,
Noah’s son Ham sees his father passes out and naked, tells his older brothers
about it, who then go in (being careful not to see their father naked) and
cover Noah up. Upon wakening, Noah curses his son Ham’s son Canaan
to be a servant unto Shem and Japheth’s sons, for nothing more than Ham
happening to see his father naked! Perhaps it would be one thing if Ham had
intentions of seeing his father naked, but that is not made clear here or even
implied. There certainly seems to be a code of justice in the Bible that
frankly I’m glad we do not currently live by. Also please note that at the end
of Chapter 9 Noah is said to have lived until he was 950 years old. But I
thought…
Skipping ahead to Chapter 11 is the story of the Tower of Babel. In this story, God is worried
that mankind may be capable of too much. As the story goes, men are erecting a
building to reach the heavens and if they succeed, nothing will be able to stop
them from any further accomplishments. Well God can’t have that. To thwart
mankind, God confuses their language so they cannot understand each other and
then spreads these men around the globe. To me, this is as if a parent were
trying to thwart the achievements of their own child. It’s as if you as a
parent were to intentional confuse your child so that they’ll never be as smart
or as accomplished as you. If I didn’t already, I’d say I were starting not to
like this god.
Believe it or not, the word of God, this Bible here, gets
more outrageous. You see, Chapter 12 tells the story of Abram, a man God is
sending off into the world and upon whom God will bestow a great nation…for
absolutely no reason we know of. In his travels, Abram enters Egypt and lies
to the locals that his wife is in fact his sister. Abram fears he would be
killed because his wife is so beautiful the Egyptians would eliminate him to
take her for themselves. Soon thereafter, Abram’s wife is taken into Pharaoh’s
court. The Pharaoh compensates Abram by giving him sheep, oxen, camels, even
servants, for the sake of his new concubine. God responds in Abrams favor by
reigning plagues on the Pharaoh’s house. Mind you, the Pharaoh didn’t know Sarai was Abram’s wife. As Pharaoh’s house
is stricken, he learns of the deception and wisely sends Abram and his wife
away. Amazingly all of this is perfectly okay with God. He sided with the liar.
Exactly who is the bad guy in this story? We don’t know. We don’t know what
wisdom this story is meant to impart. One thing we can be sure of, the morality
of God is dubious.
In Chapter 17 God changes Abram’s name to Abraham and
establishes a certain painful covenant; again for reasons we’re not privy to. In
Chapter 18-19 we witness the destruction of Sodom
and Gomorrah,
cities whose sins are not made clear
so we today might avoid their mistakes and avoid all that fire and brimstone
that will inevitably reign down from the heavens. Perhaps Sodom
and Gomorrah
could’ve helped themselves had it been a little more clear what is and what is
not a sin. Here we are reading the word of God, the Bible that up to this point
has been remarkably unclear on the issue. Although we can be sure, thanks to
Chapter 19, that offering your virgin daughters (who aren’t really virgins read
the story) to an angry mob for the protection of angels is not offensive to God.
In Chapter 22 God tests Abraham by telling him to offer up
his only son as a sacrifice to his Lord. Abraham prepares to do so only to have
God rescind the order at the last moment. I suppose the lesson here is never to
question God and you’ll be rewarded. Yet what if God hadn’t rescinded the
order? Couldn’t God find a less morbid way to test his faithful servant? What
kind of twisted deity are we dealing with here ladies and gentlemen?
Now folks, I’m not even going to mention the incestuous
story of Lot and his daughters that God
seemingly has no problem with. Nor am I going to mention the fable in which
Jacob blackmails his brother Esau into giving up his birthright; also okay with
God. And I can’t even begin to mention the rape of Dinah in Chapter 34, in
which God allows the slaughter and slavery of an entire city as retribution for
one man’s crime.
Now here we are having read the Book of Genesis. What
conclusions can we come to on our own so far? What can we infer being
reasonable people with no preconceived notions about what we read? After all,
we don’t need anyone else’s input on the matter. The word of God should be able
to speak for itself.
From the first chapter to the last we have read about a god
that is at times thoughtless, careless, confused, jealous, primitive and
savage. On the other hand God is powerful enough to have created us, the
heavens and the earth. According to the Bible we should be thankful for as much
and worship God, though, does that necessarily
mean we should care? God comes off as being something of a shallow, capricious
character. Is that worth honoring? While God may show favor towards those who
do worship him, we might be inclined to think there are other gods worth
worshipping. Remember that nowhere in Genesis does God ever claim to be the
only god.
We’ve read some fantastic stories and most of those stories
do not cast God in a positive light. Genesis has a bias against women. Whereas
few women are mentioned, even the most trivial male is called by name. You would
think that women, being the vessels of life, would play a more savory role.
Only, the most savory female role in Genesis goes to Lot’s
wife, who gets turned into a pillar of salt for her disobedience.
Being of reasonable mind, I don’t see the point of reading
any further. Thus far, we’ve read many a tale that any sensible person alive
today would consider immoral, that’s if you can get past the wholesale
absurdities lurking around every corner. Yet the Bible has survived 1700 years
and is a sacred text to millions of people today. I don’t know what’s more
frightening, how silly this book is or the fact that so many people take it
seriously.
That concludes today’s look at the Bible. Please, remember
never to simply take my word for it.
Read Genesis objectively and draw your own conclusions. Have a nice day. And God
less.
